Promenade Sail Dive Charters Blog

Kerry and Bazza made it safely back to the boat last night and on time, a mere 36 hours to get to the BVI from Canada! Unsurprisingly they were quite tired; I headed off for an early night too as Kerry brought TV shows for me downloaded on the ipod! It was a Law and Order SVU marathon!

They headed into town today for a long, hot and over all unproductive day. Me and Rich have been…………. can you guess……….. you got it, doing some maintenance! Today, it has been our hatch having a spruce



the pantry window primed, new pieces of boot line put on where fenders have rubbed away, Richie has been in the engine room, I never ask what he gets up to in there! and general bits and bobs, so an overall productive day I would say.

The most exciting thing of the day is we are back with normal service on the internet! As you may remember a rant about a week ago and lack of wireless/internet with the new all singing and dancing $300 router we got, yet it couldn’t transmit wirelessly to the fore peak aka the office, the conclusion being from the CCT guy, that we could run an Ethernet cord to the fore peak and plug in our computers, or move the router to the office and then no one else got internet! I didn’t think that 30 feet was that far to transmit wirelessly, after all the old pyramid could happily do it! So today the router went back to the store and we bought a second hand pramid for half the price of the router and guess what, it can transmit wirelessly all the way to my bedroom! And all 4 laptops can use it at the same time, yeah for the pyramid!!!!

First thing first, the after shot for the aft cabin, looks a bit more homely now, also notice new tropical sheets, Kerry will be the first to sleep on them!



I don't think she was convinced it wasn't going to look like a building site when she arrived, you would be amazed what I can do with a pot of paint in an hour!

The cockpit is also semi back together, there is a guest end, with cushions and a work end with a few paint pots out....



Apart from that, every where clean - check, Full throttle in fridge - check, lasagne for dinner - check, looks like we are ready for the imminent arrival

Kerry is back to food blogs and I am back to maintenance blogs! Food is always a lot more fun than maintenance, but at least we can cross a few more jobs off our to do list, it never looks any shorted though!

So the last few days have been the cockpit, it takes 2 days to do, 1 for the white paint and 1 for the non skid, always looks so pretty when its been done, heres action Richie



If you look closely you can see the difference between the old and new paint colours



You have to be careful to not stand in what you have already painted, some time you do



Which results in this



I have been ripping the back cabin apart, Kerry and Bazza are back Sunday and moving in there so thought I would get it painted and ready to go for charter now and it will look pretty for them arriving! Doesn’t look so pretty at the moment, but this is the before picture, will give you the after picture tomorrow!

Two things I forgot to mention from St Thomas, I saw my first ever mongoose, very cute little fellow but wouldn't stay still for a picture and we also got to see one of the big iguanas, always cute



I put my Christmas tree up early this year I normally wait till December the 1st, but what the hell



So heres our Charlie Brown Christmas tree, stockings for our presents, I don't think Richs brand new sparkly MAC will fit in there! if you look to the right you can see where the lights are around the T shirt cupboard!!

That brings us to todays activity, can you guess what we've been doing...........



Not getting our internet fixed thats for sure, we went in yesterday to get it checked out, we had a mexican stand off between him saying it is fine and me saying no its not, we actually got a guy out to the boat to see it not working there, he agreed it wasn't working properly, promised he would do something today, guess what.......................

I have developed a rather new irritating habit (no comments please!) I wake up at 6:30am on the dot every morning, lets hope its a temporary thing! But it does mean I get a lot of work done before Richy wakes up, hence the blog at 7am this morning!

There has been a whole world of news since my last blog, I guess we need to get out more! Arrived to St Thomas, we checked in at St John, which is all modern and swanky now, they have the proper booths and finger print machines, we didn’t get finger printed, so I don’t know if they work or not but they look the part. Made it to Charlotte Amalie and was greeted by 2 familiar faces…..



This is Bob and Sheila, brokers from St Martin and good friends of the boat! They have been here for the boat show and are hanging out before heading off again. We popped over for a visit and were quite excited as we know they have pussy cats aboard, we saw pictures when they were kittens but we never got to meet them until now and what little cuteys they are





Early start this morning, with a full St Thomas day ahead, we were quite successful and the day of shopping was made much more enjoyable as everywhere has Christmas stuff! The normal boring dredge of home depot was fabulous, where can we fit this on the boat Kerry? I also thought Rich's dad would like this, I love being at his house at Christmas, it is like living in Santas grotto, he really goes to town and everything is Christmassy even the toilet paper!



Kmart………



We have bought a little tree, Rich convinced me a 6 foot one wasn’t practical, so we bought a “Charlie Brown” one, it is a twig with one bauble which we thought was funny, if only Kerry hadn’t thrown my pink feather one out! We also got a few lights for the liquor cabinet….

We visited a few pet stores, long story but it wasn’t for animals, Rich has a cunning plan! So I got to stroke lots of other peoples animals, the best was an English Bull dog, she was the cutest thing I have ever seen, not to mention the most muscular! Apparently she isn’t normally too fussy with strangers, she adored Rich, she stood on his feet, hugged his leg and looked at him adoringly, it was the cutest thing!

So I had a great day out and we got some useful boaty things too!
The dingy dock at Yacht Haven was insane at night, I have never seen anything like it, dingys were 3 deep



To top Richies day off, we called into our post box on the way home and he had a little present too, this is his Christmas present from me



It kept him quiet all night, I have no idea what time he came to bed, but I was long asleep!

Not a lot to report from the BVI, weather is more settled, lots of rain in the night but sunny days, we like that! Had an unexpected phone call the other night, the Captain we did our Atlantic crossing with is back in the BVI, he had just arrived with a boat he was delivering from Spain, so popped over to see him and he had a present for me, a whole salami from Spain, yum yum!! Not sure what the boys are doing with my salami here......



More maintenance going on, shower grates varnished, more painting, batteries tweaking….

Continuing down to St Thomas today, need to do a bit of shopping down there so we can paint the decks, stock up on supplies and the like. Just getting the blog done before we leave BVI and loose internet, so may be quiet for a day or two, depends if we can pick up internet in St Thomas!

No ranting today, looks like Kerry had a day about the same as mine, she was on a major rant too on her blog!! (www.saildivebvi.com/serendipity)
So whats been happening in the world of Promenade? We have had some boats come join us on the dock, they have been here for a while, its nice to have some one to say good morning too. One guy Martin, a nice German fellow, who has bought a boat as a fixer upper, has been seeking some help from Richie with matters of batteries, alternators and stuff that has been blown up. The main problem Rich discovered was he had to plug the battery charger in for it to work and charge the batteries! Another kind gent who came to help him with this matter the other day, hard wired his shore power into a circuit board and blew up his brand new 6 speaker surround sound DVD player! For Richies troubles I got a nice bottle of wine, seems like a good deal to me!

I have been painting, in the crew head, which is all shiny now



The kitchen, which is a work in progress and tricky due to the need to feed ourselves, I banned Rich from the kitchen yesterday and he took me out for dinner, especially after what he had had his hands in all day, didn’t fancy those hands making me a meal!! A bonus though is now the toilets suck the air out the room they are so powerful!



The last few grates for showers are being varnished, one being the crew one, which always gets especially grotty due to the amount of traffic it gets, so its having several layers applied and is another work in progress…..



Rich hasn’t taken to sarongs, he’s soggy as he’s been diving! I think an excuse to test his new toy out, his ultra sparkly, ice diving, can go to minus who knows what reg! The fact he bought this scares me a bit as I don’t know where he is planning on needing it, especially as I didn’t get one! Is he off on his own to dive the Antarctic?? Today, he got to dive on our old mooring in Road Town, we are on our way to St Thomas, only got this far as we thought it would be a good chance to check it out, as Bazza hasn’t had the boat on the mooring all year. Good job we did as it needed a bit of a tweak, some of the links on the chain had corroded to half there original size, there is all manner of things living on the line and chain as it hasn’t been out the water for so long! Funny being back on the mooring, lovely breeze and the Peter Island ferry wobble!

Went to Pussers for dinner last night to try out the new one in East End, purely for research for guests! I was so happy as they had a floating in the sea Christmas tree all lit up! Didn’t have the camera so will endeavor to go back to get a picture! We also got our first Christmas card from Richies Dad Jim, thanks Dad xxx

The rain finally stopped yesterday mid morning, I have never seen that much rain here in the BVI before, it was 36 hours of constant, pouring rain! So we made it to town a day late, you could see some effects from the flooding from the day before, mainly a few trees knocked over



There were a lot of really big puddles and in the on line news paper there was a picture of a car that got squashed by a retaining wall that fell on top of it! Power was out for half the day in the entire territory and a few fires!

My thoughts about town days are very similar to Kerry, never a fun fluffy day and you normally feel like banging your head against a brick wall at times.

Our new internet router isn’t working 100% so we took that in to the office, I thought I was fully prepared and had everything they could possibly need, of course we had to wait, after 30mins we got through the door to see the man who could help, who told us we needed to see the other man on the other side of the office as he was the expert, so we waited another 20 minutes to see him, who told us the man we really needed to see was off sick and he is the only person in the building and entire company who can help, except for a technician but he was some where else that day! So if we call tomorrow they can help! So my first hour of town wasted!

Next the banks, they always fill me with dread and as we had to visit 2 different ones, we decided to divide and conquer! The queues were enormous so we both sat in our respective banks patiently, I got through before Rich, with a hopeful out come, he was still trying to convince the lady there that the checks we ordered 2 months ago were not hiding in our PO Box and yes we knew that if the package was too big we got a slip from the post office and had to retrieve it there, so with a sigh she confessed she had no idea where they were! We kind of guessed that before the visit to the bank and were more interested in what she planned to do about it, she finally managed to come to the conclusion that we were not going away with out a resolution to our problem and finally asked if we would like her to order some more? We felt that would be a good idea as we have already paid for the checks and are without any, so with another sigh they were ordered, so now we will see!

Rich took me for a quick lunch at this point, apparently I needed a time out! The rest of the afternoon went quite well and we got everything else we needed. We even had a quick walk through Colombian jewels, Richie is getting a new computer so I think he thought he could buy me something pretty to make things even, I did see a very pretty ring that sparkled, being a magpie I was attracted! I tried it on and it looked really pretty, Richie looked pleased with himself, so he asked how much, it was a mere $81,000!!! I thought Rich was going to choke and I got quickly marched out the shop! So no present for me!

The best part of yesterday was a quick visit to the English store for our annual event of buying the Advent Calanders, here they are up ready for xmas!



This brings us to today, the cockpit looks how Kerry hates it, full maintenance mode



Rich is doing all kinds of bits and pieces and I will leave it there. I have been painting stuff for a change, the few remaining grates I didn’t do before, windows and anything else that standstill long enough for a coat!

I have also had to find a new laundry, the one Kerry used last year is no longer a valid number, but I think I was successful, it took the lady 4 hours, it smells pretty she promised not to bleach anything, she called to say it was done, now I just need to have a look at it!

So what does a charter boat get up to when it isn’t on charter? Well no painting so far! After our drop off on Saturday we had parcels to collect and presents for me and Richie, those are the kind of parcels I like. Our regulators for diving are getting quite old and tired so rather than service them yet again we bought new ones! So Rich got to put them all together and tweek and I arrghed (pirate style!) for support. The other packages were nowhere as exciting, a new pan and some tank boots!!



Saturday night was fun, we went to the jerk pork van for dinner, my favourite as I might have mentioned before, we rented movies and snuggled on the couch with blankets and everything!

Sunday was an outrageously lazy day, I made breakfast of left over steak and mashed potato, along with a pot of coffee and gave Richie breakfast in bed, he deserved it, he has been a busy bee. We then watched a movie in bed and I internetted, which is working amazingly well now we don’t have 6 computers all trying to access wifi at once!

The rest of the day was mainly spent watching movies! I told you it was lazy, I didn’t get out of my pj’s. We had more left overs through out the day. Weather was bad it rained all day long, with barely a break.

That brings us to Monday, it was still raining when we woke up this morning, the rain got heavier and heavier, we had thunder and lightning, a small squall came through with 40mph winds, Rich was running around in his underwear and waterproofs checking all was good, no picture I am afraid!

We were going in to town, but as there is a severe weather warning on the island and flooding everywhere we thought it might be better to stay home and dry! Heres a picture from the boat after the squall had passed just to show you how grey and murky it is!!

The last day of charter was yesterday and we managed to fit a lot into the day. It started with the morning swim around Salt Island Bay, there was a few stingers in the water so we had to vinegar a few of the swimmers but nothing to bad! After breakfast every one headed ashore to have a look around and to hunt out the geo cache. Heres Linda and Will trying to work out the GPS for the geo cache



They found it and got some great pictures from the peak



While they were off on the Island me and Heather went for a quick dive in the bay, it was pretty spectacular, hermit crabs, eels, juvenile angel fish and as we were heading back to the boat I heard Heather squeel behind me, I turned around and we had picked up a few friends



These remora were about 3 1/2 feet long, they stayed with us for at least 20 minutes, they kept trying to stick on to us.

We had a sail down to the Baths, the north swells have finally finished, so the group wanted to get back to the baths so they could swim and do the land tour, they loved the area and had a play afternoon there, followed by a few mile swim for the last swim of the trip.

We spent our last night on dock as we had some early flights next morning, we had a quick cocktail game before dinner, out came the shots!! Poor Heather got the ominous one given to her



Linda ended up with more than her share of shots, after dinner she had a quick nap



So that brings us up to speed. Every one had an early flight, so left early. We have had a great first charter back in the BVI, swim vacation had a great time and left some really nice comments in our guest book:

"Thank you all for a wonderful "swim vacation" week aboard Promenade. Your combined knowledge of sailing, history and marine life was wonderful and enjoyed immensely"

"Thanks so much for making our time together so amazingly special, you are an exceptionally talented group. Cheers!"

"Thanks for all you did in helping to make this a dream vacation"

"You guys are the best! This has been my 1st Live aboard and your attention to everydetail made it a fantastic experience. The wonderful meals and spectacular sailing have helps make the whole swim vacation my best ever vacation"

Yesterday aboard Promenade, managed to get even more hectic than before. There was a big swim first thing, followed by a big breakfast to keep everyone going till lunch time, these guys can eat, I guess its all the exercise! We headed over to Angel fish reef on Norman to check it out, Rich and Heather took their cameras for a dive and what a dive, they saw loads of cool stuff, the funniest thing was in Heathers pictures, she had all the creatures and Rich in every shot, in Richs pictures it was the same except Heather and the creatures. Heres Rich and the turtle with his butt in the air, Rich not the turtle!!





They also saw during the dive a reef shark devouring an octopus, sad for the octopus, but pretty amazing to see! I was quite jealous as I had already missed the manta! Look carefully and you can see the octopus mid water



Mark, our eldest member aboard, has astounded everyone, he is like the Duracell Bunny, he keeps on going forever, after the 2 mile morning swim, he did another few miles while Rich dived and every one else snorkled, he then swam over to the caves while we motored over



We had a huge thunder storm while we were at the caves, it didn't slow any one down though and it washed the boat down nicely!

Cute richie picture, just because



After the caves it was a cruise up to Little Harbour, this was the lazy 1 swim day so to make up for it we did an afternoon of pull toys!!!!! Doesn’t seem like a relax to me. We had a try out for our new deck hand, we got Will to swim the line ashore, he did a great job once we got him in the water and stopped holding onto the line so he couldn’t get anywhere! It amused us any how



Out came the banana boat



With the inevitable end



Those of you who remember our first deck hand Brad, he was anchored next door and not on charter so was out playing



Then the predator came out, it was harder to get on than stay on apparently, heres the 2 Chris’s



Every one was in a jolly mood so I thought a little cocktail hour game could be in order, so we played Bushwakers, Adrianne won and she happened to win the last surviving Bush waker T shirt we have aboard, so now they are a rare commodity if you have one hold on to it, it might be worth something eventually! Luckily she won too as it was a small!



It was quite a noisy night after the bushwakers, but fun was had by all

Another big swim this morning, followed by visits to the Chubb house



with the usual wild life, even a goat skull was brought back to the boat!

Some kayaked



and a spot of free diving coaching from Richie, Heather and Will got down to 55 feet, a personal best

Absolutely no wind at all today, so no sailing to be had, instead of a relax while we moved we played the “jump off the bow and wash up the back of the boat” game, which they all loved, then to finish the day off it was an epic swim from Dead Chest to Dead Mans Bay, not a long swim, but a little choppy. Historically it is also where Black Beard marooned his crew, as in “yo ho ho and a bottle of rum, 10 dead men on a dead mans chest”. As the story goes they were stuck on the Island of Dead chest with a bottle of rum, the stranded pirates all decided to try to swim to Peter Island as it was bigger and I guess they thought a better chance of water and food, unfortunately they couldn’t swim and all drown, their bodies washed up in Dead Mans Bay, hence the name. Hopper has always wanted Swim Vacation to do this swim, but the weather has never cooperated, but today was the day. The guys loved it, it was a challenge but good and Chris even saw a little nurse shark! To celebrate I made margaritas, what more can you ask for!

Late entry again, internet wasn't working last night as we were tucked into a bay and no reception, so news is from yesterday! We were Excited yesterday, we had internet, wireless, every one had there bag!! Here’s a cute picture of Mark with his bag, he was very excited and happy to be wearing his own clothes



There has been a lot of swimming although I don’t think Hopper will believe me as I haven’t posted many swimming pictures. After the swim yesterday morning, Heather came back with wild tales of spotting a manta ray, normally I would question it and guess it was an eagle ray, but she is a Scuba instructor, so she knows the difference, I cant believe I missed it!

It was a pretty and hot spinnaker sail down to the Indians





Every one got to go play and look at the fishes for a while



I think we have acquired a new Captain too, so Rich has some one to talk boats with, he is a happy boy!



The afternoon swim took them to Wily T's, but there was some drills practiced first, looks quite Bay watch to me.....



When they arrived they were greeted by cheers and yells of "Hello swim vacation" the bar staff all new who they were swim, they must have had a good time there before to still be remembered!! They must have been looking tired as floats were thrown in for them

Every one is probably wondering whats happening on the boat, all is good except the internet blew up good and proper last night, so it has been a work in progress, we kind of half have it again, we will see! a story for another day.

Yesterday, it was an early start to our first charter, we were awake by 6:15am to drive Kerry and Bazza to the airport, they have finally made there escape from the island. We snuck off the boat and left our guests sleeping, I forgot my camera so no pictures, but Kerry did get one of me in my pajamas at the airport!! I bet they are sat in “Outback steak house” eating something very yummy as I type! She has been humming the ad music for the past few days along with “Leaving on a jet plane”! I think she was quite excited to be getting vacation at last.

Our first charter of the season is always a fun charter to do and to make it even better it is Swim Vacation, so old friends back aboard and new ones we have got to meet. They are with out there fearless leader though, we do miss you Hopper!!

You could tell we were officially back on charter as I burnt the croutons, same as I do every week!!

All is as it should be, except we have a missing bag, but all the guests made it ok. So it was off for a sail, with some sail training on the way



We made it to the baths, we have some north swells this week so we wanted to get there before the swells got to big, the group always love to swim here and it didn’t disappoint, eventually we managed to round everyone up for the official first jumping in picture







After the swim it was cocktail hour and to welcome every one to the islands we had painkillers



We are tucked away nicely for the night away from the north swells so we should have a nice flat night, but the internet is a little sketchy just for a change, so this may not get posted till the morning, we will have to see how it goes! The traditional first night dinner picture



So today has been busy, the internet wouldn't work this morning, we have swam, I have called American Airlines 100 times to locate Marks bag that they found the other day and then went mysteriously missing again, we have also been calling random people and a lovely lady at Road Town ferry, walked to customs and found our bag and called me back to tell me she had!! AA called 3 hours later to say they were working on it, I told them I had already got it thanks for the help!

So snorkeling on the Rhone, more swimming and a fabulous dinner of ribs.

More news and pictures tomorrow, this has all just taken too long (2 days to post!)

SaildiveBVI blog does not like my passwords this morning, so it will go here.
Raining tonight on Tortola, and it does not surprise anyone on the good ship Promenade as Richard and Lisa are picking up charter guests tonight! Although we were in at the boat show today, we did not do so well on seeing boats, and in fact, I obviously do not do that for a full time living as we mostly visited up and down the dock! So, my overall count was low, but I picked up good gossip on the dock if that counts!
Did manage to make it over to the Culinary Contest to see what dishes were on display. It was aptly judged by David Pugliese of Brandywine, Jan Robinson of the Ship to Shore series of cookbooks among others.

I only had my small camera so not great pics, but it will give you an idea on what some of these boats do anyways. I am not sure what this dish is, a sailors seafood dish of some kind, but I do have to say that I thought the presentation on it, was lacking. It probably tasted wonderful, but....



I can only imagine how nervous you are standing up there having your food being judged!

Although I am not sure what this dish is, I thought it looked very pretty! This is Robin's from Texas Star....Noticing another yacht with a lot of the rich jewel tone colors here!

This is Max from the 65' Privilege True North...

and her dish of DUCK. I do not think I have every tasted duck...nor would I, ( I am a basic girl....) never mind have an idea how to cook it or indeed even where to buy it here! I think the food competition was supposed to be using local ingredients though, and I am pretty sure we are not raising a lot of ducks here on Tortola!

I know this is a Grouper DIsh...



There was one or two more but by the time I arrived the judges had already done all their tasting and I don't think I needed to put up pictures of left over plates.
We visited on Cuan Law for quite awhile, as well as talked to the crew on Bliss, SHiwara, Viking Dream, Swish, and that pretty much took the rest of the afternoon. Lisa was starting to look at her watch as she had charter guests coming early evening.... Did I mention that I on the other hand, DID NOT have guests (as much as I love a lot of you!) and was flying out early tomorrow to Orlando? Not sure If I mentioned that or not!
As flights go, per norm, the one person who came in via St Thomas from LA, arrived without his luggage (tomorrow mon), and a contingent of 5 or so, who were supposed to arrive at 7 had their plane turn back about 10 minutes out of San Juan for an engine anomaly!!!
Our friend Heather, from Swim Vacation (guide extraordinaire) who missed the trip in April at the last moment with the flu, carried on ALL her bags. They took away her bag at plane valet in San Juan to put in the belly and somehow in that short time, they managed to make sure her dive mask was shattered in a million pieces throughout her luggage, so the first sight we were treated to was her shaking out her underwear! She fits right in.. We then handed her a vacumn cleaner....

In an unusual move on Promenade, Swim Vacation has brought their own deckhand this weekend. Kristy (long black hair...) is from Key West and we are so unused to seeing females as deckhands/eye candy on our boat! I am sure the contingent of males will be quite happy....

Swim Vacation has several repeats from last winter on board, including also LINDA. Linda is a texas girl...who comes complete with her own state flag. Apparently she has brought a MUCH larger one this year as they one she brought last year (a courtesy flag size...) just did not cut it!
I am a bit apprehensive of seeing the size of the Texas Flag she pulls out when Lisa gets a pic up on the boat blog!!

Guests arrived, it poured rain, awnings went up and down in the cockpit, group went across the street to Emile's for a bite and a beer, and we said our good night and good byes so we could be ready to fly out tomorrow AM.
There you go, a bonus blog entry this weekend when I said I was not going to do one.... I really have to learn to make my blogs shorter so I have more days to post the material over!
Swim Vacations' guides blog for the week! Promenade should be well covered in between Heather, Lisa and Kerry!

When we were down in Charlotte Amalie yesterday we watched the Coast Guard doing a safety inspection on Cat Bird, wondering if we were going to be next since we were anchored just in front of them, but it was our lucky day.

I think R & L were ecstatic to get US off the boat and out of the way so they could get moved into the "captains' quarters" and get all the rooms made up. I took pictures. I am sure that was helpful! Although pictures of heads are not that exciting her varnish is very pretty!!

Since both crew cabins are being used next week as well, she had 7 cabins to get ready, and of course, as you can imagine, after sitting for 3-4 months they really needed some cleaning! I am not sure I have ever heard the vacumn cleaner going so much.

Had to laugh, Rich and I were sitting in the salon after lunch checking our email and the last thing lisa told him when she left was to make sure he watched the water tanks, as they were being filled...The next thing I knew he was jumping up and I managed to grab my camera to take a picture. I told him that I would not tell Lisa on him and he said "you will just put it on the blog" Yep, he was correct. Maybe he will get lucky and she does not read the blog!!!


As great as doing charters has been the last year, we were so ready to turn them over to Richard and Lisa....