Underway for the Bahamas

Saturday, May 11, 2013

On Saturday I took Mercy-dog to Marathon to the vet for her Bahamian health certificate, and then to Publix to pick up my list of perishables.

As I came out of the store, an employee called out to me, and asked "Is this yours?" referring to a cantaloupe that had rolled off the bottom of the cart, unseen by me. When I stopped, the second one rolled off. Why would a bagger put bowling balls on the bottom of a cart with no lip? 

When I got to the truck, I motioned Mercy-dog up as I put groceries behind the seat of the truck. She just stood there. I usually don't allow her on the driver's seat, and keep the other seats covered. I looked at her, reassured her, and ordered her up. When I got the groceries loaded, I looked, and she had laid a tomato on the seat besider her. Hmmm. I didn't buy that kind of tomatos. I don't know if she had picked it up off the ground in the store, and had been carrying it that long (shop lifting dog?) or just where she grabbed it... the only place our walk paused was when the employee had called to us. The nice thing about good bird dogs is their tender mouth. So, I ended up with an extra, intact tomato.

As we were loading, Bob came by with a bag of mangos. I love mangos!!

I got underway to anchor in Newfound Harbour, just out from the house. I knew that when I woke up early on Sunday, I would be chomping at the bit if I had to wait on the tide.

Dick and Peggy ran out in the 19' Whaler to pick me up after I got anchored, so I did not have to tow the Whaler out on a week-end zoo day... when there is a lot of boat traffic in our narrow canal. (Thanks guys!) I finished closing up the house, and went back to the MERCY and began stowing some items for sea.

By 10pm, the wind had dropped to slick calm, a little earlier than I had expected, and it took all my rational self control to not get underway while the Stream would be nice. I knew that I had a 20 hour window on the trip with no sleep, so I went to bed.