The Astarte Exercise Program

Saturday was an all-out active day for the crew and guests aboard Astarte. It started in the morning with Michael filling the diesel tanks with the on-deck 15-gallons. Then he and Dave rowed to shore to fill the tanks. They had to row because of the broken outboard, then, they lucked out and got a lift to the gas station to fill the jugs. They rowed back with the additional weight of 15 gallons of diesel. Then they filled the tank and went back for 10 more gallons. Again, this required a row to shore. Luck didn’t smile on them and they had to walk to the gas station. They went to one but the fuel was a dollar per gallon more – so they hiked the extra distance to get the cheaper fuel…and unfortunately also had to walk back carrying the jugs…and rowed back to the boat. Then it was everyone in the water to snorkel around the boat. It was mostly grass patches and a few soft corals, some small tropical fish and a barracuda that befriended Dave.

After a warm-up on the boat, we decided to row out to the edge of the big reef near the really deep wall and see what the wall was like. It was a long row. We tied to a mooring buoy and all snorkeled over a magnificent, albeit deep, reef. It was a healthy reef with lots and lots of fish, healthy coral, big groupers, schools of fish, beautiful sea fans and more. We stayed in the water a long time amazed at how deep it got right off the edge.

The row back to the boat was a group effort. Lorna and Barbara went back in for another around the boat snorkel and discovered a pretty little coral patch a little way from the boat. Barbara also saw some interesting squid (or cuttlefish?). Then it was salt water baths for everyone with freshwater rinses.

But that wasn’t enough exercise – so the group decided to row to shore and see what kind of excitement was in Grand Turk on Saturday evening. We roamed around town in search of a place that supposedly had great ribs - but determined it might be a bit far to walk – Dave had already put in a pretty active day and his legs may not be up to more walking. So we stopped at a local beer stand for a cold brew. Rowed back to the boat for dinner and yet another green flash sunset.

Talk of another domino tournament was just that – talk. The group activities of the day had everyone pretty tuckered and after a hearty meal – sleep was the only tournament to be played.

Activities started ashore about 10 pm with some music that played until 3 am. And as Jimmy Buffett said, “There’s a fine line between Saturday night and Sunday morning,” the music on shore began again at 6:30 am – only this time it was a group baptism on shore near the boat and a choir singing (the same song over and over and over again – probably until everyone got dunked).

Look closely, Baptism in progress.

More snorkeling on the agenda today as well as organizing, packing, voyage planning, GPS point inputting etc. Dave and Lorna preparing to leave and Michael and Barbara ready to take advantage of what looks to be a good weather window to get to Puerto Rico and get the outboard situation solved. We’ll skip the DR as it would be tough to be there without an outboard.