Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Spanish Virgin Islands


           Culebra is a laid-back little island off the east coast of Puerto Rico.  It was used by the US military for bombing practice for a number of years.  When we arrived on Friday, we were told that “if they don’t have it, you don’t need it” by someone who has been coming here every year for ten years.  The only thing we have found that we REALLY need that we have been unable to get is propane.  We hooked up our second tank on Friday and on Saturday, there was none to make coffee!  BAD start to the day!!  LOL  Anyway, there is only one man who fills tanks on the island and he has yet to return our phone calls.  We went exploring on Saturday and found a very nice little library – run entirely off donations.  The librarian was super nice.  They have WiFi available for free and that is where we had some copies made (since the only office store is now closed).  There is a small airport on the island near the anchorage where we have been staying.  There are very frequent commuter flights coming and going.  The pilot has to navigate between two small peaks, bank a turn and be dropping altitude all at the same time to land – talk about task-loading!
            This is a place that I could spend a little time!  No loud music, a ferry back to PR three times a day for $2.25 if you need to go get something, a day from St. Thomas……paradise!  We need to get all of our chores done so we can go do some snorkeling and maybe even some diving!  Roxy is missing her beaches but I understand there are some beautiful ones just around the corner. 
            Yesterday, we learned that Lyric (our grandson) has viral pneumonia.  We sure hope he gets better quickly.  I’m sure Jessica and Craig hope that much more than I do.  This is the little fella that we are anxious to go back to Texas to see!  Of course we want to see Jessica and Craig too – lol!  He made a full recovery in a few days – boy kiddos are resilient!! 
            After a week without propane, we talked to the librarian who said “he never returns phone calls”.  You just have to leave your tanks there – WHERE IS THERE??  She gave us directions to his house/business and that afternoon, we dropped off our tanks there with contact information.  Next morning, Darrell went there and the tanks had been moved but Mr. Perez was not there.  I was on one end of town and he was on the other, we started looking for the truck we had seen there the day before.  I flagged down Mr. Perez near one of the hardware stores and asked if he could kindly fill our tanks that day.  We made arrangements for him to bring them to a local business in ½ hour.  That afternoon, voila!  We had propane!!!  In the week long interim, we had borrowed an adapter to use the one pound cans (for our barbeque) to get our morning coffee!
            We had need of some mail to get to us soon as some credit cards are expiring.  Jessica and Scotty were kind enough to mail them to the post office and they made it in lightening speed.  In fact the two pieces of mail that we have sent and/or received have made it faster than we were used to in Key Largo!  Thank you two!  We are in the process of having all our mail transferred to a mail service in Green Cove Springs, FL.  They can scan important things and send digitally to us – really cool!  Now, we just have to remember all the places we need to change our address!
            We have enjoyed our stay in Culebra but we are getting antsy to move again.  We hope to move on the St. Thomas in the next 3-5 days – a 20 something mile trip.  After that, we will be going to St. John for an unknown period of time.  We are thinking that we will fly to FLL or MIA and pick up our car in Key Largo to drive to TX for a visit.  We save a LOT of money that way and we have more time than money these days, lol.  We have several boats here that we have come to know over the past month or so that are all heading the same way.  In the meantime, we are each reading about one novel per day from the library!  Ready to find a new anchorage and do some something!

No comments:

Post a Comment