We awoke to a sunnier day than the last two. There was a lot of activity at the marina dock as the 60-foot sailboats made their preparations to begin the final leg of their race around the world. About 8:30 am, Gale, Maureen and Big Lucy (we call her ‘Big L’ now) went out for a dinghy ride to explore a little bit more of the harbor. We also wanted to let Lucy swim for awhile to burn off some of her excess energy after being cooped up in the boat for so many days.
Just before 10 am, we went back to pick up Little Lucy and then motored out into the harbor again to take pictures of the sailboats as they left the dock. The ten clippers left one at a time which provided ample photo opportunities. The plan was
to rendezvous outside the harbor and then spend a few hours getting used to the boats and getting ready for the 2 pm race start. As mentioned in a previous entry, there are seven legs to this race and the seventh and final leg began in Port Antonio. Sailors sign up for one or more legs at a personal cost of $12,000 per person, per leg. The race will end in New York.
After the boats were out of the harbor, we splashed both dinghies and set out to find the “famous” Blue Lagoon where the movie of the same name was filmed many years ago. Brooke Shields was the female lead in that movie and she was a young teen at the time. We stopped two or three times to find out if we were on the right track to the lagoon and heard more than once, “it’s just around the next point.” After a few such points, we were finally rewarded in our search and came upon the lovely setting. There were a couple of entrepreneurs there with their bamboo rafts taking people for romantic rides around the lagoon. We stayed in our own boats and explored the small area on our own.
Fletcher, a guy at the Blue Lagoon who was building a floating bamboo barge, told us that if we wanted to take the dogs to a nice beach, we should continue on “around the next point.” We followed his directions and found an abandoned resort with a nice beach. Evidently, this was not the beach he referred us to since the security guard said it was closed and we were not allowed ashore. We asked about a beach and she directed us “around the next point” where we did find a public beach and a spot to let the dogs run for a few minutes.
Back aboard the dinghies, we decided it was time to head back to the harbor – the only problem? – the 16-foot dinghy wouldn’t crank over! We had experienced problems starting the dinghy several times since leaving Stuart, but had always been able to get it going again. No worries, Mon, we simply towed the big dinghy behind the little dinghy and set out. Away from the shoreline, we could see that the race had not yet started and the boats were circling around all vying to be in the best starting position when the gun went off. When we were about halfway back, Mark and Jim hollered to let us know that they got their dinghy started. Gale and Maureen untied the towing line and both the small boats went back under their own power.
By 2:15 pm we were safely aboard Adventure where we racked the dinghies and prepared to leave for Jamaica.
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