Day 278, Thursday, March 27

Day 278, Thursday, March 27

Another beautiful day in the Bahamas.  The winds continue to kick up and clock around so we stay in our nice safe haven of Hopetown.  Julie spends some time polishing stainless and tidying the boat.  Clutter gathers very easily.  As Julie is cleaning the transom she yells to Dawson that a blue hulled boat in entering the harbour.  Dawson looks over and is stunned to realize it is our old 33 foot mirage Gael Na Mara.  Dawson yells over to them a hello but we are not sure of who is on the boat.  We had heard that the Ramsey’s had sold the boat.  Anyways we are quite shocked and thrilled to see the old Mirage as we loved that boat and there are many fabulous memories of our summers raising the kids.

Gael Na Mara motoring into Hopetown

After about an hour we hop in the dinghy and go looking for where Gael Na Mara has parked.  We find her at the Hopetown marina and go over to say hello and we are pleasantly surprised to see that it is in fact David and Kathy Ramsey, and their friend Gretchen.  Retirement looks good on them as we hardly recognized them.  They welcome us aboard and regale us with some of their stories, although an injury to Kathy (falling off the boat while on dry dock) caused them to cancel their 2012 sailing plans, she is well on her way to recovery and they are enjoying the 2013/14 season here in the Bahamas.  It sure was great seeing them enjoying the boat and they spoke lovingly of all of Gael Na Maras assets.

Time for long pants!

We head over to the patio for an afternoon game of Banana gram, however between chatting and welcoming Toby and Joanne back to Hopetown we end up just chatting for a couple of hours.  Toby and Joanne and us then head over for dinner at the Edge and for the first time in a long time, both of us put on long pants for the evening.  It is great seeing Toby and Joanne as we had not seen them since November and their boat Comocean was one of the few boats we sailed down to the Bahamas out of Hampton Virginia with so we have a wonderful shared experience.

Dinner at the Edge with Joanne and Toby

After our late dinner at the water’s edge we head back to the boat for an early night.

Cheers

Julie and Dawson