Author: Lucy Vannini

The sound of my alarm filled my ears and I glanced at my watch which said it was only 6:01.
“Turn it offfffff.” Groaned Sally turning on to her side.
I turned it off and sat up quickly seeing my hiking boots. We were going to hike to a boiling lake, which was something that I was looking forward to sense we got to Dominica.
After changing quickly I shook Sally.
“Wake up Sally” I said and started to walk out of the room.
“Whhhhhhhyy.” She moaned.
“We are doing the hike..”
“Oh yeaaaaahhh. I’m up.” She said cheerfully sitting up. That was a fast of emotions I thought with a smile as I got some breakfast.

A few minutes after we were all ready, sunglasses, sunscreen, water, snacks, and Willie’s “hiking gear”, one of Sea Cats(tour guide) workers came to pick us up with CarpeVentum. Two really nice people as well as cruisers.

We went to the car and from the second that Sea Cat started taking, I knew that this would be a super fun hike and worth every penny (or ECs in this case.)
We got to the hike and we started off. We learned all the trees, plants, and edible things going up the first 45 min.

We got into the Nation Park zone and some came to one of our first long stops.It was a overlooking the town. It was pretty foggy though since it was raining the whole hike so far, but it felt nice cause it was hot earlier. That stop Sea cat gave us all some “rum punch” aka passion fruit juice. It was in a slushee and super good. We made some passion fruit juice the other day too.

We continued our hike through small water falls and some places Willie was almost vertical when he was jumping down. We made it through a couple of hot springs and came to a large hot spring valley. It was called “the Valley of Desalination”. There was lots of little mud pots, little geysers, and lots of hot springs. It was like Yellowstone packed in one with no fences. There was steam coming out of the ground in some random places and in some places the water was boiling while in other places it was warm or even cold.

“Face masks, get them from this volcanic ash.” Sea cat chanted and smeared some of the volcanic ash on each of our faces. I will post some pictures….
After we all had our mud masks on, Sea Cat took out a container of raw eggs. I was confused when he put all of the eggs in a bag.

“How do you want your eggs, over easy or hard boiled?” Sea cat asked going over to a little geyser with the bag of eggs.

We answered over easy and in one minute we all had an “over easy!” egg. The outside was black because of the volcanic sulfur and apparently that was super good luck in some places hence, it would make you live longer. The egg was super good. One of the best soft boiled egg I ever had. So now I can say, “I ate an egg from Dominica cooked in boiling sulfur vent geyser thing.”

We hiked through the steam vents, boiling water streams, cold water streams, and lots more random hot spots. The water then started trailing to a waterfall. My eyes widened as I realized that the waterfall was the path. There was only a little drop that time, one we could all easily hop down, but you could tell that there would be bigger ones. We continued hiking through the warm water. Well “we” consisted of everyone but Willie. Willie was hoping on the land scaling the side of the river because he thought that all th water would be hot now. The water felt nice warming your feet but not too hot. The rocks were beautiful. The rustic orange color of fall met with deep and light yellows to make a breathtaking combination or rock colors. It looked like someone took the colors of sunset and sent them down the river, painting the rocks as it went on.

Then we came to the drop. I saw a rope dangling from a couple of trees. I looked down at the 15 feet drop. It was pretty smooth with a couple of small footholds. Malone, SeaCats helper went down first using the rope and just sliding down. Ooookkkaaaay then I thought as I held on to the rope. I slowly started sliding down the slope my hands tight around the rope. Finally I found a foothold and I looked down realizing I was only a couple of feet off the bottom. I jumped the last little bit still holding on to the rope. I let go of the rope and high fived Malone.

“It wasn’t that hard!” I called, turning around. Only then did I realize I was encouraging Willie. How in the world was he going to get down? I thought… I saw SeaCat hold on to Willie’s harness and then Malone was on the bottom. Willie did a jump type slide thing and Malone caught him and put him on the ground. I let out a breath. Fewwww. That was nerve wracking , I thought. Heidi started down and soon everyone else made it down easily.

Willie ran ahead and then the rest of us followed him. The trail had a steep up hill right away but it smoothed out a little bit. Soon we came to a little stream coming out of the land next to the trail. Sea cat took two elephant ears off of the tree. He put the first elephant ear on the little stream making it into a fountain that came out of the leaf the next cup he folded into a cup. The cup worked all the way and didn’t leak at all. He filled up the cup with water and asked if anyone wanted to drink from the “magic cup”. Sally drank some of the water and it was super cold she said. I didn’t have any but the cup and fountain were super cool!

We kept on hiking getting closer and closer to the sulfuric steam coming out of the mountain. It seemed like that we were almost there. I peeked around the corner and was happy to see the end of the path! The boiling lake is going to be right here. We all sat down and waited for the fog stuff to go away. It went away in a few minutes revealing a big lake that was boiling. It looked like a humongous pot that was boiling only in the center. There was a huge bubbling thing in the middle causing the rest of the lake to go up and down! It was super cool!

Sea Cat made a super good salad and salted cod salad type thing with bread. It was really good! We ate lunch and talked for a while. We also had some more passionfruit juice! After we were done eating, Sally and I found a pit of volcanic ash mud and we dug some up to save for making into face masks. I will post some pics…..

Once everyone was re energized, we started going back down. It was mostly the same except that we stopped at some hot springs to go in them. We were all, very tired by the time that we reached the first river. After lots of fun and hiking, we made it back to the trailhead.

Right next to the trail head there is a beautiful as well as cold gorge! There were deep greens draped against dark gray rocks and the pretty light blue color. We all went in getting very refreshed. If you swim up the gorge the current get stronger and super hard to walk at the end near the waterfall. That being said it was with the beautiful view of the waterfall. We dried off after we were done with swimming and headed back to the boat. What an amazing fun filled day!

Bye till next time!☀☀☀❤❤⚓⚓
The one and only
Lucy

It was a beautiful day outside, blue skies and the water was glisenting. We just finished tubing (about that later) and we where going to go to the windsurfing place.
We got there and saw lots of sails and boards. We were met by Izzy Mike at a beautiful house. They were both super nice and we where going to try a little bit of windsurfing. We had a good short lesson and that night we decided to stay another day where we could get lessons by Gerd the windsurfing instructor.
We came the next day, we finished school quick then went for a good day of windsurfing. 
Sally was given a smaller sail so that she could pick it up and I had a sail on a trainer board.

Sally was super good and natural at windsurfing and you could tell she was getting it easily.
On the other hand I was moving all over the place and after lots of attempts of getting on and doing the sail, I had one or two runs. We all had so much fun that we decided to stay yet another. Then another day.

We learned how to stand up and then turn, and stand up and perpendicular when I am windsurfing are now glued in my head.

The next day was super windy. I tried going on the windsurfer for a little while and the wind was too strong. I kept on trying to get a good run but I only got a few in. Its got windier so I stopped windsurfing. Izzy invited us to bead with her and we had lots of fun doing it. Izzy is 18, super nice, and has been windsurfing and spending vacation their since she was 5. We did lots of necklace, rings, and bracelets. Later I was outside and Gerd suggest that I go on Sally’s board. Her sail was smaller but the board was a lot less stable.
The first few times, then I was getting up the sail, I leaned the same as I would on the bigger sail that I had been using, and I fell of very quick. I had some good runs but mostly I tipped over. From then on I decided to use the bigger sail and the more sturdy board.

The first time I turned successfully. Well, first things first, it took a while. For Naturals like Heidi and Sally, it took like 10 minutes. Haha, not for me. After a couple of days I was able to turn and have one or two good runs. It was a nice day with little wind compared to the other days. I started getting the sail up.
“Perpendicular” Gerd said.
I finished getting the sail up. Then did the rest of the beginning routine. I pushed my front hand forward and then I started going.
“Remember loose hands.” Greg called.
I let my grip relax. Just then a wave came by.
“Don’t move!” Greg called.
Unlike all the other times when he said that I somehow didn’t move. Normally as soon as he said that I moved by accident and Greg said, “You moved.”
Anyway surprising myself I ended up being able to do a turn right as Heidi was telling me the rope was ending.
I got back on the windsurfing and decided that I would end on the one for the day.

On the last day there we went on a nature walk. Toni was super nice and brought us on an amazing hike and taught us about all of the different plants and flowers. It was a beautiful view from the rocks. We even ate some cactus peppers that were bright pink and tasted kind of like strawberries. We went for two or three hours enjoying the view and lots of amazing blow holes. We did school after that and then did more windsurfing that afternoon. We all had lots of fun and were all very sad to say our good-byes later.

Tubing!
It was a nice day in Puerto Rico blue skies and a bright sun. We had just gotten to Gilligan’s Island. We did school quick so we could play in the water.

We where asking abut dragging our paddle board behind our dinghy. Then we thought of an even better idea. We had a dragging tube. It was a little after one o’clock when we first started. Some of us got into the dingy. Sally wanted to be the first one so she flopped on in to the big tube. We went super fast and left and right zig zagging. Surprisingly, Sally stayed on the whole time. We took lots of pictures and videos. 
 Then after about 5 minutes, it was my turn.
I flopped in and finally got into the tube after several times. The ocean water was bumping me up and down.
“Are you ready?” Dad asked.
“Yep!” I replied giving them a thumbs up.
I was a little nervous.
Ahhhhhhhhhhh!! I screamed.
I darted as the water skimmed the tube until I was up on a plane. The water was rushing on either side of me.
Few, I thought, this isn’s as hard as it seems.
The tube suddenly jerked as the dinghy did a sharp turn.
I almost fell in. I was literally standing on the water my hand holding on to the straps.
I sped up again but I was still hanging off of the tube.
Welll, then I figured out that if you are hanging off you go about two times faster.
I am so surprised I haven’t fell off ye…..tttttttt AhHHHHHH.
We did another sharp turn and I went flying off the tube.
I felt myself go downward fast and then the dinghy stopped.
“Are you OK?” Sally shouted back at me.
“Yeah!” I shouted back swimming towards the boat.
After a couple times I made it back into the tube and we started again.
It was as fun was the first time and after a while it was Heidi’s turn.
We had lots of fun!

bye till next time

the one and only

Lucy

We were walking down the street a warm breeze blowing,on our way back to our boat. We were looking for Gigi’s dentist, were many people recommend we go to for our teeth cleaning.
“It’s supposed to have a more modern look and have a wheelchair ramp, right?” Heidi asked.
“I think that’s right.” Replied Mom.
We are going to get appointments today if we can ever find this. I thought, still not completely excited to get my teeth cleaned and not knowing what they are saying to me. I tried to remember the Spanish I had learned in 4th grade….
“Lucy, I think this is it.” Sally said and pointed to the building waking me up from my thoughts.
I looked and it was, indeed a modern building with a wheelchair ramp, and lots of teeth on it.
“Looks pretty right.” I said and started up the ramp.
We went inside and it looked like any other dentist. Couches, lots of “perfect teeth” pictures, and signs (which I couldn’t read-they were in Spanish), and a T.V. filled the waiting room.
“Hola!” We all said and got more “hola’s” in return.
“¿podemos limpiar los dientes por favor,.” Mom asked which translates to “Can we get our teeth cleaned please?”
She answered yes we wrote down our names and then we just ended up waiting then.
Oh, I thought yikes, I am a bit nervous.
“I am not going first!” I exclaimed making sure not to be the first one.
“Me neither.”Added Sally, then Heidi.
We waited a while and then after about 30 minutes, they called back Mom. I realized I would be the 4th one so I had some time. We played hand games and whatever for a little bit until I was called back.
I went into the room and was handed a towel and clip on thing. I just held on to the napkin unsure of what to do with it.
The dentist told me a bunch of things in Spanish then pointed to the chair so I lay down on it. Few, I thought this isn’t as hard as I thought. Just then another dentist came in and started talking. There was a long silence after a question that maybe I was supposed to answer but I don’t think I was cause just then they started cleaning my teeth. It was good same as all other except a little bit quicker.
The dentist stopped then said something in Spanish this time I knew it was to me and pointed to a glass of water. I drank a little not sure what to do. I didn’t have any toothpaste in my mouth.
“No,no, spit” said the dentist, ohhhhhhh I thought that makes more sense. I was still thinking how to say I am sorry in Spanish when the teeth cleaning started again. Oh, well I thought and the dentist was very careful to tell me to spit from then on.
It was done soon so I went out.
“Yours good to?” I asked and everyone except dad said yes. I must have looked confused because dad exclaimed I have “quatro cavities.” .
I was pretty surprised.
“Did you know what to do with the napkin they handed you?” Dad asked and when the rest of us just held it, of course, he put it behind his head.
The rest of us laughed so hard you could barely hear dad explaining why he put it behind his head.
We all walked home with clean teeth.

Haha we made it! Hi again! We did our passage and we are super and happy in the Dominican Republic! It is great here and there are lots of things to do.
In the morning it is a nice cool tempeture and is good to be outside in. At 9 am though it is SOOOOOOOOOO HOT outside and there is no wind. By 12 am there is some wind and it gets cooler, slowly but surely☺☺ We have walked around town, all of us working on Spanish. The locals are very kind and friendly and you are always greeted with a big smile. They are also very supportive of our Spanish even if sometimes it is mixed with so other language. Hahaha. We went to the fruit stand many of times. They have the best pineapple and papayas I have ever had!! The first time we had it I couldn’t stop thinking about “I love papayas, yes I do.” Hahaaha. They also have lots of different cheeses and salamis which were all very good. The scenery here is beautiful with mountains and green everywhere. The lush trees and exotic flowers are a great break from beaches, don’t get me wrong, I love beaches, but the mountains and forests here are spectacular. We have been having a great time here and I can’t wait to explore this beautiful island more.

Hi everyone! We are currently on the way to Dominican Republic on the first out of the three days on the passage…all is well so far ☺️We had been in Rum Island prior to the passage we are on. There was lots of snorkeling and we found three conch and Dad caught a lobster. On the beach there it was beautiful and we spent part of the days collecting shells, sea beans, and running with Willie on it. We had lots of fun on that anchorage and we are all looking forward to the next anchorage.
Since we are on a passage right now I am going to explain what it is like.
So we each have a certain time we do watches at night so that we can all sleep.

Also someone cooks the food so we each are doing something.

My favorite part of passages are at night when it is calm and you can see the whole Milky Way.

The wind on the boat the moon on the sails,
your heart in the ocean,
your happiness all there.
The stars are shining,
the dark water has blue caps,
the moon is so bright,
and then you tack.
You breath in and out,
a cool breezy air,
you feel as if you’re the only ones there.
The waves are rocking,
so happy,
so free,
there is no feeling that is more happy.
Your eyes are wide,
there is so much to see,
and you think to yourselves,
wow, I am so lucky
We are trolling during the day but we still haven’t caught anything from that.☹️

During a passage when I am not on watch and not slepping I am probably
a) reading
b) sitting on the bow
c) writing a blog post, what I am doing now
d) cooking food
e) resting
f) any other thing that isn’t that hard to do and keeps you rested

Well, we are all good and happy and I will try and keep on posting and tell you what adventures this passage brings us☺
Guess what!! We just saw a whale jump out of the water in front of us and we hooked a blue marlin!! It was super cool.

Hi everyone! This is Lucy. I am going to do a blog post because we are in the Exuma’s! It is very pretty here in the land and sea park. There are lots of white sand beaches and turquoise water. School is good because I finish at 10 a.m.  An average day looks like this…….

I wake up then run with Willie on the beach

Eat breakfast

School

Go swimming

School

Eat lunch

Go swimming, snorkeling, paddle boarding, Windsurfing, or hiking

Do that for a long time…

Eat dinner

Play game

Go to bed

So far the Bahamas has been super great! Eleuthera had  great and super nice community. The land and sea park had fantastic outdoors and water. We also met really nice people there. Staniel Cay was good. We went to Thunder Grado and saw the pigs. We also went to the church there where they welcomed us with open arms. It was a really neat experience and showed in more detail part of their great culture. Now we are in Black Point settlement, which has grocery stores, laundry, and you know basic town things. There are lots of jelly fish here. Some are moon jellies and I am not so sure if any of them sting, saying that, I am not so sure I want to check!          

Snorkeling…..

The sea is below the sun up high 

The fish in the water 

Sea turtles are waving good bye 

   The water is clear

    As blue as can be

     Now it seems nothing in the world could be so pretty.

Snorkeling was great in caves and more, there were fish galore. You would get to the caves and it would be all dark then you would look past it to the fish and see the light blue glow of the ocean. It looked like it came out of  a Disney movie.  The cave inside seemed very dark with light jutting out of the sides and even if it felt dark you just swam over to a little light and be able to swim through it. It took awhile for your eyes to adjust once you were back out in the light. But the darkness of the cave with thousands of fish in it was almost as beautiful as when you made it out to the light.

 

Talking about it being dark, at night the stars are so so so so so beautiful. Some nights you can see the whole milky-way! There are so much some nights you can barely make out the constellations because all of the stars are overlapping and together.

We have met so many nice people and tried lots of new things. It is teaching me lots of things and I know I will continue to learn more, 

We have been having a great time and we will continue to have more fun! Until next post….

The one and only

Lucy

Hi this is Lucy. As of right now we are in Long Island but so so so much has happened before that! We got here from Georgetown yesterday….
Georgetown was super fun! I met lots of friends there and we played on the beach and had campfires! It was really really fun! There was this rope swing where you could climb to around the top of a tree and swing down! It was scary at first but then very fun! We went on hikes, swam and competed in many events! We did the coconut challenge- a challenge where they put a bunch of coconuts in the harbor and you had to paddle on your dinghy to try and get the most. Then you had to throw them at a target and toss them into a bag. The next event we did was the kayaking race me and Sally both did it and I got 2nd and she got 3rd in the kids section! Congrats Tortson!(Friend who got first!) And then we did the downwind dinghy race which we used our windsurfer sail, paddle board paddle, and lots of ropes(lines) to make a “sailing dinghy”! We got 5th, but we didn’t really know it started! We were setting up the sail and then all the sudden there was a different sail in my face! Then the inflatable dinghy came and I was squished in between two! I scrambled to get into our dinghy and we were a little behind, not the greatest start! hahahahaha! Anyway we had tons of fun and that is all that counts right! The day was full of tons of fun and we hung out with our friends afterwards! We also went to a variet show there, I can’t believe I almost forgot that! There were Bahamians as well as cruisers in the variety show! I got picked to go on the rake and scrape, this Bahamian dance thing but yeah it was pretty embarrassing but hey, everyone else seemed to think it was funny so hahahahaha. The rest of the variety show was pretty cool except for when dad totally embarrassing did the rake and scrape with some pretty interesting moves! We are now safe and happy in Long Island and had a great night at Tiny’s! If you ever go to Long Island definitely go there! They have the best conch fritters ever and WiFi. Hahahahaha. Well all is great here! Until, next post
The one and only
Lucy

NOTE: This was a few days ago, now we are unstuck and happy in the ocean in Mobile AL

Hi everyone! WELL, in the last two days lots have happened! I will tell the main things, and like always, please note that this might be a little exaggerated. All is good now, don’t you worry. Wait, we just got stuck again, in what we thought were tides, we are still stuck while I am writing this. We are better now, don’t you fear!

Wednesday, November eight,
“BRREEEMMMP BREEEM” I woke up with a start as the engine turned on. I stayed up for a minute then went back to sleep as I usually did when we first started. I was half sleeping half awake when the engine suddenly stopped. Now you might be thinking for me, finally some peace and quiet. But no, that is not good, I thought.
“Lucy,” Sally said awoke by the stop of the motor, “what happened?”
“I am not sure,” I replied a little scared. But sure enough I was talking to someone who was asleep. I stayed up expecting the engine to turn back on, but it didn’t. I looked at the window to get some assurance that we were fine, but what I got was exactly the opposite!
“Sally!” I said flicking her arm.
“Wha, evil gummy bear go away, OH MY GOSH, THAT TREE IS ON OUR WINDOW!” Sally finally came out of her dream land!
I quickly grabbed my shoes, as I wondered, what happened this time?
“Got your life jacket,” Sally exclaimed as we headed out to see what happened.
“What is happening?” Sally asked before I could.
Then the words came, the oh to familiar words came, three words my new least favorite. We are stuck, again.
“What should I do?” I asked eager, like the rest of us to get us out of the trees.
“Nothing yet, I just don’t know why we are stuck.” Said Dad as we started to pull our selves with the anchor, but it didn’t improve.
Finally, Dad thought he might have to go swimming, again, because the propeller wasn’t right, gosh, I might have to skip yesterday and go to today, there are some awful noises right now.
OK, so, this is Thursday, November 9th.
We just got stuck, again! So we are in what are supposedly tides, but don’t change for a day or something. I don’t really get it. Confused face.
So, you probably know what I am going to do now right? Well, this time I wasn’t that scared, surprisingly, not sure if that is a good or bad thing. Sally went up and asked what happened. I will let you figure the next part out. Just kidding, we are stuck. So now Mom and Dad are running our faucets and water out, (not the one we drink) into the river. Over about 50 gallons we only got an inch higher. We called the lock and tried to get more water on our side, but that would take awhile. Then this sample getting crew came by us. They asked us if we were ok. We said, yes, but we are stuck. They didn’t want to get stuck too, so when we asked them if they could maybe give us tow, they were hesitant at first. But, after we got our bridal with a long line attached they did it. Thank you so much to the USGS!!!!! Well, the rest of the day was a lot less eventful. It was nice to be at a nice anchorage after. Oh wait, I have to finish the first part.

Continued for Wednesday

“Huh,” Dad huhed as he realized someone else anchor was attached around our propeller. After a lot of work of uniting and cutting the line it finally came undone with an anchor!!!
So yay, we got a free anchor and we are unstuck now!
————————————Three hours Later——————————————
No one was outside except for dad. We were trying to get to a certain anchorage so we sped up and flush. There goes the new anchor! = (