Saturday, February 4, 2017

Maintaining Our Individuality

Rounding the East end of Beef Island
Buddy Boating can be a slippery slope.  We’ve never done it before now and for whatever reason we are…  Where is the line?  When do you lose your individuality to the wants or needs of others?  How does that jive with chucking your life and living free as a Cruiser?

We don’t know.

We enjoy having another couple to hang out and do thing with, but it comes with a price.  Instead of just getting up in the morning and leaving when we’re ready, we find that either we, or they are waiting for the other.  Why can’t you just say “I’ll meet you there” and go on your merry way?  Well for now, it’s because our Buddy’s chart plotter is being repaired.  So we are the plotter and creator of routes for the moment… 


Going right on past The Bight...
Guests on the boat:  Bruce and I have had the pleasure of guests and know how much work it is.  We feel that we should give our friends some privacy with their friend and not “rock the boat”… so we are leading the way to the places they wish to visit, places we’ve been before, and then we’re giving them some space.  This way, we get our private time and they can enjoy their guest.

Agenda:  People who come to the BVI for a week have a lot of things to squeeze into a short period of time.  Add the weather to that and it becomes even more tight.  When our friends from home came here on a charter we found the pace to be much more than we were used.  Much more than could handle, even if we wanted to.  It is a grueling schedule of dash and stop punctuated by spending large amounts of money in bars and restaurants that we just can’t afford.  

So what do we do about it?  Bruce and I are working very hard to get our friends and their guest to the places they wish to go while still getting in the down-time that we want and need…  First stop?  Privateer Bay, Norman Island.

N18°18.670
W064°37.559



The Willy T is an icon here in the BVI and a place that almost everyone who comes here would like to visit.  We’ve been there many times and frankly it no longer appeals to us.  So, we chose to visit an alternate anchorage where our friends could choose to anchor for free, take a ball, or go on into the Bight and get a ball there closer to the Willy T.  


We were somewhat relieved when they chose to go into the Bight, not because we didn’t want them close, but because we knew that they wanted to go and party at the Willy T... Plus, it was a start in laying the path toward greater autonomy for us all.  Unfortunately it didn’t work out so well… As they motored away from Privateer Bay toward the Bight, their engine overheated.

I got a call on the VHF that they turned it off and were adrift.  I offered help immediately, we would drop the dinghy or pull up our anchor and come raft up… After a few minutes, they were back underway again and on their way to the mooring ball.

Sigh of relief… We got back to work putting the boat to bed… then another call on the radio.  It was overheated again and they were going to grab the nearest ball and would Bruce mind coming to help troubleshoot?  No problem.  Perk of having a Buddy Boat... I fixed Bruce a sandwich and off he went in the dinghy leaving me there on the boat to make sure we held our position.  

Long story short, it was the impeller.  The boys found all of the pieces and the engine was good to go again, disaster averted.  Bruce returned home and we enjoyed our solitude and the sunset while our friends went out and partied at the Willy T.  

We enjoyed a new anchorage and got some down time.  In the morning we would choose a new destination… if we were alone, we probably would have stayed another night, but tomorrow promises to be another fun day.  


Bruce and I left our life and set out on this adventure together… just the two of us.  In the years since we left we have become very much more spontaneous and relaxed about time.  We hadn’t realized just how much we had changed until now and we are searching for a middle ground…  We're enjoying having a Buddy Boat... but we love our individuality too…  We’ll figure it out…

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