Drunken night at the Bar!

So, hard work and exhaustion often lead one straight to the bottle, or, in our case the bar at Le Phare Bleu. Pizza, champagne, beer and cocktails do not a great mix make! But it didn't slow us down, we had a great night. My favorite, absolutely, worlds best barman, Rudell, along with Rachael, took great care of us tending to our drink and food needs, and managed somehow to keep us in control (well almost in control, from what I can remember) at least we got back to Daisy without falling off the dock into the ocean LOL… I have a vague somewhat drunken, silly call to Edi and Paige, hopefully they will forgive our stupidously, incoherent, drunkeness at least it was a happy call...

Bob helping (hmmmm) Rudell behind the bar…

Rachael patiently humoring her very silly, somewhat drunk customers...

Hard commute!

Most of us moan and bitch at times, usually all about nonsuch, nonsence, unimportant stupid stuff, I'm the worse for this, I'm always moaning or bitching about something, thinking "why me?" And occasionally something will happen to slap me back to reality with a real wake up call, then I realize things really ain't that bad! I've only been back in Grenada for five days, on Daisy working my little butt off sanding like a crazy person and getting ready to varnish. Daisy is alongside on the dock, actually on the T Dock, so we look out to the little island just off the far point of the peninsula off our part of Grenada. The distance from the mainland to the little island is probably less than a quarter of a mile (bear in mind I'm useless at guessing distance)

I believe the island is privately owned, and rumors run riot here at Le Phare Bleu as to the identity of owner of the island, is he a drug lord? or someone famous, or just a nobody with a shit load of cash, anyway he's built/building two amazing houses on the island, he has a dock and a very fancy motorboat, and he's apparently not very friendly. But then if you think about it, if you wanted to be surrounded by nosey parkers you wouldn't buy an island to isolate yourself on, would you? He obviously wants his privacy, but that doesn't stop people gossiping! Anyway, I digress, the point of this blog… The other morning, well several mornings actually, I've noticed this guy with a back pack and a long stick, walk down the VERY steep hill to the shore, climb carefully along the rocky shoreline and then proceed to make his way "on foot" across the ocean between the shore and the private island.

This photograph shows the distance he has to walk! He is sometimes up to his neck in water, but he carries a stick to locate his way, and obviously knows the path across. This journey takes him about 45 minutes. He then goes to work on the construction site, at five he makes his way back across the water to the mainland clambers along the rocky shore and walks up the very steep hill home… And I thought I had it tough, talk about a hard commute!

This photograp[h appears twice on my blog, but its one of Bob smiling and looking happy, not something you see too often, he is talking to his Dad on skype, and that usually makes him smile...

Photographs of Le Phare Bleu

Drunken Dinghy Fest...

So, here I am at last back in beautiful Grenada, at the fabulous Le Phare Bleu Marina and Resort. I thought I was coming back to varnish Daisy's toe rail. It wasn't until I was on board that Bob informed that the entire boat's interior needed varnishing. And I have only two and a half weeks to do it. This is a job that could easily take a month maybe two. Fortunately, realizing it was more work than even I (the varnishing queen) could manage, Bob enlisted the help of a local to do the sanding on the toe rail.

Photo of Le Phare Bleu... I had decided to take it all the way back to the bare wood, but after an hour of serious sanding I'd only finished about five feet of rail and there's at least one hundred and thirty feet, at that rate I'd never get the rail finished in time, let alone all the woodwork throughout the boat. So, the hired help was gratefully received. We managed to finish our days work at a respectable hour (before dark). The resort was hosting a dinghy fest in the next bay. There was a floating platform with a bar, reefed to a barge, and Dieter's Swan (sail boat) was anchored and reefed alongside the barge. Along with about 50 dinghy's all filled with all the yachties that are anchored in the bay.

Crazy Dinghy Fest... It was a crazy sight, this huge conglomerate of people all gathered in the middle of the bay, singing, dancing and generally acting like idiot teenagers.

Our launch dropped us off and we grabbed a couple of beers and joined the drunken group, as with everything in our lives we were among the last to arrive. The live band were hyping up the atmosphere and everyone was dancing, waving their arms in the air and singing along. To my surprise even Bob started to dance! There was a real carnival spirit. Having only arrived in Grenada two days ago I was seriously pale, and next to all the deeply tanned sailors I looked a little out of place, not that any of the drunken sailors cared. The party continued until dusk.

Bob on anchor duty, on the Swan... Instead of taking the launch back to the marina we made the return trip on Dieter's swan. It was a quiet sail under a full moon and totally amazing, the sea was really calm, the breeze was like silk on my skin, it was wonderful,although sadly too short. But then all good things come to an end. Back at Le Phare Bleu we headed to the restaurant for Pizza night. The restaurant was filled with the noisy group from the dinghy fest. Fortunately we found a table outside by the pool where we ate really delicious pizza's under a moonlit sky next to the ocean. Days or rather nights like this don't happen often enough.

Back to Daisy, Almost!

So, Sunday Bob and I were supposed to be flying back to Grenada to Daisy. However, as so often is the case with our travel plans, both Mother Nature and American Airlines had other ideas. Hurricane Isaac was making its way past Florida, bringing everything to a standstill, our flight out, being one of those things. As it happened, this wasn't a total disaster. Bob has had so many boat parts and equipment delivered over the last few weeks, that I was no longer able to even put my car in the garage. All these things needed to somehow, either travel with us, or be shipped out. Had we left for the airport Sunday morning with all the boxes we would possibly have been turned away, as apparently there's an embargo on boxes until September first… SIGH… typical airline crap… Anyway, I've not complained about spending a few extra days on land, although I do have so much varnishing to do while I'm there, I'm now worried that I won't have enough time to get it all done… Hopefully we will be able to fly out on Wednesday, please keep your fingers crossed for us. Cheers Daisy :o)

The Mile High Club!

I'm sure most people are familiar with the "mile high club" but if not, let me enlighten you, I'm trying to think of an unoffensive way of putting this, basically it's having sex in a plane during flight. For those of you out there who may be curious, no, I'm not a member. However, I may have been exposed recently to a couple who quite possibly are. My flight back from Columbus this week was a morning flight. I was seated in first class (having been upgraded by a very nice attendant on the check in desk) next to a very nice young lady. The couple sitting opposite us were about my age, I've never been very good at guessing the age of people. The woman, and I say woman in preference to 'lady' was dripping in fake diamonds and dressed in shorts so short there was little left to the imagination, quite inappropriate to my way of thinking, for someone of her age, or in fact any age. She wore a skimpy, loosely knitted top, without a bra. I became aware of this because her nipples stood out like corks through the top. Not that I'm in the habit of looking at women's breasts, but when she stood up in the isle in front of me it was hard to miss. She had blond 'just fucked' hair, which hung in a tangled straggly mess down her back, a sorry attempt I felt, to look like Pamela Anderson in her hay day. Maybe she was one of "The Real Housewives," the show that exposes the very spoilt, quite old, stretched face brigade, who are married to even older, very wealthy guys. For the entire flight the two of them were making out, and not discretely, the guy was practically climbing on top of her, putting his hands places one should never put hands on another, while in public. They both showed little regard for the other passengers on the plane who were subjected to witnessing their public display of affection. I was amazed that the flight attendants didn't say something. This all sounds very prudish, very Mrs Bennett of me. However, I do feel that there's a time and a place. And, while first class gives one much more room to move around, I really don't think the extra space was designed for sexual activity... Airline travel (sigh) never a dull moment!