Well this day started out ..... Interesting. Woke up to a heavily pitching boat. This ain't no cruise ship kids. It's only 360 feet. When it's rough out ... You feel it. So far though I am one of the few without the seasick patch. Rocking doesn't seem to bother me all that much.
Our sail from St
. Maarten to Anguilla took us 23 nautical miles last night.
Anguilla (pronounced an-gwil-ah) is a British overseas territory in the Caribbean, It is one of the most northerly of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles, lying east of Peurto Rico and the Virgin Islands, and directly north of St. Maarten. It has a population of around 15,000 people. For more about Anguilla: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anguilla.
Ok ... cut to boat scene in .... 3 ..... 2 ..... 1 ......
Had breakfast and then went up on deck and photographed a little bit. Then hung out up front as we approached Angiilla. Again .... Freaking spectacular.
At 10 am they conducted another lifeboat drill sans the life vests this time. After that, they had announcements and the crew was introduced to everyone. That was held in the bar area on the top deck. It was quite hot and stuffy
.
Now the next part is 1/2 memory 1/2 people telling me what happened .....
I got really clammy really quickly. I reached out and grabbed Heathers' shoulder and she took off into the air. When she did that my hand, still on her shoulder stretched out with her ... Her pink shirt became a spinny sort of trippy tunnel. Next thing I know I'm sitting on the deck. With Heather, Chris, fellow cruiser and new found buddy Phil and several other people asking me if I could speak and to say something. I recognized Chris and Heather but Phil I was like who is this guy and why is he holding my hand?
.. and then I oddly remembered that scene from Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, when Steve Martin and John Candy woke up in the motel room snuggling .....
"Where's your other hand? Between 2 pillows .... Those aren't pillows !!!" ....
Sorry
.... Movie reference side street ....
Anyway.... Just hit the deck. Literally. But they checked me out and I was fine. Probably too many spirits follows by too little water. After I got some fluids in me, and the medical officer checked me out to make sure it wasn't anything more serious than poor choices, I was ready to put this embarrassing experience behind me and get this vacation kicking
The super rough ferry into the island was fun. I think I'm good on the whole seasick thing. If I survived that? I think I can handle this for a week.
Let me try to explain taking the tender to shore.
Imagine being on one of those hard shelled life boats rocking and rolling you all over the place, and then having to get off that bronco ride and onto a smaller boat. One of those rubber rafts like the SEAL teams use when they're storming shores
. Zodiacs. I think they're called zodiacs. So you take that about 100 yards and try to to get off that with all your stuff clutched in your saltwater drenched terrified hands, only to stumble most ungraciously into waist high water .... And then blissfully on to the shore .....
Ok .... Maybe embellishing the experience a bit but it was indeed a dance of the drunky plum cruisers .....
Once on the beach though, the sand was white, the water was blue, and life .... Well life was good.
A few clouds in the sky but not many.
They have a beach bar there called The Dunes Preserve. Very unique island bar. Owned by Reggae musician Bankie Banks. Live music, cold fruity drinks, and it appears that weed is either legal or the law is just not enforced because the local crowd was making a cloud. The pictures are cool, but you can't hear or smell a picture. It definitely added that island, reggae feel to it. Bankie jamming a little helped. We hung out at The Dune Preserve for several hours.
Todd came up and did a couple of blues songs for us, and this was our first introduction to blues musician Nic Clark. That was indeed a treat.
The only thing I really didn't like about the whole place was they had a monkey named "Frisky" chained up in the back you could have your picture taken with for $5
.00. You could tell poor Frisky was not a fan of captivity at all .....
Seriously? Free the damn monkey .....
Besides loving their music, these guys hang out with their fans like this is just a cruise everyone was in together, which ... durrrr ... it is. But how many people get to cruise with a band they love on a level like this??? Good luck trying to get Aerosmith or Morley Crue on a 170 passenger sailboat with their fans. Sheesh ... just the thought of that terrifies me.
Great guys all of them. Very humble and appreciative of their fan base. But we're appreciative of them too so .... Funny how that works out.
Caught the rocky tender back to the boat. I'm still solid. Haven't fainted again :-)
At 5pm the band hosted a party for the cruisers.we got treated to an amazingly intimate performance on the top deck
. Todd formally introduced us to Nic. An 18 year old harmonica player who is just an amazingly gifted young man. Todd opened with "This Land is your Land" and everyone ended up singing along. He then played several tribute songs he wrote to blues musicians that have passed. He ended with a song off their new CD "I feel smooth." I was able to video about half the performance before my stupid phone ran out of space.
While this was all going on, the ship set sail for tomorrow's destination, Virgin Gorda. It was rough seas. This ship was a rockin'. On many levels.
So after the Cocktail party we just kind of hung out on the top deck and watched the sun set and laughed and chatted with all of our new friends.
Around 7:30 we headed to dinner. I came down to the cabin to put my nice new bamboo shirt on. As I was coming up the stairs to the dining room I see Heather so that was great timing as they were just being seated
..... At the same table with none other than the man himself. The Blues extraordinaire ..... Mr. Todd Park Mohr, and Millie.
Now, one would think there would be ..... I dunno a sort of musician\fan dynamic going on but nope ... Not with these guys. Just 6 people having dinner, telling stories, and laughing together. Granted we asked most of the questions, but I think that's probably suspected. Arrogant rock stars can suck it, and should probably take a lesson from these guys. Dinner was, I'm guessing, a highlight moment. I was going to ask for a photo op after dinner but decided against it.
I wanted that to be what it was. Dinner with a very nice couple we met on a Caribbean cruise.
After dinner we went into the piano bar and played a round of Cards Against Humanity. A great was to gauge how twisted your friends and loved ones are ....
10:30 pm was bedtime for me. The boat was in mid ocean and boy were we ever rocking and rolling tonight. In spite of that I was beat tired so sleep came early.
Awoke around 12:30 and Heather was not in bed yet. Couldn't fall back asleep so I decided to take a stroll topside. Found my girl in the bar area just dancing and having an awesome time. Lindsey walks up to and is just "Dave ... Your wife is just the best." As with everywhere ... Everyone just loves Sweesy
. It was sooooo good seeing her relaxed and letting loose a little. She's been so stressed, and getting to see her just unwind .... Priceless.
Stress is about 1000 nautical miles away from us ..... or as I keep saying "This is far far away from sucking."
Day 2, in spite of me passing out, tripping, falling in the hall, smashing my head into a wall as I bent down to pick up something, and smashing my thumb in the bathroom door .... Was a great success!! My favorite picture to date of the gorgeous Miss Heather and I was taken today. It'll be my profile pic for awhile, and if you know me, you know that's a big deal because I change profile pics like politicians change stances.
I'm starting to think losing a limb wouldn't even affect this trip .... Let's not test that theory out.
Day 2 - Anguilla
Sunday, March 15, 2015
Anguilla, Anguilla
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2025-02-15