We’re back!

After a nice, but extended holiday break in Philadelphia, we are now back in Antigua with a mostly restored back for Andrew and all kinds of unfinished boat projects. We decided to rent an Airbnb in the Jolly Castle Hotel for a few nights so we didn’t have to climb up and down a ladder every time we wanted to get on or off the boat, since it was still out of the water. But, despite comfortable and inexpensive lodging, we’ve been quickly immersed in the world of ‘nothing is easy on a boat’.

Our first morning back, we enjoyed a homemade Antiguan breakfast (scrambled eggs, beans, mackerel and dumplings... that tasted like fresh baked doughnuts without the sugar) at Joseph’s right below our apartment in Jolly Castle. The apartment is comfortable, clean and supported by a very friendly and responsive staff. Arlene, who owns the place, arranged for a taxi to pick us up at the airport and met us at the hotel when we arrived. It is very convenient to the beach, restaurants, grocery store as well as the boatyard and the kitchen makes a nice place for Andrew to make Painkillers to reward us for our challenges.

When we got to the boat, we found the electricity was unplugged so all of the refrigerated and frozen foods we were trying to keep, were spoiled. Cleaning out the refrigerator and freezer were two of our boat projects on the first day back. In addition, Andrew removed 250 feet of chain from the anchor locker in order to inspect both and we had to flake it back into place. We had left a few folks from the boatyard with instructions for a handful of projects, half of which were done, so we spent the rest of the day supervising what was left to do.

We splashed the boat on Monday (1/20) and after a few days for provisioning and waiting for a weather window, we plan to head ~35 miles south of Antigua to Guadeloupe.