We left Road Town on Tuesday at just before noon, after one last stop at the internet cafe. We had a pleasant reach down Tortola in light winds and calm seas, and then around the tip and over to Jost Van Dyke. Our first stop was Little Harbour (yeah, they all have the same names) also known as Garner Bay. There are 3 restaurants in this harbour, competing for the business of a few yachts. We picked up a mooring and went over to Harris Place to pay for it. You land at the dinghy dock in front of Sidney's Peace and Love, where the friendly people help you tie up your dinghy and hand you a menu, point out their souvenir clothing store, and try to get your business. They mostly succeed. Lance made friends with the owner of Harris place, who is in the process of building her own dinghy dock, but it's getting done on Island time, and meanwhile she's dying for lack of business. We decided to have some food at her place, but her menu had only complete dinners, and our attempts to talk her into selling us just soup and salad weren't effective, so we finally settled on splitting a complete conch stew dinner. This is so far the best West Indian food we've had. She made this wonderful split pea soup, salad, garlic bread,

tender conch stew, rice and "peas" (red beans), and coleslaw. It was more than enough for both of us. On Monday nights, she has a lobster special and after listening to her describe it, we're coming back for that one day. Caribbean lobsters are huge, and often overcooked and dry. She boils it, then barbecues, then puts it in the bbq oven with the butter sauce to steam it and keep it moist and tender. My mouth is watering.
    Sidney's has a nice hat that says, "Don't judge a man by the size of his dinghy" but I didn't get one for Lance.
    In the morning, with the calm seas, it was time to work on the boat. We have used up enough diesel to finally replace the fuel filler hose. This involved a lot of wrestling with the old hose to get it out, followed by cooling swim, then several bouts of wrestling with the new hose, and more cooling swims. The old diesel permeated hose is out of the boat, and another insurance item is taken care of. We also found that the hose from the engine compartment to the blower had fallen off, so we fixed that too. Meanwhile, all the other boats moved on, and we were alone in the harbour. In the afternoon, we moved over to Great Harbour, home of the infamous Foxy's Tamarind Bar, where everyone needs to go. Foxy was at the microphone, telling all the same

jokes and stories, and making fun of the tourists as usual. One joke new to me: if you walk along the road, and you see two potatoes, how do you tell which one is the prostitute? It's the one that says: "Idaho".
     We went back over our survey and to do list, and made a shopping list for the Budget Marine in St. Thomas. We got a 30 day stamp on our passports, so we have to get out of here in the next week. Everyone says supplies are much cheaper in the USVI, so we're going shopping and then we'll check out the anchorages. The shopping list is huge -- we have some running rigging to replace, need fans, reading lights, tools, etc. Meanwhile, a new item came to the top of the list: one of the water tanks leaks. When we finally used up a tank and switched, there was nothing there. Lots of stuff beginning to make sense -- why did we have that problem with water in the bilge, that went away? We thought is was the leaky transom shower, but now we think it was more than that. Bilge has been really dry.