bvi captains log blog

Lisa always tells me "edit Kerry! Edit" "Summarize Kerry summarize" I don't seem to do very well at that and always have a billion stories and pictures to share! Notice how she has handily given up the blog to me this week! But I do have to admit that i like it. I have 22 pictures that I have to somehow put on todays blog. Not sure how that is going to happen here, but lets give it a try!
First up we have super diving LULU, when not cooking and organizing she is diving, and is ALWAYS up to do the night dive on the Rhone!

When I left you yesterday we were in the process of towing the banana boat up the channel trying to throw them off of it! ha! I think he used a hundred gallons of diesel and zigged and zagged all over the place, but the guests were mostly victorious and we could not get them of. Funny that, with a big old boat that does not plane!

Which brought us to the RHONE and Richard took the boys down to do some free diving and hopefully to swim through the shallow tunnel to the propeller! Look its SUPER RICHIE!!

The guys did great and here are some action shots, which I took from below.



After taking the pictures I took the opportunity to sneak off by myself and see what else I could find pictures of! I found some great shots and it was wonderful all by myself!

I was pretty excited to see turtles that let me take pictures of them. I think these are quite nice pictures, especially the purply one of the turtle! Lots of barnacles!



Then there was this little eel poking up looking at me at the same time as the turtles!

I took a swim out in the blue and found a couple nurse sharks that did not stay along too long once I showed up and then came back to the wreck and took a few more pictures before getting back on the boat! Amazing!

And super Richy also followed this Puffer around, who basically ignored him. Richy told me that he had a bit of a belly and had to put on more weight to get down! There is a lot of that going around!!

One last picture of the wreck before moving on..

We stayed the night in Salt Anchorage, and it appears some of us are still fighting jet lag as I do not seem to be able to get out of bed before noon! Not to worry though as we were still all at Salt Island.
There was Sea Glass hunting...

and climbing up to the top to find Promenades geocache...

As well as to get a couple spectacular views of the Rhone

and our two boats nicely at anchor...

Then we made our way over to Ginger Island to dive, but that is the next entry! After that we did our swimming game. This is where you jump off the front of the boat while sailing (under two knots) and like an amusement park ride you come out the back, grab onto a line and climb back on board. There was all kinds of giggles for this!
Some jumped right in...

Some had to think about it!

But there was tons of giggles when they were all in!

Some had to see to believe that they were actually there (note, we are trained professionals! DON"T try this at home!!! Only on Promenade! Ah, guess you will have to book a charter!)

Once the smaller ones were off and it was only the big boys on the charter and the big boys on the crew (that would be Richard and Brent!) then Bazza smoked it up so we were going about 4 knots! The guys could barely hang on! In fact, poor Tim at 18 years old had the pleasure of his shorts trailing at his ankles so with one hand he was trying to hide his bits and the other one he was hanging on, all to the amusement of the mothers who had out video cameras to tape the event!

We don't get to play this very often, but it is always a lot of fun for crew and guests alike! It is like being on technology corner again this week. This pictures does not do it justice actually how many IPODS and phones there is plugged in on our panels!

We had a really lazy time coming up to Savannah Bay on Virgin Gorda late this afternoon, and are anchored here now!
Whew! That was my version of summarizing. I have a billion emails to answer, which I apologize to everyone in advance for, I don 't think we will get at them until tomorrow! Maybe! If lucky!! It is almost midnight and I have to go see what words Lisa has played on Scrablous as I think I have just about enough energy to do that this evening before hopefully falling asleep. I did see daylight last night, it was about 6 when I fell asleep. I know it is going to get turned around soon.
Phew! I did it!! 22 pictures and a summarized blog entry kind of. Only took me an hour, so off to play SCRABULOUS!

My blog is back up!!
So, still no blog entry on the proper place. I contacted Go Daddy, my hosting server and they tell me it is my blog program. I contacted them and they say it is a Mysql server problem, which I tend to believe and that Go Daddy is just taking the easy way and not reading the entire message I sent. Yep, I believe that it is the server. Oh well, good thing I had a back up blog!!
Found a picture of the last arrivals on the other camera.

Cooking for 18 people on one boat is quite an extravaganza, we have lots of older male boys as well, that seem to be always waiting for that first bell!

I thought we had rats on the boat as there is so much rustling in the junk basket all day long! Lisa is just stocking it once a day, so we have enough to last! It is almost like a stampede though. All these kids on here are a great perfect age to enjoy Promenade.

I am not sure what Jasper thought when we pulled up at Money Bay on Norman Last night and told them we would tie in and then they would come in beside us.. We are always inches from the bottom when we tie in here but they gamely followed our boys instructions (Lisa and I wouldn't!)

Snug as a bug, a bit of swell so we did feel some tugging last night, but not too bad.

Then the Predator and kayaks came out and there was a flurry of activity until dinner! in fact they predatored until about the sun went down and STILL had enough energy to do the Macarena!
They also seem to enjoy Kerrys Blue drink (it was actually purple this week, and Lisa pronounced it better then the blue drink!)

The last time we were in Money Bay, I said they were building a breakwall on the side, and it is not only completed, but another stone landing dock has been built in the middle! They have totally destroyed this once lovely little beach by putting in three massive piles of rocks everywhere. Very sad to see!


As I am writing this mid afternoon we are in the process of pulling a banana boat up the channel! You will think, "gee it must be flat" and it is, but we are also towing it with the floating laundry ship called Promenade so tomorrows entry should have good pictures!

It was a picture perfect day, summer is definitely coming! It was really picture perfect as I did not wake up until 1030!! All that jet lag you know! I was up in time to do my lunch duties! We barely felt JASPER rafted to us in Little Harbor Last night. By the time I poked my head out we were well on our way to a dive at Angelfish Reef!

We had 4 divers and a snorkel tour as well going on with some of the older members out sailing on the monohull. Here is what I always like taking, a picture of the boat from under the water.

I have had to do some fancy cropping in my pictures as I asked my husband to clean my mirror and inside my lens, as it was filthy with dots everywhere, and I think he pushed them all up to the top! It really needs doing professionally but I have to try and get away without it until we go back to the states. Over to Santa Monica rock we went for an uncommon dive! Don't get to go here too often! A bit of current, but the visibility was pretty good as you can see here.

Lyndon, our videographer this week is as clear as a bell going down. He forgot his handles for his video at home but Bazza managed to make him grips in his little paint locker machine shop so he would not have to be without! YEAH Bazza! bazza is busy. I think the boat is definitely a she, as when he has been away and comes back it throws little temper tantrums as she has lost some of his attention so he was lurching from one thing to the next this AM.

This little EEL was right out and looking at us. Unfortunately, I had on a wide angle lens and only one strobe today, and without having done any underwater photography in the last few months it is almost like starting all over again!

See this great picture of a Squirrel Fish and Remora?

Nice colors here on the Trigger fish.

The boys coming over the reef.

The cutest little baby Nurse Shark that let us hang upside down and look at him. He was tucked quite nicely into the reef under rocks though!

LOTS and lots of lobster. I must have seen a dozen and they all came out to challenge me! Or to try and scare me away, you decide!

A lost weightbelt of someones that I did not bother to try and lug around with me! I have decided I will just take pictures of everything I see. Some of the divers also found a mask and snorkel.

Just diving in one of the gullies here...

It picked up the seas a bit when we were down on the dive, so we had a couple feeling a bit icky! We made our way up to Money Bay, and that is where I will leave the story tonight!

It is a tough life but someone has to do it! Surprisingly, our flights were all more or less on time getting here. We were missing one bag, but we gambled that it would be in on the next flight and waited and there it was! So, off to boat to basically give the crew all the stuff we had brought and we went to sleep about 3 in the afternoon until 8 the next morning! Hopefully that should take of jet lag!
Remember I told you that i used up all my air miles flying first class on AA as I was so angry with them? Well, I guess technically it was business class, as they did not have first class, even though they charged us first class air miles! Business class now means they thrown a few peanuts and a pathetic little meal at you.
I was looking for the foot rests and individual movie screens with 57 movies like Air New Zealand, but no luck there! Oh well, you know things are bad when you are extremely happy to make it here semi on time and only missing one bag!
The new marinas over by the commercial dock seems to be a great gathering point for BIRDS. Lots of seagulls and pelicans!

Bazza was over by Port Purcell this afternoon. This place had burned down almost to the ground last Monday. Today, he said he could swell the rotting food as soon as he reached the dock and going by there was about 100 people in the debris going through it carting away what they could! Truck fulls in some case!! Find that hard to believe, what in the world would you want with whatever had been in there?
This is unusual for us, picking up at the ferry dock for Cooper Island over at Joma Marina. The reason being is we have 13 guests this week, 9 on here and 4 sailing "Jasper" from BVI Yacht Charters, but eating, drinking and diving on us the mother ship!

Our guests were spread out all over the place. Some had to buy 6 new tickets to get here when there connection on Spirit in FLL was a bit late and Spirit told them they could not get them out , like all week! Sounds like the airlines I know.

The next group was a couple hours late coming over from St Martin...

And the last group we despaired of them ever arriving and finally found them on the last ferry of the evening! No picture, we were busy making cocktails by then.
Our bareboat had to be out of the marina by 4 otherwise they could not leave dock, so we sent them off and we waited for the other guests and then had a nice sunset sail over (as we independent boats don't have a curfew and can be out after 5!)

Nice sunset coming across the channel, almost feeling like summer out there now!

We tucked in and rafted up to the little boat. Funny thing about this picture. See the fender B is holding? Bazza had told him to let it go and throw the line to Richy on the other boat! Well B let it go....straight into the water! We figure it is time to give B a week off next week! He can go cause mayhem in Puerto Rico for a few days!

With 13 guests on board, we have two tables for dinner! The guests always hate me the first night as I won't let anyone start until I get pictures. Well, that took twice as long with two tables let me tell you! Plus we had to get the guests off the other boat present and accounted for.

I love the smiles on these guys faces, they are from ear to ear. I think they are saying "if I smile really wide, she will stop taking pictures and let us eat!"

We celebrated a 12 year olds birthday tonight as well.

I thought I saw DVD's coming out from the younger members tonight, but she who has not done charters for a few weeks has taken her sore feet to bed! (this is Kerry not lisa by the way!)
Lisa is playing more divemaster this week and I am taking over most of the meals, well, except for breakfast! I am not getting up that early unless I have to.

Unfortunately we have a group who was coming June 12th who needs to put up their week to see if it can be resold! This is a very popular time, so act quickly if you think you are interested!