Wednesday, July 24th

We awoke with the wind howling at 20+ knots and gusts to 35 knots.  Our new 35lb spade anchor was holding well so we were very happy with this investment.  Based on the forecast we decided to stay here another day and spent the morning doing jobs on the boat.  We called the Dutch couple on the radio and invited them over for dinner that evening, when the winds were forecast to have diminished. 

It turned out to be a day full of action.  First off, we noticed a sailboat trying to beat into the harbor (against the wind).  Presumably she had engine problems.  Anyway she wasn’t sailing at all well in the 30 knot winds and was making very little progress.  Ron called the marina to report the boat in difficulties and was told that the coastguard had just been dispatched.  So we had a grandstand view of the coastguard taking her in tow and depositing her on a mooring in the harbor. 

By mid afternoon the winds were still howling, but having invited our new friends to dinner we had to brave the dinghy trip to town to get groceries.  We had some spray in our faces, nothing too serious, but it was odd tasting salt for the first time.  (We’ve been in fresh water up until now). 

The winds died down at about 6pm, Dennis and Ank came over at 6:30 and we had a very pleasant evening with them.  Their boat, Bodyguard, was anchored further inshore than ours and they were a little concerned that it would ground at low tide.  They kept their eye on her from our boat and around 9pm, Dennis went over to check things out from his dinghy.  Unfortunately, he was a little late and Bodyguard was already aground.  So they both went back to her to see if anything needed to be done, and Ron followed to see if his help was needed.  (It wasn’t).  Ron returned to Quinita, where Teresa was keeping her eye on a third boat that appeared to be drifting between Quinita and Bodyguard.  It had no navigation lights, or anchor lights, but there were some lights on in the cabin.  Ron went over in the dinghy to see if they needed help.  A man and woman appeared and said they were anchored there.  They weren’t – they had an anchor out but we’re quite sure from the way they were drifting it wasn’t touching the seabed.  So we told them they needed to be further away from us, since we had 200ft of anchor rode.  They agreed to move and “re-anchor”.  A while later, they drifted back towards us, and when hailed, the woman came out and stated that her captain told her the anchor was properly set and there was no problem.  They drifted to within a few feet of us and agreed to move again.  This time they actually started their engine and moved off out of sight, still with no lights on.  We think drink may have been involved!  The boat had an apt name – Surprise!

By 12:30, we saw that Bodyguard has almost re-floated, and Surprise was nowhere to be seen, so we went to bed.