Bioluminescence

The only internet access on the south coast of Vieques is dial up and we can't get the photos to load. Sorry! If we ever get closer to "civilization" we'll load photos then.

Dec 9th –

Our sailing friend Brad asked about our morale. I will have to say that the winds, waves and occasional squalls have been a bummer.

In spite of this, I would say that morale is good as we are having the adventure of our lives. It helps that we find humor in the situation. I do feel badly for those people who are on a one-week trip and this is all they got – wind and rain.

We recognize our own inexperience in sailing and this makes for some fun “after action analyses”. At night, we tend to work on formulating our travel plan for the following day, discuss what we learned and what we could have done better. By having these discussions at the end of the day, we are able to be more objective and personal. It also helps greatly to work on these blog entries.

Lara typically writes the first draft of the blog. Jim then makes a pass through it and we discuss things that were funny (in hindsight since much of this is NOT funny at the time). Eventually, we have ourselves laughing at the situation and the goofy stuff we said and did.

By the time we’re finished with all of that it is usually about 8pm or so and we pretend that we’re going to just lay down and read for a while. “A while” usually ends up being about 6 or 7 minutes and then the lights are out. Hey, it gets DARK here!

We try to listen to the weather report several times a day and we’ve gotten to the point where we just roll our eyes. It’s always the SAME report (small craft advisory for the next two days with the winds and waves dropping by the third day….but the third day never seems to get here).

We do find that we are getting used to getting up in the middle of the night to close hatches (rain) and check the anchor (wind and waves). It’s getting to the point that we really don’t remember it in the morning until we notice that things are different than they were the night before.

Jim has been pretty disappointed not to be able to take the boat offshore to pursue the BIG fish. On the other hand, he does want to live through this vacation! He is actually being pretty philosophical about this (for those who know Jim, this is a BIG step for him!).

When we went to the Bio Bay tour last night we met a fishing guide and his girlfriend (a property manager) who live on the island. When discussing the weather, he made an off-hand comment about the fact that we are PAYING for this and we laughed so hard we cried!

Speaking of the Bio Bay…this is a bioluminescent bay where you kayak in (think of being on a pointed butt cushion in all of the wind, rain and waves, in the dark in just your swim suit) to an area where you can swim in water that lights up as you move through it. It was VERY cool, in spite of the weather. We saw lots of fish swimming (they make streaks of light in the water when they sprint). Actually, the clouds blocked out the moon and made the light display more dramatic. The owner of the tour was very apologetic about the weather (like he could control it?), as it was a LOT of work to get into the bay. He offered a free “re-tour” to anyone who wanted to go later in the week when the weather calmed down.

As you recall, our toilet pulls in seawater. Last night, I noticed that the toilet water had little glowing specs (these are the dinoflagellates which turn on when disturbed) when the toilet was flushed! Does this count as my free “re-tour”?