It was the late 70s, and we still practically newly weds, when I said something like “hey honey, let’s buy a boat”.    Brenda and I had been sailing together since our junior year of high school when we sailed aboard a Carl Alberg Typhoon out or Norwalk with our friend Chris.  It was from Chris that I caught the sailing bug.

Well, Brenda must have said yes, or is perhaps guilty of not putting up a better fight, but one way or the other, we settled on our first boat.   Somehow we found a tiny, although it didn’t seem particularly tiny to us at the time, Cape Cod catboat, a Mystic 20 built in Groton CT named Tao.    She was named, as are so many “cat” boats, after a cat.  In this case, the Siamese cat in the Disney story “The Incredible Journey”.

We looked at her in Mystic CT and it was love at first sight.  Our very first boat.   I believe this is a shot of her in the marina, the day we took delivery.
We headed out, aboard Tao, with our friends, Chris and Pat for the run back to Bridgeport where we planned to keep her.    I was a happy guy.   Happy to have a boat that was better looking than my hat.    Well, this shot wasn’t taken on that exact day, but it illustrates my point. Brenda, perhaps happy as well but only until she discovered, to her extreme distress, that she was prone to nausea when things got bumpy.  Which on a small boat, is nearly all of the time.  I wish I could say that she eventually got over it, but not completely, even to this day, 40 years later.

Look at her. Her expression is very nearly “come hither”.  Worked for me…

I guess it was a calm day on the water.  Nice sweater,  she knitted this one and many, many others, over the years.  Hundreds?  Quite possibly.
Well, we finally made it to Bridgeport where I had arranged for a mooring to be installed off of the beach, down the street from the duplex apartment that we were renting at the time.

That arrival day, when we tied up to the mooring off of the beach,  was not a calm day.  Not at all.  Once we were secured to the mooring, Brenda leaped overboard, foul weather gear and all, and waded ashore.   I don’t recall what she said or perhaps thought exactly, about that first cruise but I am pretty sure it isn’t printable.    Not a great way to begin our sailing life together.

Shortly after that horrible beach landing, perhaps the very next day, I moved the boat to a more sheltered mooring in a nearby harbor.

From that day forward there has been an ongoing quest to find calm anchorages.  Sometimes we were actually successful. We hung out with our friends Chris and Pat along with others, nearly every weekend.   No outboard engines on our dinks in those days.  Chris and Garrett with me in the bow.  Good thing it was a calm anchorage.   Rub a dub, dub…

Chris and Pat’s Sea Sprite 23 had an outboard.  Way to small for an inboard.
We joined the Catboat Association and were members for many years.  Eventually, Brenda and I ended up on the board, or “steering committee”.  Get it “steering” the association, like a boat?  Clever?  We thought so.

We also participated in many catboat races in those days.   However, like today, back then, if you ask Brenda what her favorite part of sailing is, she will say, predictably, “being anchored”.
And anchor we did.  I particularly like this shot of Brenda.   What a dish.  I’d totally date that girl.   To starboard, a mop, or some bleach blond chick.  No, a mop, really. However, anchoring alone was rare for us as we nearly always rafted up with other small boats.  Somehow three tiny boats tied up together don’t seem, well, so tiny.   That became even more important when we all started popping out kiddos.    However, we weren’t in a rush, as while we were “yacht owners” we didn’t want to bring kids into the world until we were really settled.

To us, being “settled” meant a microwave and garage, which weren’t in place until we’d been married for nearly 8 years.  Actually, there was more to it than that as we were pretty much kids ourselves when we got married, our early 20s.  Kids having kids doesn’t always work out so well.

Here’s Tao rafted with her bigger sister Lady Bug, a Legnos 10-3 and Petrel, a sister ship to Tao owned by Toby and Martha Forbes.   We met them. along with their son and his family that owned Lady Bug in Port Jefferson.   We became long time friends and eventually moved into the guest cottage on their estate Oak Knoll, in Ridgefield not long after this shot was taken. This is where Toby and Martha lived, in the main house.  It was built by Frederick Remington, the artist, as a summer home.   We loved it there and lived on the estate for, I think, three years.   Oak Knoll was designated as a historic site in the 60s. I was a really charming little cottage, once the home of the estate gardener and also built by Remington.  It was a great spot and the deck, nearly as large as our cottage, provided a spectacular view. I loved working out in the yard, or should I say, the South 40, clearing brush and cutting dead wood for the wood stove.   Toby and Martha were very happy to have the help, I think.  I am not absolutely positive about that, but they were always very gracious.   They left us pretty much alone and it wasn’t until years later that we really became good friends.  We all wished we had spent more time together when we lived in the cottage.

Toby and Martha met during WWII in SanDiego.  Toby was a PBY Catalina amphibious airplane Navy pilot.  Martha love to tell the story of how she was smitten by him when she first saw Toby in his uniform and went right up to him and took his arm.  They were a wonderful couple.

Here I am with my college buddy Tom, driving the tractor.  “Bob, let me drive, let me drive!”  Tom now lives in Marblehead MA and is an active sailboat racer with his wife Lisa.  It was a lovely cottage.  I believe this is a shot of the living room.  Want to guess what time of the year it is?  That’s right Christmas.  Gold star for you.

Notice the stuffed decorations on the tree and the skirt.  Brenda sewed them all.  We also sewed those lovely covers for the chair cushions.  Not a bad pattern.  Since then we’ve upgraded.  No more vinyl sling chairs for us.
It was aboard Tao that we learned to enjoy gin and tonics, perhaps from Toby and Martha.  It must have been too early in the day for that when this shot was taken.   We are still in regular touch with Chris and Pat, to this day.  Our youngest is named for Chris, actually.
We fished but once caught, we had no idea what to do with our catch on on such a small boat.  Besides, who actually eats bluefish?
In those days, no protection from the weather so foul weather gear was in use nearly all of the time.  Brenda just loved being coated with salt, even on a sunny day.  Tao was a wet boat and to make matters worse, no shower.   There’s that hat again.  I guess it was on sale.  I can’t think of any other reason I’d buy it.  Heck, perhaps it was free.  Had to be…
Not sure about how this shot fits in.  I just like it. We sailed as late into the season as we could and I can still remember the one Memorial Day Weekend when I couldn’t get the boat ready in time.  I wasn’t happy at all about that.  Mechanical problems, I recall.  Isn’t that always the reason?
I guess Brenda hadn’t yet seen “Jaws”.   Thanks Stephen, I never really got over that, myself.   DUH DUH…DUH DUH…DUH DUH DHU…However, I have always been fairly sure that sharks don’t eat clammers.   Well, mostly sure.  Don’t you just love the speedo?
We sailed Tao, far and wide, farther and wider than was reasonable, in such a tiny boat.  Oh, did I mention that it had an even tinier 5hp one cylinder diesel?  When it was running, it sounded like someone rattling a stone in a coffee can.  Bang, bang, bang… I still have the prop on my desk as a paper weight.

We covered a lot of ground from Bridgeport to Nantucket and down to Barnegat Bay NJ.  Brenda was not amused when we went through NYC, Hell gate sideways and into a snotty SW wind under the Verazanno Bridge with a full ebb against the wind and a huge chop.

After that experience, it wasn’t until we headed south in our SAGA 43 Pandora, that she went through NYC again, more than 20 years, or was it 30 years later, declaring “Well, that wasn’t so bad”.  You go girl!  She is such a sport.

Once, we even sprung for spot on the dock at Bannister’s Wharf in Newport, behind the famous ocean racer Boomerang.  For a 20′ boat the cost of dockage, by the foot was about the same as a fixed rate mooring.   It was a really long way down from the dock to the deck at low tide.
Remember Buzzards bay Light near Martha’s Vineyard?    It’s now a tall flasher but no longer manned or with a chopper deck for switching crew.
We passed the light on our way to the Vineyard and Nantucket.  It was a really long way to go in a 20′ boat.   Perhaps easy to get there, with the SW prevailing winds but tough to get back in time to go to work after our two week holiday.   And, when it got foggy, no radar, GPS, just dead-reckoning in pea soup, not sure what was coming our way.

And, there was always a lot of commercial traffic coming our way.  This freighter pre-dates the current container ships that dominate world trade.  This sort, the type that sports it’s own cranes for loading and unloading, are still used in some really small ports but most have been scrapped. Our one trip to Nantucket aboard Tao was to visit the Opera House Cup, an annual gathering of classic yachts.   This is the original Malabar class schooner, by the same name, designed by John Alden .  I tried my best to get a spot on this boat for one of the races.  No luck. Back in the early 80s, there we still a lot of older fishing boats out on Block Island Sound.  That was before the modern draggers that decimated the fish population.
And, there was no fishing village more charming than Menemsha, Martha’s Vineyard.  This is an old style sword fishing boat.  A spotter would stand on the cross tree on the mast, supported by the hoops.  When they saw a fish swimming along the surface, they’d go up on a long bowsprit and harpoon the fish.    A lot of swordfish were landed at these docks.However, adventures aside, and there were plenty of them aboard Tao, we had some of our best times just lazing along on a calm summer evening, G&T in hand.
And it was on this very evening, when this shot was taken by our artist friend Chris, while aboard his own boat, that he immortalized Tao and her crew in the painting that he did for me as a gift on my 25th birthday.  For me, that painting immortalizes those wonderful times along with those famous words, “hey honey, let’s buy a boat”.   I’m pretty sure that sometimes Brenda still wishes she had said, “let me think about that for a while”.

Setting that aside, and I do, it’s been a great ride.

Now that I am settled, sort of, into the reality that cold is going to be the word of the day for the next few months, I have been wondering exactly what I will write about.  In years passed before I retired and we headed south for the winter, I somehow found a way to keep posts flowing, but for this winter I fear that I will find myself  at odds as to what I can write about for the next few months.  It’s really easy to write about boats and such when we are aboard one but now, not so easy.

Sure, I can write about the upgrades to Pandora but just how much scintillating prose can one absorb about heat guns and scrapers as I tease out the mess that’s ,no longer, holding up the headliner?

My brother Bill had suggestion that is intriguing.  He had initially shared this idea with me a while back but I never took it to heart and that was to write about the “olden days”, a sort of “what I did on my summer vacation” story.  Ok, described that way perhaps it, does sound like a big yawn but I am going to try a version of that.  With that in mind, I’ll try to go easy on you and bring something to the discussion beyond the “we went from Block Island to Cuttyunk and it rained with wind on the nose and took xxx hours….”

No, instead I’ll, well I’m not sure what I’ll write but I’ll try to make it interesting.

So, yesterday I went up into the attic to pull out a few boxes, and let me tell you these boxes are big, full of years of photos, both prints and 35mm slides.   I’ll admit that I got a bit teary eyed as I sorted through nearly 50 years of photos trying to decide where to begin.

As it’s close to Christmas as I write this, I also found myself thinking about an Osborn Family Tradition of watching National Lampoon’s Family Vacation with Chevy Chase, on Christmas Day, after all the packages are unwrapped.  Griswold had the crying gene too, big time.

My trip to the attic reminded me of the scene in the movie when he becomes trapped up in the attic.  If you recall the scene, skip this 2 minute clip.  If not, view on and you’ll get the idea.  And, speaking of wonderful memories and old photos.   I ordered a photo converter that can handle negatives, slides and prints and scan them to digital.  It’s a pretty neat unit and I should have it in a few days.  No wait, it’s going to arrive on Tuesday.   Amazon promises…and I believe.  I BELIEVE!

We have been planning to get a quality scanner for some time now as Brenda still has hundreds of slides to scan for the book she’s working on about Archie Brennan, the tapestry weaver and her long time teacher so we needed it anyway.

“So, Bob, do tell.  What scanner did you order?”   Well, if you insist, it’s an Epson Perfection Document Scanner, and can handle slides, negatives and photos as well as digitize text from a book or magazine which will make plagiarism ever so much easier.  I chose this particular model as it was recommended by Brenda’s publisher as easy to use and fairly fast, even with high density scans.  It even has a few “magic” features that removes dust spots and scratches as well as re-color faded slides and photos.  How do it do dat?

In the meantime, I thought it would be fun to kick off this “series” and write a bit about Artemis, our third boat that met an unfortunate and untimely death when she tangled with a granite dock years ago.

Artemis was a Pearson, Invitca Yawl, built in 1962, one of about 10 built from Bill Tripp Sr’s design.   I am told that the design was similar in form to a Bermuda 40, which you can see from the lines.  She was a beautiful, if slow boat.  We sailed her quite a bit, although she wasn’t very fast, with her 25′ waterline and small sail plan.

As a particular point of interest, Artemis had a famous sibling, Burgoo that won first place, for the entire 142 boat fleet, on corrected time of course, the Bermuda race in 1964.   Event the NY Times wrote about her feat in this article.   Don’t you just love Google?

So, back to Artemis,  and our time aboard her.   We spent a lot of time cruising in those days although it was always in short stints over weekends and our obligatory summer vacation.

Our boys Rob and Chris were a lot smaller then.  Along the way, we often visited Selden Creek, on the CT River, not far from our home now.  It was, and still is, a beautiful spot.  However, we don’t visit aboard Pandora as she’s as long as the creek is wide and draws to much water to get over the bar where the creek meets the river.

Don’t tell anyone but I was trespassing when I took this photo, probably in 1995.    Like the bimini?  I was a striped bed sheet.  Only the finest. A lazy day ghosting along in light air with her mizzen staysail up and drawing nicely.  Brenda and Chris enjoying the easy sail.
I always thought that she was had beautiful lines, and felt the same way about Artemis.   Here we are at the dock at Norwalk Yacht Club, where we were members for many years. Yes, we had some great times aboard.  However, good times do come to an end, sometimes more dramatically than others and Artemis met her end in the harbor during the October nor’easter of 1996.  Many boats went up on the rocks in Long Island Sound that night, over 200, I heard.    There was considerable damage in Wilson Cove, where Artemis was moored with nearly every boat ripped from their moorings.

I had received a call from the club that Saturday morning reporting that “Artemis isn’t on her mooring”.   Off to Norwalk I headed, not knowing what I’d find.   The beach near the club was littered with boats washed up on shore.  During the few short years I owned her, I took great care of her and did what I could to make her a proper yacht.  The name on the transom was hand painted by a sign painter.  That was in the days before the computer created vinyl lettering of today. So, there I found her, poor Artemis, tucked up against a granite dock.   You can’t see it, but she was sitting on top of a J24 which she had crushed under her heavily built fiberglass bulk.  You know the phrase, “they don’t build them like they used to?”   That’s how Artemis was built, but she was still no match for the granite blocks she was pitted against. They duked it out, Artemis and the dock, for hours and the dock won.  Being the “d0-it-yourselfer” I was and still am, I set about to salvage her myself.    First I stuffed bedding, cushions and towels in the huge crack, over 30′ long that ran down much of the port side where the deck and hull separated.   Notice the oil slick that covered everything down below and around the boat. I was able to get a work boat from Tavern Island nearby to help pump her out with a huge fire pump.   All that “stuffing” of the holes helped and once the bulk of the crack was above water, up she rose like Lazarus, from the depths. When the pumps finally took hold she came up in only a few moments.   Then I towed her to a marina where she was hauled out of the water.  I don’t want to think about what would have happened if she had sunk in the middle of the channel on the 2+ mile run to be hauled.  Oh, the ignorance of youth.

Actually, she was scheduled to be hauled for the winter a few days from then as we had our “final” cruise for the season on Columbus Day, only a few days before the storm hit.
She had a lovely galley with a very nice Force 10 Stove and oven. Not quite as nice after…How about the fridge.  At least, I think that’s what this was. Those cushions, the ones I plugged that 30′ crack with, well, they were never all that nice. But, by comparison, beautiful… Oh yeah, we had recently had her re-powered, about a month earlier actually, with a brand new Westerbeke diesel replacing her worn out Atomic 4 gas engine that finally gave up the ghost on our trip up to Martha’s Vineyard only two months earlier.  I think that the engine only had ten hours on it.   Particularly easy access from the cabin sole and particularly easy access for the engine oil and diesel to rise up and soak everything.  Thank goodness that the EPA wasn’t paying attention as I worked to raise her. Note the mooring pennant in the cockpit.  Oops.  Didn’t hold.  She was a great boat and, boy, was I sad when I lost her.  However, she was the only boat I ever owned that actually paid me back.  Not only was she insured for an agreed value of twice what I paid for her, prior to all the improvements, but I was also paid to salvage her.  When all was said and done, I ended up nearly doubling my money.   Not likely to EVER happen again, that’s for sure.   We are talking about boats, after all.

However, like many smitten by being on the water, I quickly doubled down and brought a boat that was cost even more, Elektra, our Tartan 37.  But, that’s a story for another post. so stay tuned.

Of Artemis, I will always have fond memories of times aboard with Brenda and the boys.   Especially in “The Pit” in Port Jefferson, Long Island.  Those were great times.   Well, great except when the weather was crappy, the wind was unfavorable and everyone was feeling a bit under the weather.  Perfect except for that…These days that harbor is chock full of moorings and it’s party city on the weekends with boats rafted up from one shore to the other.

A lot of water has gone over the dam, we’re retired now and both Rob and Chris are on their own and doing well.

I guess that about covers this for now so I’ll close with a shot I took last week of Rob and his brood.  My, times have changed, haven’t they?  But, in a good way.  Aren’t they cute?  Love Tori’s hair.  She’s going to be two in a few weeks.  Time flies indeed. And, Christopher and his girlfriend Melody, as we dropped them at the airport last week after their visit for Thanksgiving, to head back to CA.   They will be back soon.  So great. Yes, things have changed, but in a really good way.

So, there you have it, a bit of reminiscence of times past.    We’re all grown up now and no Artemis didn’t fare so well, but for us, so far, so good.

Let’s hope that our good luck holds.

As far as this post goes, I hope that it doesn’t read too much like “what I did on my summer vacation”.  Actually, it’s seems more like the Poseidon Adventure with sinking boats along with vacations and such.

Griswold, you aren’t alone in getting a bit teary eyed about days past.   Me, I have the crying gene too.    Just don’t get me started.

Here I am, home again in CT, after a week in Antigua to welcome the Dawgs and The Salty Dawg Rally to the Caribbean.  They had a tough slog on the way down, some saying that it was the most difficult run in nearly a decade.

Faced with persistent SE winds, about 25 boats had to stop in Bermuda for fuel repairs or both.  Others kept heading south, working hard to make their way against relentless headwinds.

With the fleet about equally split between making landfall in the BVIs and Antigua, the expectation was that about 30-40 boats would end up in Antigua.  However, with some boats taking nearly 2 weeks to make the run from Hampton, VA, as they passed the BVIs, a number of Antigua bound boats, out of time, stopped there instead of continuing on to Antigua.

I was bummed about that but certainly understand that crew has only a limited time to be away and with Thanksgiving early this year, schedules were tighter than usual.   And, speaking of Thanksgiving, this year it was on November 22nd, but next year it will be nearly a week later, on the 28th, which will take a lot of pressure off of schedules for both skippers and crew.

Anyway, when I arrived in Antigua on November 12th, there wasn’t a Dawg in sight excepting a few that had happily made their way north from Trinidad to meet up with the fleet.   Unfortunately, with nobody in “town” I had to put off the first event.  However, by the time our next event, on the 14th we had a respectable showing so we carried on.

The plan was for the boats to congregate in Nelson’s Dockyard and a number of Dawgs did just that. It was nice to see our rally flag being proudly flown in such a historic spot. Our first event, held at Rhythm of Blue Art Gallery was a great way to kick off a week of celebration for skippers and crew.  Nancy Nicholson, who owns this lovely gallery in English Harbor, timed her season opening to include us and it was a great evening, complete with a terrific reggae band, rum drinks and great sushi appetizers. I expect that Angie of Club Sushi, at the Yacht Club, had a hand in providing the sushi.   I’m no expert but Angie does make great sushi.

Nancy was joined by her mother, Lisa Nicholson at the opening.  Lisa and her husband Desmond came to the island in the 50s and were instrumental in establishing the charter and tourism trades on the island.  The Nicholson family had a lasting impact on Antigua.  I have a book with photos that Nancy’s father Desmond took in the 50s and will be posting them soon.    They are wonderful and show the remarkable transformation that the area has undergone over the decades.

Nancy and her mom.  Note Nancy’s colorful pottery behind them.
True to form, Nancy brought in a great band. It was a lovely evening. A number of “early Dawgs” joined in the fun. But wait, more Dawgs. The ever generous Antigua Yacht Club hosted three events for us.  Count em, three.  That’s a really remarkable showing of how welcome the Dawgs are in Antigua.

I presented a rally flag to AYC Commodore Franklyn Braithwaite.   Franklyn has been tremendously supportive of our efforts to bring the rally to Antigua.  Franklyn is a fixture in Antigua and an accomplished Olympic sailor.   I guess you could say that Franklyn is truly a “Dawg’s best friend”.
And, speaking of the best friends, Janie and Geoffrey Easton, have worked tirelessly on our behalf with local businesses and government agencies to smooth the way in Antigua.   Without their help, things would not have gone so perfectly.  The clubhouse is a great spot to spend time with friends. AYC even opened up the clubhouse for a “down island briefing” hosted by Bill of Kalunamoo to help the Dawgs learn about the best spots to visit between Antigua and Trinidad.  Bill and Maureen have explored the islands extensively over the last few year and were happy to share their experiences. The Dawgs even took time out for a jam session in the Dockyard.  Once again, the Royal Navy Tot Club of Antigua and Barbuda, regaled us with a “tot of our own”.   This is a wonderful tradition of raising a glass to the Queen, yes that Queen, every evening at 18:00 to carry on the now discontinued British Navy tradition of issuing a “tot” of rum to it’s enlisted men.   What wonderful historic surroundings of Copper and Lumber, in the Dockyard.   The rum was good too.
North Sails opened up their shop for a cocktail party, complete with crepes for all.  I missed this event but heard it was a lot of fun. And, of course, our arrival cocktail party at the Admiral’s Inn, a wonderful spot to enjoy history, and an “adult beverage” in the heart of the Dockyard.
We also had our arrival dinner, the capstone of our week of celebration in Antigua, at the Inn.  Happy Dawgs. Me, I was happy to stay at the Inn myself for a week and had some really tasty cups of coffee while enjoying the sights from the deck.Well, here I am, writing about all this and we are on the tail end of a cold snap with temperatures in the low teens.   All I can say is that “it will be better by May”.  Yes, and shortly after that Pandora will be back in the water.  Something to look forward to.

Antigua next November?   Yes, indeed.  I’ll be there.  And, if you are too, you’ll have a great time, I guarantee it.  In fact, plans are well underway and I’ll soon have details of what’s in store for our arrival by mid January.

Arrival dinner?  Sure, we got that.  How about Celebratory Week, Antigua style?

And what a great style it is.

Oh yeah, come January you can click here to sign up and get more information about the 2019 Fall Rally to the Caribbean, you’ll be glad you did.

 

Well, it’s finally happening, after a long run south, with a stop in Bermuda for many, the Fall Salty Dawg Rally participants are beginning to arrive here in Antigua.

That’s a good thing as am here with lots of parties planned and I just hate putting on parties when nobody shows up.  When I arrived on Tuesday, there was, in fact, nobody here from the rally which was a bit of a bummer.

I should note that I came to Antigua the easy way, by plane, flying in for a week to enjoy all the festivities with fellow Dawgs.   As they say, “nothing goes to weather like a Boeing 737”.  Sadly, I’ll have to leave before some even arrive as there are a number of Antigua bound boats still up in Bermuda, waiting for a window to head out.  It’s been challenging weather, that’s for sure.

The weather here has been unusual here as well with more rain than normal.  As a result, Antigua is remarkably green.  This island is normally fairly dry this time of year, but now it has a beautiful tropical look I’d usually associate with the lush islands further south.

I am staying at the Admiral’s Inn and it’s a lovely spot with beautiful grounds, authentic, although updated, from Lord Nelson’s time on the island.   This is the view from the end of the hall.  What a spot. The gardens are really amazing.  And you can’t beat this as a spot to have morning coffee.  That’s my friend Craig, in the blue shirt reading a good book.  He arrived yesterday to join in the festivities.  And, there are plenty planned. In my second year as Port Captain for Antigua, I continue to be struck by how generous everyone here has been in helping set up a really wonderful series of arrival events.  Forget the notion of an “arrival dinner”, here in Antigua think “arrival week”.  Of course, we will still have our official “safe arrival dinner” at the end of the week at Boom, overlooking Nelson’s Dockyard but we will also have plenty of other events that will keep our early arrivals busy and make the Dawgs feel at home in Antigua.   Click here to see the full list of activities.

As I write this, on Saturday morning, perhaps 15 boats have have arrived but more will be coming into port over the next few days.   Many will tie up in historic Nelson’s Dockyard, the only operating Georgian Dockyard in the world.  And, to make things even better, they can enjoy this fabulous harbor for about the same cost as they’d have to pay for a mooring in some US harbors.

Our events began two days ago and the first of the many planned events was a special evening at the Rhythm of Blue Gallery in English Harbor.  Owner Nancy supplied the Dawgs and many local friends with free rum drinks, wonderful passed appetizers, sushi actually, and she even hired a terrific reggae band that really kept things hopping.Nancy was joined by her mother, Ann, at the event.   Her parents were early in coming to the island to set up a fledgling charter business, I believe.   The two were great hosts for the event. A few boats arrived that day so we had some Dawgs in attendance.  My friends Bill and Maureen, on the left, had come up from their summer “home” in Trinidad, aboard their Kalunamoo.  Later in the evening we were invited to a special talk, complete with free wine and cheese, at the Antigua Yacht Club by Andrew Dove from North sails who spoke about his 40 years as a sailmaker.

Last evening we were treated to a wonderful event at Copper and Lumber, in the dockyard by one of my favorite groups, The Royal Tot Club of Antigua and Barbuda.  I  won’t repeat what I have written about this group except to say that they meet every day to toast the Queen.  I am not sure of the exact count but I believe that we had more than two dozen Dawgs with us.  It was a beautiful, historic setting.  If some how, you missed what I have written in the past about the Tot Club, click here for a post from last season. It’s a great group.

During “arrival week” we will welcome more and more of our members to Antigua for a great line-up of events, most at little or no cost to the Dawgs.  And to cap things off we will have our arrival dinner here at the Admiral’s Inn, perhaps the most scenic spot in Antigua.   Last year, this event was really well attended and I am hopeful that most will be on-island with us this year as well.

It’s been very rewarding to me, as I worked with many here on the island to set up this year’s arrival events, to see how enthusiastic everyone is about the rally coming to their island.  In particular, the Antigua Yacht Club, local businesses and government officials have made it very clear that having us visit is very important to them.  Given their enthusiasm, I am confident that next year’s events will be even better.   Charles, “Max” Fernandez, the Minister of Tourism, will be with us again, for the second year, which is more evidence that Antigua really appreciates our making their island a destination for the rally.

If you didn’t get to Antigua in time for our event week, be sure to put Antigua on your itinerary for later in the season and for next year’s Salty Dawg Fall Rally to the Caribbean, or should I say the “Salty Dawg rally to Antigua”.   I personally guarantee that you will be glad you did.

If Antigua is still on your travel plans before the end of December, make a point of being in Nelson’s Dockyard so you can ring in the new year.  There is nothing quite like fireworks over the fort guarding the harbor.   Brenda and I did this, along with other Dawgs last year and it was fabulous.I expect to have a full list of 2019 arrival activities posted on our site this coming January.  If you missed this year’s arrival events, you’d be well advised to put Antigua on your schedule for next Fall’s rally.  I know I will.

Now you see why it’s so easy to say, and that’s not Fake News, that we are deep into the Dawg Days of Antigua.

It’s Wednesday afternoon and I am here in Antigua, anxiously awaiting the arrival of the “fleet” of Dawgs heading our way.   I  flew in yesterday afternoon, and I am here to say that flying is a lot simpler, and faster, than getting here by boat.  However, I’ll have to leave here to fly home after only a week.  That’s such a bummer, let me tell you.

The harbor is nearly empty with only a smattering of small boats here.  Our good friends, and live aboard couple, Bill and Maureen on Kalunamoo, arrived a few days ago from Trinidad, where they spent the summer, out of hurricane harm’s way.  It’s good to see them but I am sad that our paths won’t cross again until next year, perhaps in the summer.However, spars or not, there is plenty of tonnage here, made possible by Anna a 365′ behemoth, recently launched in the Netherlands, the largest yacht ever built there.  There’s only a handful of yachts in the world that are larger.  And she’s owned by, you guessed it, a Russian,  Dimitri Rybololev and she cost an astounding $250m to build.

That sounds like a lot but it’s really not all that much when you consider that he has an estimated worth of $7 billion.  That’s 7,000 millions!   What’s even more amazing is that he still has that much money after settling with his ex for a whopping $4.5 billion divorce settlement awarded to her buy a Swiss court.  But don’t worry about Dimitri because the award was later reduced to a piddling $600 million after the couple settled amicably.  Isn’t that sweet?  Me, I’d be pretty amicable if I got $600 million.   At 1/4 billion, she’s just bristling with cool stuff.  Including her own chopper.  You can be pretty confident that you have plenty of funds available if you have one of these on board.Of course, having two “garages” to keep your tenders makes a pretty clear statement as well. You can really tell how big she is compared to one of the crew up forward.  And, this guy is only one of 30 that work aboard full time.  Quite the payroll.   Need to know more in case you are thinking about having one built for yourself?  Check this link to get the skinny. Dimitri is a smart guy naming his new boat after one of his daughters as she won’t be divorcing him any time soon.    I expect is pretty good friends with Putin. 

And, speaking of Putin who also seems to be pretty fond of our president, I was struck by this sign at the Skullduggery bar in Falmouth, promoting a special rum drink.  At $5EC, it’s quite a deal as that’s only $2 US.  Thanks Mr President.  
If you disagree, don’t blame me, I’m only reporting. 

As far as the Salty Dawg Rally is concerned,and that’s why I am here in Antigua, the 40 or so boats that are headed my way, in spite of delays caused by a really bad run of adverse winds, should begin arriving over the next few days.

I expect that more than a few of them will be happy to have a Trump Punch.  At $2US it’s about the best deal in town.

Of course, that will only be the beginning as we have plenty of fun events planned to help welcome the fleet to Antigua now through Thanksgiving.  

One way or the other, Antigua is about to really go to the Dawgs and I am looking forward to that too.