Cruising With High States: Hurrican Dean, Celebrating Birthdays, Merengue Night

August 2007,
Another busy month that has flown by.

HIGH STATES at anchor. The calm before the storm.

Luperon Harbour

HOLY TOLEDO......NO; HOLY DEAN....What a day yesterday was.....We ended up with two huge squalls beating us up a bit.....When we were in Spanish Wells we were in 63 knot winds and managed with one anchor down so we thought we'd be okay here too when we heard DEAN would be 200 miles off Luperon. About 3 pm; while Rand was having a rest and I was reading ; it was amazing...like a feeling in the air of change.... We both jumped up and all of a sudden one of the boats was calling out.....so and so boat is dragging...so and so boat is dragging.....We looked out in the cockpit and I said to Randy "oh no UNWIND is dragging". They are probably a good 100 yards behind us and they were "dancing" helter skelter. All of a sudden Randy said "" We're dragging too!!! Because the wind wasn't constant we feel it just picked us up, just like that... Motor on and Randy jumps into the dinghy with our spare anchor and threw it overboard. He then decided we were getting to close to "Cosmic Convergence" ...by this time two other dinghy's came to his aid and helped him pull up the spare anchor while I continued to stay at the helm of High States. He got the spare anchor into our dinghy and oh my gosh he and the anchor are covered in mud. Coming back to High States he decided we'd reset our first anchor closer to the mangroves...we got ready to do that and it didn't look good so pulled the anchor back up and decided to drop the anchor basically as close as to where we were before. He's on the bow giving me signals to turn the boat around and reposition us which I did and we dropped the anchor. Deciding to put the second anchor down again he rowed back out and put the second anchor off our port side. What a challenge.It took a couple of hours to clean everything up and then around 7 pm we heard another squall was heading our way. This time the winds weren't as bad but the rain was incredible. We were soaked again and could not see more than 50 yards in front of us. By this time we are exhausted. Another advisory came over channel 68 ( harbour channel) that there shouldn't be any more storms for the night...We actually only woke up a couple of times. You know the one nice thing out of this weather was the evening was cool... We actually weren't dripping wet all night. This morning we went into the Sunday swap and shop and around 2 pm Randy said it's looking nasty back out in the harbour, so off we went....The rain was like hail ;sharp and cold. The seas were up which made for a rough ride home. and the visibility was very poor. We managed to open all the water intakes and collected some fresh water. Tonight things seem to have settled down. We've just had dinner and it looks like we're in for a quiet night. It sounds like the next couple of days will continue to be unsettled but we're hoping for the best. We figure the next time we hear a hurricane is heading our way we'll tie into the mangroves and wait it out.

Aug.2nd

Evelyn has managed to get a Gua-gua for a trip to the Parque National La Isabella. The Enterprise crew are joining us. Originally La Isabella was called Villa de Navidad (Christmas Village) by Columbus on Dec.25th, 1492. Columbus left 39 men to protect his new city and when he returned one year later he found them all dead. The “city” burned down. The story states that the settlers had raped and kidnapped the local native women so the chief had them killed. La Isabella was abandoned when Columbus set up nis new “city” at Santo Domingo

Skeleton of Spanish Sailor

We stopped for a traditional lunch of chicken, beans and rice with a salad primarily made out of cabbage. Of coarse lunch is not complete without the Presidantes. The restaurant was full of flies and the local chickens were running in and out of the restaurant. The girls entertained us with their dancing skills.

After lunch we hiked to Playa Punta Deborah---a beautiful calm beach where we all enjoyed a swim.

Sat. Aug.4th

Our local baseball team which we participate in some times was invited to a neighboring town for a baseball game.

After the game the "Gringos" were given a wonderful local Dominican lunch hosted by the Home Team.

Aug. 13th.

Our Yanmar parts are in so we’re off to Santo Domingo. Art and Becky have joined us.

Aug. 20th. Games Night up at the Yacht Club.

Well, yes I am sure you do see lots of Cervesa bottles and no games, however, we did in fact learn how to play Mexican Train Dominoes

Here Katrina and Caylin give Liz (Carrey Okies) and "Bear" a big hug.

Aug.21st.
Happy Birthday Lynn
What a fun evening. Randy threw me a surprize dinner party at The Upper Deck. (The Upper Deck is where we attend our Spanish Lesson twice a week.) Derek, Evelyn, Caylin; Jeanette & Bill; Virginia, Ron, Katrina & Cailyn; and Becky and Art helped celebrate. Randy had Wendy (the owner) make a chocolate cake topped off with icecream.

Our friend Jessie who works for Wendy. Her husband is Benvenito, our Spanish teacher.

Caylin and Jeanette

Evelyn, Ron & Rand

Randy, Bill & Derek

Katrina & Caitlyn

Aug.24th
Merengue night. Evelyn organized an evening of Merengue lessons at the Upper Deck.

I am dancing with Benvenito, our dance instructor.

Here Rand is being taught the Merengue by the female instructor.

Evelyn and Derek

Aug. 27th.
Happy Birthday Rand. We celebrated at El Belga, an Italian Restaurant. The tables were outdoors under a covered patio.

This morning Randy had said to me"Lynn, let's just celebrate my Birthday quietly". I said OK. Meeting Derek and Evelyn for breckfast, they said "What are you doing for Randy's Birthday"?

I said he didn't want to celebrate. Well--"We'll find you guys where ever you are even on your boat and we'll be Birthday Crashers"!!!

So here we all are at El Belga and of coarse had a wonderful time.