Wednesday, March 7, 2012

March 3, 2012.

I had to sit and ponder just how to start this post. Down here most people leave their VHF on 24 / 7. It's just the prudent thing to do in case of a night time emergency. We're remote enough that there’s not really any radio chatter, especially at night. Unless of course Arctic Racer is within 25 miles.

Arctic Racer is one of 5 Canadian boats that stopped here briefly on their way to Cuba. He spent the better part of 3 days yammering away on the VHF. Morning, noon and night. He called folks at 0630 just to tell them he'd be moving down near them. Is that really important at 0630? I'm thinking “SHUT THE FUCK UP, ITS 0630, PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO SLEEP HERE”. You might be able to tell that I'm not a morning person but Jesus, 0630. The next day, at 0600 he called somebody who was underway to inquire about sea state. The Allies landed at Normandy with less radio chatter than this blabbermouth puts out in an hour. If you say anything to him he thinks you're teasing.....I'm serious here f@#kwit.

He'd never been here before and when people came into the anchorage he was advising them where to anchor and then chastizing them when hes ignored. A control freak with a VHF is an annoying combination. Fortunately they're few and far between. But enough of that.

The French are here. Not too many French Canadian boats come down through the Jumentos. We've had reports from friends in Georgetown that the petty bullshit between the French and English speaking boats is worse than ever. “Bedlam” and “Mayhem” were used in two independent reports. Its all very “high school” and just another good reason to skip Gtown.

At an evening beach function I was talking to one of the French Canadian women when she said “I can't believe how nice everyone has been to us down here”. It kinda drove home how uncomfortable the hostility between the French & English up in Georgetown must be for them too. Over the course of the next two days we sent them hiking on our favorite trails and told them where to take take their kids snorkeling. We even did some hunting together and gathered a few coconuts. They were fun and I hope to run into them again. As a bonus, I think that I'm now eligible for diplomatic plates for my dinghy.

The Canadians left for Cuba so there’s only 8 boats left in the Jumentos. Seven of them are here with us at Hog Cay hiding from a week of ridiculous wind. Once again the wind is predominantly from the east. Its Tuesday night and the wind is 30 knots gusting to 40 with rain squalls.

We knew we were in for a week with
no water sports so we did jump in the water and grab nine more bugs, a small Nassau Grouper and a Red Hind.

Alpha Mike 1, Crabby Bastard, Beast, Diplomat standing by....

7 comments:

Unknown said...

If you didn't have other friends there to wake up you could have blasted the air horn at the bastard around 5:00 am. It's amazing how some people have no regards for other people. From your sign off aliases it sounds like you may have sent him off with something to think about. I hope so. Be safe. Hey when are you guys heading back and are you coming through the Exumas?

S/V Veranda said...

At the moment the plan has us making the run up the west side of Great Exuma straight to the Black Point area. Probably in about 8 to 10 days from now.....

TJ said...

French speaking and English speaking boats don't like each other? One of the reasons I hope to leave the land behind soon is to escape just that kind of petty bullshit...but I guess people will be people no matter where they go.

100,000 years from now some truly intelligent beings are going to dig up remnant bits of our civilization and say, "That species of ape built some interesting tools, learned a few things about the cosmos, but never did grow very wise. Too bad for them, they could have been a contender."

S/V Veranda said...

Its a weird dynamic. Whenever we've been with 1 or 2 French boats we've always had a good time. As soon as theres a crowd of each the division just "happens". In a place as crowded as Georgetown the polarization gets tiresome to deal with.

Unknown said...

We are moving down to Sampson Cay today and then down to Black point over the weekend and then to Big Majors. We would love to meet you guys when you are in Black Point if our paths cross.

We love reading about your adventures on your blog. I can always count on a big laugh when I read your post.

Great Job. Don't ever stop.

Gremlins Hammer said...

Like your blog- just stumbled across it recently. Thanks for posting this- very amusing story and gave us a good giggle... although I'm sure you didn't think that at 0630... Looking forward reading more! -Gremlin's Hammer

S/V Veranda said...

Thank you for the kind words. GREAT boat name by the way....