Kai Ohana

March 4, 2008 -
Virgin Gorda

- by Preston Bach

I finally woke up after a two-hour nap from hell. The boat was still pitching and I decided it would take less energy to sit up at the helm and give my hallucinating father moral support than to stay in the cabin and death-grip my bed frame trying to keep me and my mattress from crashing to the floor. I made my accent to the helm, the whole time thinking how delicious a five-course breakfast would be after not eating anything in two days but some crackers and a granola bar; I could have eaten damn near any thing.

I slowly drug my carcass to the wheel where my paps was still sitting, a bit more cheerful than I had seen him in the last two days. I looked toward the bow and realized why. He was studying two chunks of high rock with a narrow pass in between. I then looked to the stern and was even happier to see that my “Corvette” (our 14ft rigid inflatable dingy with a 48 hoarse power outboard) was still being quickly towed behind our 50-ton ship and hadn’t been lost at sea during the night’s high seas. The only reason I think my corvette was still behind us in the morning was because the day before my dad had promised to give her a couple big smooches if she was still following us when we got into port, and later that day he kept his promise.

We still had about two hours before we made our way through the Ginger Island Pass into the lee of the islands south of Spanish Town. While we sailed toward the pass, Captain Daddy Paps told me about an experience he had had the night before. He had not slept properly in about thirty-eight hours and was starting to get a little loopy around 10:00 pm when our small red-lit Danforth compass started to make animated faces at my sleep deprived father, then proceeded to give the captain little pearls of knowledge which he couldn’t quite make out. Moments later, mom (The Admiral), walked up to the helm to see how he was doing. Paps’ immediately asked if she was coming to relieve him explaining the compass’ antics. She stopped him halfway through and told him she didn’t want to hear any of that freaky stuff. After he had finished telling me his story, I was even happier to see the Virgin Islands because that meant he wouldn’t be having any more late night conversations with Mr. Danforth Compass.

We had just done our first passage in our refurbished boat from St. Martin to Virgin Gorda and it was an absolutely hellish trip. When we pulled into Spanish Town and performed one of the most perfect anchor jobs we’ve done to date, the majority of the crew was ready to jump ship and never do an overnight sail again. Then we all went ashore. My parents found the immigration office and filled out the repetitive paperwork, while my sisters and I explored the waterfront, letting our sea legs wear off and searching for all the facilities on our list (drinking water, grocery stores, restaurants, garbage bins, laundry, fuel, bar, coffee shop, internet, bus stops and routes and an assortment of other cruiser necessities). Then we went on a search to finding the greasiest cheeseburger on the Island. I’ve never really related to Jimmy Buffet’s “Cheese Burger in Paradise”, but after that sail, it was one of my favorite songs. (continued on next page)

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