Up and at em by 0830. Brekkie then customs to get ourselves “cleared out” i.e. Taken off the boat papers (we think that means just put a line through our names and stamp it). It’s kind of complicated. When you arrive you’re “cleared in”, your passport is stamped and the boat is given paperwork stating who’s on which boat. Then you’re meant to leave on the same boat. If not you need to get taken off the boat papers otherwise the skipper gets into trouble when (s)he leaves as they’re responsible for who they bring in. They don’t want people arriving by boat then never leaving. We get 28 days without a visa but if you leave the boat you’re meant to have (a) proof of new boat to go to (b) a flight ticket (c) proof of sufficient funds to get yourself out the country.
We plan to fly out around the 4th Jan to Panama but as yet (Internet really ropey!!) we haven’t got flights sorted. So we thought there’d be loads of hassle but because of all the ARC boats and all the paperwork that that’s brought we think the couldn’t be bothered. They just said when you fly out you’ll get your exit stamp. As for the boat papers they said it didn’t matter. Oh well.
After that we tried yet again on Internet with little success and then returned to the boat. Cuthbert let us know he has been in touch with some friends about good accommodation options for us and he’ll let us know later. Great service :0) We’re thinking a couple more days here at Rodney Bay as we haven’t actually explored it much, then head to a different part of the island. So we’ll see what happens. We leave New Dawn tomorrow morning.
There’s been some rain showers the last day or so. But nothing prepared us for the near monsoon we’ve been having today. It hasn’t let up. It was quite refreshing to start with but now it’s just plain wet!!
But we can’t complain. We’ve hardly had any rain on our entire trip and it’s not snow like you guys all have in the UK! It’s not like it’s cold or anything!!
Hi Huw and Bernice, Murphy’s law took its effect on my
return trip to Luxembourg where I ended up spending most parts of
two days in airports in St Lucia, Barbados and Gatwick, as flights
were delayed starting in St Lucia and it snowballed all the way to
Luxembourg. Well I arrived well late last night and well tired.
Here they have had 60 cm of snow and most of it is still there. So
it will be a white Christmas. I have finally had the possibility to
read your blog. I enjoyed reading it and it is a good account of
our trip from Las Palmas to Cap Verde and further on to St Lucia
and it has a lot of good and interesting comments. I especially
like Bernice’s thoughts about her mum during her watches; nice…
Have a great Christmas and hope your trip to the next yacht will be
good and that you will have a successful trip across the Pacific,
where we might meet up some day, if I ever get S/Y New Dawn heading
west again. All the best wishes. Paul S/Y New Dawn
Hey Paul what a mission home!!!! Well I’m sure Chris and the boys were glad you made the effort. Have a great Xmas and yes we’ll keep you posted and who knows we may well meet up again… Till the next time :0)