Port Lucaya - Kayaking

The cruise is ruined. Well, nearly ruined. Okay, we'll manage. This morning I pulled a jar of peanut butter out of the pantry. I opened it and Kevin and I both stared in absolute horror. Chunky! Who bought chunky?! Not only was it chunky Jif, but it was EXTRA-chunky Jif. I double-checked the other three unopened jars in our stockpile and sure enough there wasn't a smooth one in the bunch. I guess during our frenzied shopping at Sam's Club we had grabbed the wrong kind. Ew. I guess we'll live -- we just have to chew it more.

Last time we needed a splice in a line I was the one who sat down with the book and figured out how to do it. So now I am the designated "splicer" in the crew. (A splice is a way of putting a loop in the end of the rope without tying a knot). This time it was a different type of line (8-strand Brait) so I had to learn a whole new set of instructions. After more than an hour of bruising my fingers and cussing up a storm I came to the last step. All of my strands were about an inch too short for the final "tuck"! I was totally ticked off, because now I will have to start over at the beginning. My extra-supportive husband did not hesitate to point out: "Well you would've had to do it two more times anyway since I need three lines spliced not just one. It's good practice." Thanks, honey.

To cheer me up, Kevin decided to inflate the kayak that he got me for Christmas. He pulls the thing out of the bag and goes to inflate it with our dinghy pump when we realize that the pump doesn't fit the nozzle. We find some attachments that *kind of* fit and start filling the thing with air. But because we didn't buy the "right" pump, every time we close the valve it loses a lot of air. So the thing won't inflate all the way. We are kicking ourselves for not trying it out in Florida so we could've bought the right damn pump, but it has enough air to float and we are both able to try it out. It's nothing like a real kayak (the bow wiggles back and forth with every stroke of the paddle) but it's still pretty fun.

We are anchored in the same spot, tucked back into a cove. Both the glass-bottom boat tour and the booze cruise come through here to turn around, so every day we get a boat full of tourists staring at us like fish in a bowl, and today was no different. Can't blame them, really. I'd stare too if some yahoo was paddling around in what looked like a deflated pool toy.