Adventures on Beannacht

Beannacht tied up beside Johnny Depp's boat in San Juan. There's been a fuss all week about town and here's me thinking they'd heard we'd arrived.

Some days blog writing feels like hard work, or at least a low priority.

We’ve been in San Juan for over a week now, and it’s fair to describe it as a regrouping. The short take on the second part of the arrival story is this:

So having arrived in San Juan at 11pm we were met by two US Customs officials who drove us to their clearance centre and processed our passports. I didn’t have a US visa in advance, hence the need to contact the Coastguard, but amazingly they were able to issue me with a one off discressionary visa that is valid for a 6-month stay here. We were both knackered and at 1pm got back on the boat and slept till the morning.

So over a week later we’re still here and beginning to get our shit together and think about mum and dad’s arrival at the end of the month. Old Tom and (older) Hazel have very generously (like they had a choice I’m their eldest son) booked flights up to the British Virgin Islands, meaning that we’re only about 80 miles away and have a couple of weeks to regroup and put some more energy into the boat. So far we’ve not had much luck with visitors, the only other attempted arrival was Mike Toner and we didn’t arrive on time for him either… we’re working on it, but these sailboats just don’t travel as fast as I’d like.

 

Our leaving party at Luperon, Luc hosted the gang and we had a blast.

My 30^th birthday came and went on Saturday and Kel organised a few little celebrations to mark the occasion. Firstly a pancake breakfast with homemade applesauce – what’s not to love? Then a trip to a local car dealership to collect a Harley for 24 hours. Not a bike I would own, but a bike all the same. We went to the rainforest about 30 miles east of San Juan and stopped for ice cream or coffee every 30 minutes to give Kel’s ass a break. Harleys are not designed for passengers apparently, or the average Harley pillion is sterile, or perhaps should be sterile for they’re rarely pretty.

It’s been fun to be back in a big city again for a couple of days. We went to the mall for a few ‘essential’ items (read things we don’t need and can’t afford), and went to see X Men in the cinema, we hadn’t been to the cinema since Vancouver. It’s funny to look at the posters advertising what’s on and not recognise most of the actors never mind the movie titles. We’re similarly out of touch with most world news, although we do manage to follow most of the Lions stuff, which is great.

 

Stu's birthday breakfast

And so back to porridge, or rather Cornflakes with yogurt and honey. We started our list of ToDos that we want to finish before mum and dad get here. Today was taking out our starboard side window to fix a leak, and tidying the cockpit. Then to Starbucks for some Internet to watch the Lions game before some research on electricity – to buy a generator or not to buy a generator, this is the question. Or at least it was today.

 

Walmart saw us coming.. again.

Actually to buy or not to buy has been applied to almost everything in the last month or so, sadly the pennies in the bank are small in stature and we’re having to cook up some ideas for income generation to keep the sailing dream alive beyond the summer. A combination of our fantastic ability to spend money, underestimating the cost of setting up a boat for cruising, and the pound getting killed by the dollar for the last year, brings income to the top of the priority list. One of the reasons we’re really grateful for mum and dad changing their travel plans is that it buys us a couple of weeks to think through where we should go next. We’re both really committed to staying on the boat and either working where we are or working over the Internet. I’ve been developing an idea to provide remote support for organisations in Northern Ireland in creative writing – report writing and website copy – and Kel’s researching resorts that she could offer Thai massages at – without the happy ending. We’re both a bit nervous about the whole thing, but nows the time to stick our necks out and get on with it.

 

Logan's Irish Pub, a poor excuse for an Irish bar if ever we saw one. There's been no Guinness in Puerto Rico for 4 years apparently.

Anyhow, turning 30 has renewed my commitment to running, I’m off to bed so I can get up for a lap of Old San Juan in the morning.