Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Bon Aire Update

It’s been a little since my last update. Out of the “ABC’s” (Aruba, Bon Aire and Curacao), Bon Aire is by far my favorite. It’s a huge marine park so anchoring is illegal. Mooring balls are available for $10/day right off the beach. I’m in about 10 feet of water and can watch fish all day from my boat. Had a turtle and a spotted ray swim by the other day.

Bon Aire is known for diving but I was more interested in kite-surfing…a little more my speed. Unfortunately, they only had wind-surfing so I signed up for some dive lessons. After 2.5 days, I am now a certified diver. Had a great time learning and it’s pretty simple. The hardest part was going down to 60’ and watching huge snappers swim by and not shooting them! Like I said, it’s a marine park, thus no spear-fishing. Those snappers had no idea how close they came……

I met some crew on one of the mega yachts here and scored an invite to a BBQ. Got the tour and learned quickly that the current owners bought this boat from Tiger Woods! It was pretty cool throwing down beers and shrimp knowing that Tiger sat at the same table…..let alone thinking what he did in the living room with his wife!

Ketching Up and I are waiting for a weather window to form for our departure. They’re off to St. Kitts, I’m off to find a job in St. Martin. It’ll be a 4 day sail and I’m far enough East that it should be a beam reach the whole time. Unfortunately, the wind and swell are both out of the ENE thus, pretty much on the nose. Their additional crew member came in today so as soon as the weather shifts, we’ll be off. The good news is that the crew brought down my camera so photos will start appearing shortly.

That’s it for now, hope everyone is doing well in the States,

Dan