SURROUNDED BY MEGA SOMETHING......

When you get up in the morning and you survey the scene outside from deck level, the first thing that hits you is beauty of the morning and the freedom of everything. You check out your neighbours, you see whose's come and gone during the night. You check the sky and the nearness and likelyness of rain. You check how the coffee-pot is doing on the stove down below, and you realise that every look and smell and taste is heightened. You are in MEGA LAND, where each new day brings you choices. ........... " and so what shall we do today". This one is easy. The Honda generator will not run and after stripping the carburretor down several times, it is necessary to take it to the Honda guy in Marsh Harbor. A trip of about 20 miles both ways. We come past the Mega Yacht " Gallant Lady", owned by JM Family trust,(above right), who are the Florida franchise holder for TOYOTA, and who each summer places all of the yachts at Guana Cay for the use of his employees. Swimming, snorkelling, deep-sea fishing and some fun in the sun. There are several more sportsfishermens' vessels anchored nearby that make up the "Gallant Lady" flotilla. ............... Mr Jim Moran, the founder passed away last year. My kind of 'boss'..............Back to the generator, turns out the last lot of gasoline bought for the generator was contaminated with diesel................so now we know. Fifty bucks later, it works fine again.



One of the hallmarks of the Caribbean is color and all the cottages in various settlements are brightly coloured, although these three are really distinctive.



These are "conch fritters".............. want to taste some.........
And these are TOYOTA hoods (bonnets) used as crayfish traps....(Don't tell Jim Moran).



The smiling face belongs to Corina, my niece, my sister's one and only, who is now officially eight months pregnant. Despite the heat, the motion on the ocean, and the wherewithall of having to end the adventure on "SVEA", she remains incredibly buoyant(literally) and hyper-active. Corina and Joel will both return to Australia in a week's time to begin the next adventure of 'motherhood', so every opportunity to swim and snorkel or to do another dinghy ride is grabbed with MEGA enthusiasm.



The four of us explored another sunken wreck. The 'baby' bulldozer was off-loaded before it sank, not that it got very far. Father-to-be Joel, in full hunter/gatherer regalia is out fighting for tonight's dinner. If all else fails we will pull out another macaroni and cheese from under the bunk.



Now here is a really posy picture of the "Queen", but there is a reason for this. One would think that in making a new "Welcome" sign, the citizens would take the opportunity to call it "OLD PLYMOUTH" instead of "NEW PLYMOUTH". It is not like anyone who was there in 1786 is still around to object....... then again, if you changed the name someone is bound to ask "What happened to New Plymouth?" The poinciana trees continue to amaze us. Magnificent trosses of brilliant red flowers. Memories of the purple Jacarandas in Australia. Roadways and avenues turning purple overnight, with the same brilliance as these poincianas.



You can be sailing or motoring along in crystal clear conditions and within ten minutes the sky changes, it suddenly becomes black as night with laden evaporative moisture and down it pours in buckets. These changes are so sudden that even when we go ashore, the whole time your eye is on the sky. We have had a downpour on one side of the boat and bone dry on the other. Well,....bone-dry would be a bit of a stretch. Nothing in the tropics is bone dry, ever........ Speaking of Australia, the MEGA YACHT "Prima Donna" (photo below) came into our anchorage. The captain and crew were all Aussies. Father, son and nephew as crew. The captain said it wasn't 'nepotism' or anything like that, it is just that,.... we work well together...... The vessel operates as a luxury charter yacht. Strung out in the dying sunlight behind the yacht are the jet-skis and the other 'toys', and attached to the back is a lift/hoist boom for the toys, with a kayak (paddle-ski) and not a rocket launcher. Australia is a really peaceful country, with hard to find cuddly koalas, that sleep 23 hours a day and then pee on your shirt when you hold them.



We saw the MEGA Sailing Yacht "P2" again, and this time up close, real close, more later...... Got to go.... close the hatches, here it comes........................