So on Christmas Eve, we sorta went AWOL. The fax from the seller didn't come through, but we are insured, they have our money, so we figured they should let us go. After much hemming and hawing, we signed a paper saying we take full responsibility, and .... we left the dock. Bungie warned us that the winds were up, we got out at 3:30, and the sun sets at 6 so we headed straight for The Bight at Norman Island. We promised Bungie that for our first night, we would pick up a mooring. The winds were 20-25 knots, so with double reefed main and partial jib, we flew across at 6-7 knots. Wheeee! We're sailing. This is what it's all about. For those who have been there, The Bight is the location of the restaurant on a boat -- the Willy T, and the restaurant now known as Pirates, which used to be Billy Bones. I remember Emma said there were sketchy people there. We had a lovely day

and night, and when we woke up Christmas morning, we found that Santa had brought us a boat for Christmas. Christmas was still pretty windy, but what a relief not to be hot. Now we know that Nanny Cay really is a very protected spot, out of the wind, and therefore hot hot hot. So anyway, we swam, we dinghied, we worked on the boat, and then we asked around and decided to go to Little Harbour on Peter Island. Another lovely sail, then we anchored -- good news, the windlass works, probably a little better than the anchoring team of Lance and Susie. We had to tie a line to the shore and struggled with that -- Lance managing not to step on the plentiful sea urchins when he jumped out of the dinghy. It was a great spot -- great snorkeling, calm night, not hot. We had a nice walk up the hill, all dwellings seem to have been abandoned. Then on Boxing Day (the 26th),

we sailed over to a day anchor spot, for more anchor practice and had lunch listening to the steel drum playing at the Peter Island Beach club on shore. We left there and sailed and motored back to Nanny Cay, and today we hitched a ride to town to buy more stuff. We're still looking for the coffee cone. We found someone who claimed she bought one at Bobby's market, but no luck there. Lance worked on the smelly head while we sat at anchor -- advantage being you can just jump in the water to get away from it. Now all the smelly hoses are gone, but we still have work to do to get it all hooked up. We keep getting distracted by other projects. Hope all have had a Merry Christmas. Keep those emails coming, it's great fun. We found an NPR station here, so we are a little less out of touch.
         — Love, susie and lance