Thursday January 10, 2013
Leaving Antigua for St Martin

Our destinations this seasons have been based on getting to friends and renewing friendships that time has distanced us from temporarily.  We are leaving one group of friends in Antigua to get to another couple that we cruised with in 2007 in Mexico.  The winds have kept us here in Antigua for an extra week, but the company has been so great that it pains us to leave this port.  However Classic Race Week in Antigua will come in April and we will have a grand reunion with whom we have left behind.
Hiking is a big part of the cruiser lifestyle, and we were able to go on one of the hikes here.  Granted we took a wrong turn, did not complete the planned hike, but we did end up at the bottom of the hill in a bar and drank 2 beers over an hour''s worth of good stories in great company.
Last year we circumnavigated the island and hit most of the lovely beaches.  This year we have been pinned down in Antigua with 25-30 mph winds for the past 10 days.  Great for the wind generator and our power source, but not so great for limin' the time away.  I have been busy reading and sewing and Dave has worked on boat projects and reading between social hours, short walks, and the occasional sundowners.  It has been windy and squally most afternoons and that has been quite uncomfortable.  So we have started meeting for after dinner drinks and chocolates---a change from 5-9 PM Happy hours.  The advantage is we all get dinner and a relaxed social time versus appetizers, social time, and wake up hungry the next morning for protein.
We can finally make a public announcement, this week our son announced to FB and the world that he and his wife are going to be having a baby July 18th, 13 months after becoming a husband and a dad to Julia and Layla Hansen.  We are so happy about this.  In high school he talked about how he would one day be a dad and what he wanted to do with his kids, now he will have two and we couldn't be happier for him and his growing family.  Our daughter Kelsey keeps us up to date with weekly videos of what her almost three year old daughter is up to.  This week we have a video of her Kiwi putting bubbles (from her bubble bath) on her face and saying, " Opa's face," and then taking her Happy Birthday washcloth out of the suds and singing Happy Birthday to Oma in her bath on a different night.  She is growing up so fast and thanks to computers we get to see and hear the changes from baby to little girl...not the same as being there but once removed.
Wish we could write more but then we would have to share stories between friends that no doubt would loose a lot in translation, and since the wind has kept us from exploring we really have little to add to last year's impressions of Antigua.  I will try to download photos from our walk and post them.