Extreme Weather Watch (EWW) and the Mama Sexy Fish

August 9 - 15, 2007

Thursday, August 09, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

We had much cooler temperatures last night and the wind never dropped below 15 knots. It was the best nights sleep we've had in about 3 weeks.

This morning the wind was still up and after breakfast we tackled some minor boat chores. I worked on fixing some loose lid covers on the bedroom settees and Amy terrorized the weasels with the vacuum cleaner.

Around 1 pm we upped anchor and motored down to the Volleyball Beach anchorage to be closer to the poker game tonight. When we got close to the anchorage, we found a dinghy drifting out to sea all by itself. It turned out to be Kenny and Linda's off of Lattittude and we returned it to them.

While dropping anchor we managed to suck up the painter from the dinghy into the port side engine. Shitty death! We set the anchor on one engine alone and then I had to dive over board to remove the prop and then the line from out engine. The job took twenty minutes and no permanent damage was done.

Once we put the boat to bed, we dinghied in to visit with Arlene at the Chat and Chill and to have a cheese burger for lunch. We returned to the boat around 4pm and gathered up the dirty laundry before heading up to St. Francis for laundry and poker night.

It turns out we weren't able to do laundry as their water maker is currently broken and there isn't enough fresh water to run the machines. Oh well, there is always tomorrow.

The poker game drew 10 contestants and after three hours of play it ended up with me and Speedo Ed as the final two players. It took thirty minutes or so of head to head play, but in the end I wound up on top with the thirty dollar first place prize. Ed finished second and his wife Bea finished third, so Team Joy Bells (Ed and Bea) didn't do to badly.

For the record, Amy has prohibited me from telling you where she placed.

We hung out for a beer after the game and then sang happy birthday to Bea. There was some carrot cake that Linda on Lattittude made, but since I don't eat cake or carrots, I did not partake. the cake was however reported as being quite good.

We were back on board by 9:30 and in bed by 10. Around 10:30, little wet noses reminded me that I had forgotten to put the weasels in their cage and consequently they got to spend the night in bed with us

Friday, August 10, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

I got up this morning and checked the weather and I was dismayed to see that the GFS weather model is predicting a hurricane in about 7 days. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh !!! A lot can happen between now and then, but it still makes us worry.

After breakfast and the morning running of the weasels, I fired up the sewing machine in the cockpit and fixed our spinnaker sock. It developed a 10 foot rip the last time we used it and I just now got around to fixing it. Can you say lame? I think you can.

The spinnaker sock is kind of like a big cover for the spinnaker that allows us to raise and lower the sail with a lot more control. We can fly the spinnaker without the sock, but we'd rather not have to. In any case, it's now ready to go if we ever get to sail anywhere again.

After sewing, we cleaned up the boat some and then Amy retired to our cabin to read, Mila went to bed and Milo and I hopped in the dinghy and went in to the Chat and Chill. Milo made friends with several passing tourists as well as two little lizards while we hung out under the palm trees sharing a rum drink.

Milo was much more popular then me and he got to star in five different photograph sessions. It was kind of funny to watch people taking all of these pictures and making a big fuss over an animal that isn't native to the country much less the area, but oh well, to each his own.

We returned to the mother ship around 4 pm and once the sun began to set, I fired up the grill and cooked BBQ ribs and baked potatoes.

Afterwards we read books until 9 pm when we turned in for the evening.

Saturday, August 11, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

The hurricane is still forecast to develop middle of the week and head this way, but it's still too far away to make any kind of accurate prediction at this point. Don't worry mom, we're keeping our eyes open.

I went spear fishing this morning off of one of the inside reefs. It wasn't great, but I found a small lobster condo in 20 feet that had 5 residents that I was able to evict. Looks like lobster is on the menu tonight.

Back on the boat, I put away my dive gear and then Amy had me help her launch her kayak and she paddled over to the ocean beach to yoga and swim.

While she was gone, the weasels and I set about fixing the goose neck on my wind surfer mast base plate. I think maybe this time we've got it fixed right, but I'll have to launch the board to test it out.

Amy came back around 2 pm and we ate a light lunch of grilled hot dogs. Afterwards, Amy read her book and I played video games until 6 pm when we went up to St. Francis for a Saturday night, ten dollar buy in, Texas Hold-em poker tournament.

We had 9 players and although I lost half my chips early on, I made a late game rally and ended up on top again. In the end it came down to me and Charlie (Land Fall) and although he had me 4 to 1 in chips, I proceeded to whittle away at his stack and finally busted him when I was dealt pocket aces. Top prize was 50 bucks, which covered our entry fees and our drinks for the evening as well as left us with 12 dollars to boot.

For the record, this is my 32nd win in 73 tries. Go team, go! We returned to the mother ship around 10:30 pm and turned in by 11.

Sunday, August 12, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

We continue to track the brewing tropical storm off the coast of Africa. The GFS weather model shows the depression growing to at least a class 2 hurricane and passing us to the south by a couple hundred miles. Right now, we're expecting winds up to 40 knots, but no more. Again, we'll keep an eye on it as it develops.

In other news, today we tried to do laundry, but St. Francis now has no propane, which in turn means they have no dryer, which ultimately means we didn't do laundry today.

Speaking of propane, one of our tanks ran out this morning during breakfast, so I switched us over to the back up tank and tomorrow I will drop off the empty in town to get it refilled.

After breakfast and the running of the ferrets, I worked on cleaning up the cockpit and Amy did the dishes from dinner last night and breakfast this morning. Around noon, I loaded up my gear into the dinghy and headed out to the reefs north of the harbour to look for some dinner.

I spent two hours swimming around and came home with 3 lobsters and 6 fish which after cleaning resulted in about 20 single servings worth of meals. The freezer is getting full.

After we processed our catch, we hung out in the cockpit listening to the Nascar race on the satellite radio and reading books. The weasels and I cheered when Jeff Gordon crashed all by himself on the last lap.

Dinner was bacon wrapped shrimp barbecued on the grill and served with potato wedges and fresh Margate (fish). Post dinner, we watched the second half of Domino before retiring to our cabin to read. To bed by 9 pm

Monday, August 13, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

The storm in the Atlantic continues to grow more and more organized. Around noon, NOAA named it Tropical Depression #4, which doesn't sound very threatening. Maybe they should have named it "swirling vortex of death, destruction and terror! #666" and people would take it more seriously.

Current models show the storm forming into a hurricane in a day or two and crossing just south of Hispaniola. It should be well away from us, but we're still keeping an eye on it.

Outside of storm watch, Amy did laundry today up at St. Francis and I worked on boat projects. St. Francis is still out of propane, so we brought the clean, but soggy clothes back to the boat and hung them on the lifelines to dry.

I made a trip into town and dropped off our empty propane tank. It should be ready tomorrow. While in town I picked up a toggle switch to add to the circuit of our raw water pump. I mounted it in the dish cabinet where it is readily available, yet tucked out of the way.

The reason I added this switch even though there is a dedicated circuit breaker for this circuit run, is that I wanted to be able to switch the power to the pump off at the sink rather than having to go across the boat to the master board. This way we can make sure that a hole in the water line won't flood the boat.

We hung out on board until 5:45 when we went back up to St. Francis for poker night. We had eleven players and two tables. The final three came down to me, Amy, and Michelle. In the end Michelle won, I finished second and Amy rounded out the money positions in third.

After poker, we hung out with George and Jillian (St. Francis) for an hour before returning home and turning in for the evening.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

The storm watch continues and it appears that tropical storm Dean is coming our way. This mornings GFS model shows the storm now tracking north of Hispaniola and going right over us here in Georgetown. The storm is several days out still and we're hopeful it will change course yet again.

We began making our initial storm preparations today just in case. We got out our two sand screws and made sure they are ready to go. We also began stowing the various pieces and parts of the boat that are stored on deck. Tomorrow we'll probably start taking off canvas and sails and stowing them below deck.

Around noon, we loaded up in the dinghy and headed across the harbour to Napa to try and get a new solenoid for the Mako. One of it's relays that control the lifting up and down of the engine has broken and needs to be replaced. Napa couldn't find the right part however, so I will need to order it from the states.

After Napa, we stopped by the Palm Bay Beach Club to have lunch. It was mega good and we returned to the boat full. Amy spent the remainder of the afternoon reading in our cabin and I spent the same time alternately sitting in the cockpit watching thunder storms move through the area and surfing the internet below decks.

In the early evening, we went back up to St. Francis to watch the tropical update on the weather channel. I may not have mentioned it before, but St. Francis has 8 little villa style hotel rooms on the ocean beach that they rent out. Two of these are currently rented by these really bizarre, self pretentious little French bastards.

Half way through the weather report, the evil little 11 year old child of said bastards came into the dining room carrying a live and wriggling 8 inch Lane Snapper that he wanted the chef (oddly enough named Chef) to cut up and cook for him immediately. The French bastards are obviously used to being able to order people around and they got mad when Chef said he was too busy to tend to their fish needs.

Well, the little boy was throwing a temper tantrum and the prissy mom was getting all worked up with Greg over it, so I volunteered to fillet the fish if Greg would get me a knife and a tray. Of course, Greg came back with a steak knife but I gamely went out in the dark followed by the little boy and his mom anyway.

It only took a couple of minutes to clean such a little fish, but during the entire process the little boy, to whom English is a second language, kept screaming "F**k Damn Mama Sexy Fish!" over and over again. I was trying so hard not to laugh I nearly peed myself. That must be some of that French sophistication and couth we are always hearing about.

Mama didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with the boy dropping the f-bomb at the top of his lungs even with the restaurant full of guests, which just gives me one more reason to not like the French.

Anyway, back on board our own boat, I made fried hogfish and sauteed lobster for dinner and there were no leftovers. Right after dinner, a severe storm moved through the area and drove us below for the night. To bed by 8:30

Wednesday, August 15, 2007 - Volley Ball Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

The third day of Extreme Weather Watch (XWW) continues. Today the brilliant analysts at NOAA are saying the hurricane is again going south of Hispaniola and thus we are now in the safe zone. I am sceptical and so we will continue to maintain the weather vigil.

BTW - best guess for an ETA at our location is sometime late Monday early Tuesday. Don't expect us to be moving anywhere before then.

In other news, we had a mega squall blow through last night, but fortunately the wind came from the north east where we are well protected. We had 4 hours of winds over 25 knots with various forms of rain, but in the end, the storm blew out without incident.

Around 2 am, the wind died completely and the no-see-ums (microscopic wings of death) came out en mass and we were forced to close the windows and turn on the AC to get through the night. Amy and the weasels were eternally grateful, but once the AC was on, I was unable to fall back to sleep, so I sat up from 2 until 6 watching early 1940's movies on my lap top.

The weasels decided it was time to eat as the sun came up, so the three of us massed in the kitchen and I made the crew (minus Amy) a light snack of peanut butter crackers for breakfast. Amy hadn't slept well last night until the air came on, so she slept in til after 10 am.

Around noon I went in to town and collected our propane tank. It turns out we were lucky as we were the last one to be filled before the propane supply for the all of Georgetown was depleted. I suspect this means I didn't get quite a full tank, but regardless I was asked to pay full price, which is $17 U.S. for a 10 pound tank.

I grabbed my tank and considered myself lucky as at least I didn't have to fill it myself this time. While in town, I gathered 10 gallons of fresh R.O water and $40 worth of groceries from the market. I also bought two new tupperware style containers to brew our sun tea.

I forgot to mention that our previous tea brew device was lost over board two days ago when an inconsiderate rental skiff waked us in the anchorage doing thirty knots. Amy had set the tea container out on one of our rear steps to make sure it had access to plenty of sunlight, but when the 4 foot wake rocked us side to side, the brew container must have fallen overboard and disappeared into the harbour.

Consequently, the two new containers I brought home today were fitted with safety ties, emergency floatation devices and EPIRBS. We won't be losing any more tea on my watch.

Hey, I just realized, that's almost like having our own Boston Tea Party, Bahamian style. "I ain't gonna pay no more fooking taxes on dis here tea mon!" Rock on my brothers.

After we stowed things from my trip in to town, Amy launched her kayak and went for a paddle while I installed a second 12 volt DC fan over our berth up front. We now have dueling fans and I predict we will be able to keep much more air moving through our cabin when it is hot and humid like last night.

Post fan installation, I re-installed my secondary propane tank and then spent the rest of the afternoon alternatively swimming off the back of the boat and reading a book in the shade of the cockpit sun screen.

As a side note, through out the day I heard several VHF radio calls made in a very poor imitation French accent and all any of them had to say was "F**k damn Mama sexy fish!"

Anyhow, around 7 pm we fired up the grill and cooked a stuffed lobster filet mignon with french fries and a simple green salad. Given the current Exuma market prices, I valued tonight's dinner at 75 to 80 dollars for the two of us (if you bought the food here). Thank God for our smuggled beef supplies and our laser guided, lobster homing spear.

The wind is supposed to be up tomorrow, so before dark I launched my wind surfer in anticipation of being able to catch some wind in the morning. We had the 9 pm running of the weasels and then turned in for the night.