SAILOR VEE .......

The winds have suddenly changed to the south-east and brought with them lots of rain ....... Rain, rain and more rain, so much so, that you can forget what we said about ANTIGUA being a dry island ............ The only bit of real sunshine of late has been the return of the " QUEEN OF FLORIDA AND THE BAHAMAS ", who has had three wonderful weeks with her expectant daughter and seeing some of her friends in Jacksonville, Florida ............ That same south-east wind has brought lots of French yachts to Antigua from Guadeloupe and Martinique to the south of us, most of whom call out to us in fluent French that always ends with "Sailor Vee" ....... I wish them well from "Sailor Vee", to which they again reply with " Sailor vee, Qui, qui " ...............

I did ask Laurie to bring back some additional navigation charts and she has dutifully complied .......... She says they are " colourful, stretchy, flexi and waterproof " .............. Arriving at the airport the 'Queen' certainly was hungry and we drove straight to St. Johns to get a 'king roti' ...... This a mixture of chicken and potato in curried sauce, wrapped in an envelope ............ Delicious ...... They no longer serve food on the flights but they do manage to loose your luggage ....... Retrieved two days later, all intact, but thoroughly inspected by the TSA ........ Wonder what they thought of our stretchy, flexi 'charts' ........



She was also able to catch up with Esther Robinson, the Secretary of Lauren's former Division in the School Board, that dealt with Exceptional Student Education ..... They have been friends and colleagues for more than twenty years ............ Two exceptional people ...



But here are three really exceptional people ........... The Queen's daughter, Lauren Anne Shiver, that little baby girl that's definitely on the way, and hubby Tony Shiver, listening to that brand new heart-beat ........



And driving back from the airport we finally caught a glimpse of one of those huge cast-iron cauldrons used during the colonial sugar plantation days, for boiling the cane syrup to make sugar .............. And to make delicious rum ........... Amazing what happens when someone clears the undergrowth ...........



The French are masters at making aluminum yachts (that's Aluminium if you're from down-under) .................... This one has no visible keel but probably has folding keels tucked away inside and rounded edges and some clever solar panels that act as sunshades and window protection at the same time .............



Boatyards, like this one at Jolly Harbour in Antigua, have a number of contractors that specialize in most marine fields ........ Everything from woodwork to machine engineering, and John Bryson of the schooner " AMOEBA " has visited them all ..... John and family have now spent two months tied to a dock while coming to terms with replacing their engine ............ An ordeal that no-one would want to do ...... Their engine, a new Perkins 85 HP motor, was finally shipped from Virginia, USA, and sent to Antigua .........



You might say there were boatloads of 'spectators' ..............



We mean, how beautiful is that ................ Straight out of the box .....



A forklift to drop it inside the hull after John had first cut out a sizeable part of the cabin-top ............ And every day there are meals to be cooked for the crew and other jobs to be done, as we lend moral support in small doses ........ Stretching it out for this incredible ordeal .....



First a whole new mounting frame has to be built to allow for the different heights of the new engine mounting brackets ............ It all looks so easy, but then .... It isn't ............ Back and forth to the workshop for re-welding .....



And every evening calls for some sort of celebration, because bit by bit, they are making progress ........



The crew of "ARITA" presented those wonderful people on "AMOEBA" with a set of hand-painted wine glasses to commemorate " THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY " of the new engine installation .......



The engine in, the cut-out now back in it's place and caulked shut and waterproof, and a new coat of paint over the cabin-top ......... Just in time for the two ladies to go shopping for tonight's celebratory meal ........... Tomorrow will be time to connect the propellor shaft and think about exhaust pipes and water connection lines .... Hey, they just keep plugging away at the problem, day by day ..........



Despite the fact that ANTIGUA is only a small island in the Caribbean, it is still possible to get an awful lot of technical things done ............ Provided you work in "Island time" ....... The rules are different ......... And the largest structure downtown and on the island is .......... A cruise ship ....... You can even park on the wrong side of the road, blatantly, and get away with it ....... Or as the French would no doubt say ..... " C'est la vie ...." ........There you have it " Sailor Vee " .............