family

From somewhere looking at Mount Olympia in Washington, I thought I better check in so family and friends can know where we are!
We enjoyed spending time at my sisters, although since she had just had surgery on her knee she was not too mobile. At all. I did what any good sister would do though and went and bought her get well presents, you know, like flowers, chocolate and balloons..OR if you are me, you buy much more practical gifts!

Come on, I put a bow on it! I have been looking at one of these things for the boat for years, but it is just not practical for the size of it to only make one blender full at a time!

It does chip and whir (and does not spill all over the counter, unlike Lisa and I with our blenders though!) So, I finally bought one. I was walking around Costco with everyone giggling saying "I know what you are doing tonight" EVERYONE. I felt like I might as well just tattooed LUSH over my forehead! My sister liked it though!
Not that it is such a bad thing, but we wonder what the point is of buying drinks when you go out, and I swear it would take you about 20 to feel anything unlike our drinks on the boat!

Anyways, we left her entertainment and started up the I 5 to my parents place in Victoria. The roads in California were HORRIBLE! We shook quite a few things off the bottom of the RV going through that state!
Remember I showed you a picture of a croc eating a kangaroo awhile ago from Australia? Well I don't know if these are made up, but here is a croc eating a SHARK!!!

So after that I will show you a cute little picture of a squid, I found on the roll of my camera.

For those who bareboat and give a damn about keeping up on all the latest things in the BVI, as opposed to our guests on Promenade who expect us to just keep up on this stuff, here is a link to a PDF of the National Parks act that was signed into law as a condition of the government receiving Sandy Cay from the Rockefeller Foundation.

I read the entire thing, for those who don't want to and the thing it is missing is a CHART! When we had the meetings about this act years ago, it was basically said that about 30% of every habitat would be protected under the act, and there would be fishing, snorkeling, and other types of priority areas. These could be changeable, depending on conditions, and perhaps may rotate to allow some areas not to see as heavy a use. There is usually a debate in the BVI as the fishermen say the divers scare away the fish, and the divers think the fishermen just take the fish. So, fishing priority areas for example you would not be able to dive in. Although the Marine Guide that was released awhile ago, had the places pretty broadly laid out, ie, saying "great Harbor Peter Island" it did not mean that the entire bay would be closed, and in fact we were told each area would be about a room size or so. I believe the areas were not exactly decided and signed into law.
Although it always scares me in the BVI when we get passed a "fait accompli" as it usually is not good.

The gist of what will be happening is: There will be areas that will be off limits at different times for different activities. You will not be able to anchor within so many feet of a National Parks Mooring. YOu will not be able to go more then 5 MPH in a dinghy in a Parks area. That means there will be some bays that you will not be able to do water sports in. There will be some places you cannot fish. YOu cannot dive. You can only snorkel. Etc. There is a provision for fines. UP to ten thousand. There is also some talk that National Parks would like to take over all the Moorings in the territory and farm out the upkeep and just do the enforcement. Conservation and Fisheries and a couple other departments will be under one umbrella and elevated to an equally important ministerial department like, say, Immigration. There are pages and pages in this act of things you have to apply for special permission for. IE, salvaging, historic shipwrecks etc etc. Down to taking pictures for advertising in a park. And of course pay the appropriate fee. Of course the other question that comes up is the enforcement end, as currently we do NOT have that available in the BVI,
I will let you know more as we know more. The head of National Parks will be talking to the BVI SCUBA Operators this week at their meeting, so we are ALL lining up our questions!
Here is the link to the PDF. National Parks May 08

I think it is a great idea to protect part of every habitat, as what The Virgin Islands Environmental Council is trying to do with Hans Creek!
I understand the petition against Hans Creek Development is over 12,000 and climbing!