This is a gorgeous spot. Too bad it’s just a stopover for us. Looks like it would be fun to explore. Oh well, not this year, we’re on a mission to get to Nairai Island while the weather’s favorable (which it should be starting tomorrow).

Speaking of which-we left Cousteau this morning in rainy squalls. It’ the price we sometimes pay to stage for a destination where we want to spend some time. Sucking it up a bit today means we’ll have an extra day or two of good weather at Nairai. We sailed 30 miles today, and we have 40 to go, tomorrow.

Our sail today was 7 hours. Besides the rain it was squally gusting between 20 and 30 knots with 5 foot seas. Early on we had a good wind direction. Beam reach. With double reefed main, jib and stays’l we were storming along at 7.5 plus knots. BUT, later in the morning, it got windier and it headed us until we were 50 degrees. That’s about as close to the wind as we get sail in those kind of seas, and we had to furl the jib. Too much wind. So most of the day was under triple reef main and stays’l doing more like 5 knots. We had to tack a few times to make it here. Not the best, but when the sun peeked through and the sea turned blue, it was glorious!

So, here we are. We got in with time to put away the boat, take a shower (with the teapot of couse) and have a Charisma. Now Ann has graciously offered to cook dinner tonight. Right now she’s making a lot of grumbling noises from the galley. She has very nicely offered to make her eggplant parmigiana tonight, but sometimes that can be scary. The sounds that is. There’s a lot of swearing going on. Ann’s a real sailor now you know, so swearing is part of dinner if she cooks.

Anyway, that’s our report from paradise for today.

Summary: Long windy sail with Ann swearing a blue streak in the galley and Bob hiding out in the cockpit writing the blog.