Saturday 30 May,  2015

St George's Harbour 32 22.8N  64 40.5W

Today's Blog by Richard  (Time zone: BST -4.0; UTC -4.0)

It’ssssssssssssss a loty of fun tyyyping thesssssssssse blogs with a keyboard sssssssssuffering from a ssssssssssurfeit of Coka Cola. Some of the keys stick (some predictably and some at random) and the author is wise not to use the “Tab” key as the screen whizzes interminably through the open screens! Careful proof reading is required.

We have stayed in Bermuda rather longer than we would have liked due to an unusual weather system. If we had left before now, we would have spent days with an uncomfortable thrash to windward, and gentlemen don’t do that, if it is avoidable. As you would expect, we have used this time wisely.

On Monday, we sailed to the capital, Hamilton, and moored at the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club. Getting into the berth with a strong onshore wind had its challenges, but David swung in and parked, like it was his Aston Martin into an NCP. (Getting off the berth is more of a challenge, of which more later). On the way in, we saw Drumbeat, in which Prince Philip has some sort of interest, and the only yacht larger than Serendipity in Hamilton.

Although Hamilton is the commercial centre of Bermuda, it retains a similar Toytown aspect to St George’s. Look at the clock tower on the City Hall which Terry noted had a sailing vessel for its wind vane and the “clock” shows wind direction.

We arrived on the day of the Bermuda Day Parade. It’s a very jolly occasion and the whole town is out lining the streets. People start marking their vantage points at 5am and some bring tables of hot food, drinks etc. All sorts of groups participate in elaborate costumes – we were impressed they could last the course in the heat of the day but they had girls spraying them with cold water along the way. They included a motor cycle rally, Rifle and Drill Regiment march and (top right) a parade by the people of the Azores where, of course, we are bound next.

There was also a parade of beauty queens which we thought our readers would like to see:

You can guess which is our favourite!!

The following day, Peter, Terry and I went on the ferry to see the Royal Naval Dockyard (David was waiting on a mechanic). It is certainly picturesque……..

….but highly commercialised. The cruise ships dock here and the place is full of morbidly obese Americans, many of which have great difficulty walking. Terry overheard a wonderful conversation which went thus:

Martha: Mabel, are you planning to walk back to the cruise ship? (the cruise ship being a couple of hundred yards away)

Mabel: Hell No, Martha, I’m gonna take the train!

Or they could have taken the bus:

The next America’s Cup challenge takes place in Bermudan waters and we were lucky enough to catch sight of Oracle and Artemis which are carrying out sea trials at the moment.

We decided that three days in Hamilton was enough and we should return to St George’s. But how were we going to leave the marina when pinned to a harbour wall by 30 knots of wind, only being held off by forward and aft lines tied to buoys? The action of such a wind on the boat is to turn its bow downwind i.e. into the wall. It was going to be a challenge to do it on our own and the marina manager came by to help pull the bow off with his RIB. Actually, David was doing quite nicely on his own until the bow thruster overheated and tripped off so we were grateful for the added help. We had a similar issue yesterday when mooring at the fuel dock. Another Oyster from the World Rally,Yantina, offered us much-needed help by holding the bow off with their tender while David expertly reversed into the small space available.

Much of yesterday was spent servicing the winches (as Lynn says, “you know how to have fun”) so, subject to checking out with Customs, latest weather and, of course, emptying and restowing the lazarette, we are ready to head for the Azores. And we have the Frog safely back!