2010.02.15

We woke up to a nice Valentine’s day greeting from Cindy…We had a very pleasant evening on board, I had bought a couple of lobster tails (actually they are craw fish as they have no claws) …I wanted to steam them, as I felt it would be a good way for them to retain all their natural flavour, but do not possess a steamer on board.. So I got creative, took an aluminum pie plate, punched a bunch of holes in it and put it in a pan over an inverted plate et voila steamer.

I also very often go on the net for recipe ideas or cooking tips and I picked up a very good one, insert a skewer along the tail so it will not curl during the cooking process, I used a couple of chop sticks cut down to size and it worked very well. They were delicious with just some melted butter and lemon juice …we could really taste their natural sweetness….enough I am getting hungry again and it’s only 0800!!!!!
Sorry no pics of the finished product....we were too busy savouring them.
We had nice romantic old fart music, the sound tracks of “Sleepless in Seattle” ( my all time favourite) and a new (to us) one, “Space Cowboys” (compliments of India Summer). A very nice evening which did not break the bank or should I say was within our retiree budget!

We are in the red part (40-50 knots)!!!

A couple of night ago we had a big front going through… we’ve had one Norther after another this year but this one had gale force winds (40 - 50 knots = 75 -90 km/h) and the whole anchorage was battening down in preparation for it. It did howl, but Hope Town is like a hurricane hole, Soli was well and solid on her mooring and she is a very comfortable boat so we felt minimal movement, the only thing we thought we had lost was a cover to our forward hatch, David found it later, it had lodged itself around a jerry can on deck. We are listening to the net this morning and it is like a lost and found program, which is very nice…cruisers are being reunited with their possessions that flew away.

David's idea of Yoga!!!!
Last week we spent a morning doing maintenance on “Miss Beke” (our Westerbeke diesel engine) …she was spoiled with nice fresh oil, filters, zincs etc…we do a neat job of this, I still remember the first time David and Andre changed the oil in the engines …I’ll have to find the picture of that mess!!! Afterward we walked down to the Abaco Inn for lunch with Jim and Barb (Skat)

David with the help of Steve tried AGAIN to tighten the bolt that tightens our compressor belt for the engine drive refrigeration, this bold has been retightened several times this season, professionally and by the buddies….this time they put on a locking nut and we thought it was all good but this morning when we ran it the familiar squeal started again!!!! Can’t think of what else to do.

                                                             The language between these two was very interesting!!!!

I won’t bore you with the saga of our propane tank as it is ongoing and am sure will be resolved to everyone’s satisfaction…..just to say that life on a cruising sailboat is never without a dull moment (even when we are not sailing…or maybe especially because we are not sailing)

On Friday a whole gang of us went for a walk down to the Sugar Shack for ice cream, where we met more friends and a dozen of us walked back to the dock, where we met JP and Marie Francoise who had just bought lobsters from the fisherman for Valentine’s day…now you know where I got that idea!!!

I stayed clear of my killer coconut tree and we all ran into Ruddy Malone who thinks he is retired from working at Hope Town Marina.

We are thinking of going to Marsh Harbour on Wednesday as there is ANOTHER front expected tomorrow. I would not dare complain, even though I did wear socks yesterday!!!! . This weird weather has been all over… my Dad tells me they had 10 cms of SNOW in Villefranche (French Riviera) and it all turned to ice, needless to say the whole area was paralyzed and Danielle reported snow and more snow in Ste. Consorce (Lyon area) and off course the whole East coast of the US….Baltimore airport was closed for several days with over 40 inches of snow in a couple of days.

Talk to you later.

A few more pics

David still has this this wonderful ability to power nap anywhere, anytime....here he is waiting for me while I shop for groceries.

Ooops... I think I lost myself for a minute!!!!

Skyping with CJ

It works better from computer to computer than to land lines...
 

Some local weeds!!!!

Carol & Simon visiting.