The sea had been choppy and the wind gusting up to 30 knots intermittently yesterday, it seemed to dislodge the anchor, twice, so we had to plant it again, each time carefully setting the anchor drag alarm and monitoring our tracks on the GPS to establish whether we had dug in.  “We really are stuck in this time, hopefully”. (The second time we appeared to have picked up a length of rusty old chain.  Interesting.) 

Once satisfied that we weren’t on the move, we watched a great big rust bucket, ex car ferry park behind us then splashed over the bouncy little waves across to the nearest restaurant we could find, the Buccaneers Bar, wrapped in cagoules to keep out the worst of the wet.  The Bar could have been anywhere in the US with serving staff speaking in US accents, not understanding us because we were speaking British, the menu a choice of all American barbeque favourites.  “When in Rome”, so our choice was burger and fries and steak and fries served on plastic plates with plastic cutlery as if we were on an aeroplane and might hijack the chef with sharpened knives.  At least they served Carib beer to give us some sense of place.

On our return, heralded by the ever faithful Roxanne because the Christmas Tree had run out of puff competing with the mega watt yachts, we settled to sleep fitfully with the noisy planes, rolling motion and creaks and groans.  Bob couldn’t stand one incessant irritant where the bimini had untied itself and was flapping and jerking noisily so got up at 5:30am to stop it.  Arriving on deck it appeared that we had quietly crept right by the rust bucket during the night, miraculously without making contact, the anchor had dragged again somewhat spectacularly. The captain’s mate was rudely roused from her bunk, dazed but quick to understand an emergency, and as soon as dawn broke we had yet another go at parking.  “We really are stuck in this time, hopefully” we said with a deja vu feeling.

Later in the day, at a more civilised hour, we set off for Water Island World in search of spares including an oar which had mysteriously disappeared, probably eloping with the kill cord that disappeared at about the same time, and yet another dinghy bailer which had washed away during the turning turtle incident.  We were also required to buy an in date flare just to keep the authorities happy.  Off we went with just one oar, the outboard sounding a bit spluttery and finally conking out in the middle of all the solemnly lined up mega watt yachts in then lagoon.  The international distress signal worked a treat and we got a tow in to Water Island World from a nice American man who had shaking hands and couldn’t tie knots, probably unconnected. At this moment it chose to start to rain, a typical tropical shower. 

Island Water World were most kind and helpful and Sean arranged for a cheerful, Christmas song singing, Randy to clean out the carburettor, check the spark plugs and install a fuel filter.  We thanked them profusely and set off on our mission of purchasing a replacement Kindle from a shop across the lagoon.  The outboard conked out again but we managed to limp to the dinghy dock, bought Bob a Paper White Kindle and headed back to WIW for further assistance when the heavens chose to open and a monsoon of rain descended.  Sean and Randy were out to lunch and It continued to pour with thunder thrown in for good effect.  Eventually we made contact with Sean, handed over and headed for a bite to eat, splashing ankle deep along the road, ending up at a rather nice bar, La Lagunieres.  Soaked through we tucked into some delicious hot food, hot coffee, and beer of course, having to keep to the dry half of the bar as it hurled even more thundery rain down, before returning once more to WIW via a handy supermarket, also run by a Chinese family.  After a long, long wait while Randy emptied and refilled the fuel tank in case there was water in it, we left, cold, wet and rather “down in the mouth” and puttered back still getting even more wet.  I persuaded a deflated and soggy Bob to drop in to the visit the fat and surly immigration people to check out, thence we battled through the elements back to the sanctuary of Windy who fortunately was still in the same place.  We will chill this evening watching the lightning that continues to flash, rather prettily actually, and rumble around us, with a very large, gin and tonic whilst keeping an eye out that we “really are stuck in this time”.