Happy New Year's 2007

Recently our niece Lauren and her best friend Emily spent 10 days with us on Crossroads. To be honest, I was a little worried. I mean, after all, 10 days in a small space could seem like a very long time. Instead, we had a ball and the time flew by.


On New Year’s Eve day we started by visiting artist Nancy Nicholson at her studio. She showed us the steps she goes through to make potter’s clay from the hard clay lumps she digs up. It was great to see an artist at work and she was kind enough to show us paintings and pottery pieces that were not on display at her gallery in town.
The girls were also excited because earlier that day they had a “Dr. Phil sighting” on one of the mega yachts. Later that day we joined Dragonfly and took Mr. B’s cab up to Shirley Heights for a sunset view, barbeque, and steel drum concert. The view from the old fort at Shirley Heights is hard to beat. We could see the inner and outer anchorages of English Harbor as well as Falmouth Harbor where Crossroads was anchored. Believe it or not, after all that it was just 8:00 pm – still 4 hours to go to make it to midnight. We headed back to the boat to get ready for New Year’s Eve at Nelson’s Dockyard. This turned out to be a great venue to people watch in a very diverse crowd of cruisers, yacht crew and locals. We settled into a spot and quickly starting meeting people. The first in our cast of characters was a guy we named “Spinnaker Jim”. He was wearing a black wig and the remains of a spinnaker that was torn in an Atlantic crossing. He reminded us of our good friend Jim Fain. We thought the guy was going to be a little crazy, but as it turned out he was one of the more focused, sane guys we met all night. Most of the people we met were young and male, I guess due to the magnetic attraction of our 18-year-old guests. Everyone thought Glenn and I were Lauren and Emily parents. I know it’s a compliment, but we are used to being the cool, young aunt and uncle and becoming the parents put a different spin on things. We danced and watched the fire works over beautiful English harbor. It was a great way to bring in 2007.

New Year’s day we made a big breakfast and the girls went for a kayak ride. That afternoon we took the girls on a hike where they saw their first baby kid goat. Glenn made his yummy chili for dinner (ground beef, not goat). Needless to say we all crashed early. Tuesday we slept in and went in to town for our big shopping excursion. We loved the gallery that Nancy owns but were having trouble deciding what to buy. Glenn and I have been looking for “real” art throughout our journey. Strangely enough, we have not found much amazing art, mostly the “paint by numbers” looking un-original stuff. At Nancy’s gallery, Glenn and I could have bought a million things for our next house. So with our Christmas money in hand we bought pottery and art.

We left Falmouth harbor later that day to sail to Carlisle bay - big mistake. It was windy as all get out and the waves were huge. We only had 5 miles to go but boy was it a rough introduction to sailing for Emily. We had a rolly restless night and left for Jolly harbor early the next day. We decided to take a mooring on the inside to guarantee that we would be in a very calm harbor. The girls quickly took off for the beach. Friday the girls and I took the bus into St. John’s and Glenn rode his bike in and met us for pizza. St. John’s is the cruise ship harbor so there are lots of shops and sights to check out. Saturday was the last day of the girl’s trip, so they opted for an easy day on the beach. Our stay in Antigua was one of the highlights of the journey for me. I loved sitting on the foredeck of the boat at night watching the stars with Glenn and the girls. We spotted Orion and Cassiopeia and watched a beautiful full moon light up the harbor.

We want to give a special thanks to Jann and David for lending us their daughter and sending all our favorite goodies. Glenn is extremely grateful for the supply of honey and peanuts. I am very thankful for the lifetime supply of mucinex and People magazine. One day we hope to repay your kindness.

Michele