No news is good news

And I have no news. Things around the anchorage here in Isla Espiritu Santo are just fine. We are considering moving to a new location, just for a change, but need to wait here as another boat is coming with some things for us, like limes and beer. The important stuff.

For some reason, the anchorage is especially rolly today. We are stuck in the trough, which means we rock from side to side, and at times, sort of swirl around. It is not a problem, but a bit uncomfortable and you have to be careful where you set things down if you do not want them rolling around. I just had to get up from here and rearrange two coconuts that were threatening to come loose and roll around the counter. By the way, fresh coconuts are a lot of work but they are worth it. I have become addicted to fresh coconut water. Not to be confused with coconut milk, which is an infusion of hot water and shredded coconut, then pressed. Coconut cream is what rises to the top of chilled coconut milk, and you can make butter from the cream, all the same as with milk. I have not done anything except make the milk, which I used to make coconut rice. I was disappointed, because you could not taste the coconut, and it took me a couple hours to make all that milk. But I am going to keep working on it, because I love coconut rice.

Yesterday I did four loads of laundry in my little five gallon bucket - two sets of sheets. You can only wash one sheet and one pillowcase at a time, or nothing gets clean. I did all these clothes the other day, so it has really been a laundry week. I have three sets of sheets - a red set, a purple set, and a green set. I washed the purple and the green, and when I had them attached to the sail sheets drying in the wind, it looked like I was flying a spinnaker. Speaking of which, when we headed to the Rio Sambu from this anchorage, we were in a flotilla of five boats, and at one point, we were all flying our spinnakers and we looked fabulous. I wanted to take pictures, but the boats were too far apart to get any good effect. Ours is not a true spinnaker, but rather what is called a cruiser, or a drifter, or an asymmetrical spinnaker. It is easier to use and more versatile than a true spinnaker.

Otherwise, like I said, there is nothing going on here. The cormerants are migrating, and there are literally hundreds of them hanging around, and flying in large groups through the area. A bunch of them roosted in a tree near us, and we discovered they have really low voices, croaking like bull frogs. They are fantastic divers, and it is amazing to watch them go. They stay underwater for much longer than the other birds do.

The boat is messy and desperately needs to be straightened up, but I don't feel like doing it. I have never been good at "a place for everything and everything in its place" although I do try. When you live in less that forty feet, you can't let things get out of hand, and we never do. It is always very clean (I will never again live through another roach invasion, and although I know they were not there because the boat was dirty, it makes me feel better to think there are no snacks left for them), but sometimes we start leaving things out and it gets cluttered looking really fast. We did buy some beautiful basketry from the Embera, and we have mounted them on the walls and it looks great.

Today the plan is to maybe do some fishing if the waves calm down, and to visit the people on another boat here, one of the boats at the river with us. I need to make some tortillas, as we are out of the store bought version. Mine are better anyway. So I guess I should get started on that!

"I have learned that to be with those I like is enough." (Walt Whitman)

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