Remembering Jelly

March 24, 2000 – September 13, 2014 We were at sea between mainland Australia and the Cocos Keeling Islands when Lin e-mailed us that Jelly had died. I mentioned it in a blog, but I guess we never really gave Jelly her due. When David was writing a blog about fishing recently, I was digging through some photos on my computer and I came across a picture of Jelly “helping” David to fish. As saddened as we were by her death, pictures like this bring back so many good memories. She was one feisty kitty.

Over the years, we've done several blog posts about her. She certainly had a unique life. Most cats do not go to sea, although from our experience, they do quite well on a boat. Jelly never knew anything other than Nine of Cups for the first seven years of her life. She was a pretty good sailor...

but rarely stayed awake during her watch.

She could smell land long before we could see it. She'd pace up and down the deck with her nose in the air, sniffing for the earthy scents of soil and smoke. Once land was in sight, there was no getting her out of the cockpit. All her senses were tuned towards our destination, even though she seldom went ashore. Our arrival at St. Helena in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean was the classic view of Jelly's anticipation. Land ho!

Pets really do become family members. We've always had cats and dogs (and rats and guinea pigs, etc) when we were growing up and when our kids were growing up. Perhaps because we spent so much time with Jelly, she was our favorite cat of all time. When we decided to visit New Zealand and Australia, we made the hard decision to leave her with my mom in the USA. Quarantine laws in those countries are strict. As it turned out, Mom and Jelly became the best of companions and enjoyed nearly seven years together before they both passed away in 2014.

Will we every get another cat? Pets pose some interesting issues aboard and we're not ready to handle those at the moment.  Maybe someday, but probably not in the near future.

Jelly still has her own page on our website. Check it out if you have a chance.

When Neptune Doesn't Cooperate

We've been ready to leave for a couple of days now. All the essential boat chores and repairs were done. We'd seen pretty much everything we wanted to see on the island. The boat's ready. We're ready. BUT Neptune is not ready and therein lies the problem. There is no wind. Not even a little bit of a breeze is forecast for the next few days. Okay, I'm exaggerating … 3kts with gusts to 4kts. This is not good news for a sailboat.  

Delays are always an issue for sailors. We get psyched up to leave and then we wait, and wait, and wait. The frustration level grows and that's when many folks make mistakes. They get tired of the endless waiting for a reasonable forecast and they just take off. Some have schedules to meet; others just can't handle the waiting game. There are not many boats left in the marina. It's definitely time to go, but we've certainly learned the hard way that patience invariably pays off. It's just not easy.

The delay has also posed another issue for us. Mauritius granted us a 14-day visa when we arrived. Our 14 days is near expiration and these couple of days delay will require a short extension to the visa. If we're lucky, we'll either get a free extension for a couple of days OR the forecast will change a bit.

So … what to do while we're waiting. We're down to the B-list places to visit, too. We take walks in the morning just to get out and exercise as long as we can. We've visited the free Seashell Museum, upstairs from the Mikado jewelry store. It's a one-room affair with a pretty good display of seashells actually. We did find out that one particular species of harp shell (harpa costata) is native to the Mauritian waters. This carnivorous gastropod (think sea snail) has the ability to self-amputate a part of its foot, kind of like some lizard can do with their tails. Even after wowing about this new tidbit of information, we made it through the museum in about 15 minutes.

We decided to buy a few souvenirs from the crafts market rather than the retail stores along the waterfront. Many of the reasons we liked Mauritius when we first arrived are the very same things that are driving us crazy now. The heat and crowds and closeness of the market and the accompanying stench of rotting produce and human sweat about knocked us over. We climbed the stairs to the souvenir vendors and walked the gauntlet to a fellow who sold t-shirts we liked. We wanted one. “Look, a kasmir/pashmina scarf for you, madame.” “No, thanks, just a t-shirt.” “Look, madame, a fine table runner for your table.” “No, thanks, really, just a t-shirt.” “Spices, madame, every women needs spices for her cooking.” “No, thanks ….” Bargaining is part of the game here and David's good at it. I just walk away and let him do his thing. We got the t-shirt (and only the t-shirt) for a reasonable price, but it was hard work.

We've been writing up a storm. We're ahead on some blogs for Gentry to post while we're at sea and David is working on a couple of articles he promised to Good Old Boat. I'm working on an article for SSCA and another for Cruising Helmsman. The website needs updating. There's enough to keep us busy if we're ambitious enough.

So … what do we do when Neptune doesn't cooperate? We busy ourselves the best we can. In the past we've waited up to two weeks or more for a weather window. Don't fret if there's nothing you can do to change things. We try to remain patient ... and we wait.

Provisioning in Style - Bagatelle Mall of Mauritius

The market is absolutely great for freshies, but we were in need of some other staples … and a few treats. We've found a couple of small grocery stores in town ... a ShopRite and a Winners ... both within walking distance, but both tiny and lacking in stuff we wanted. We haven't quite decided if we'll stop in Reunion yet, but whether we do or don't is irrelevant since prices there are very high and we're better off provisioning here. We'd heard of the Bagatelle Mall of Mauritius, which is a bus ride away, and purportedly had two large hypermarkets. We decided to head out on a foraging expedition.  

Sure enough, the bus let us off right in front of a modern, rather large mall. We're talking Tommy Hilfilger, Ralph Lauren, Hugo Boss, QuikSilver and a multitude of other high end stores we weren't interested in, plus two hypermarkets and veggie store. We walked through MonoPrix first ... okay, but not great. We checked out the other grocery store next, Intermart, and it had pretty much everything we wanted at reasonable prices. It was bustling with people. The aisles were jammed and the check-out queues were long.

Like most modern malls, Bagatelle had a large food court as well as some nice restaurants. We opted for lunch before shopping for three reasons. First, it's always better to shop on a full stomach. Second, it was lunchtime and we were hungry. Third, the name of the restaurant we chose was called The Flying Dodo Brewing Company. How could we resist?

We had a fine lunch with a Dodo beer and returned to Intermart. Since we were transporting all of our provisions in shopping bags and backpacks and needed to be able to carry it all, we were quite conscious of how much we could buy. We opted to take a small shopping cart and when it was full, we called it quits. We just managed to fit all of our purchases in the bags we had. We tromped back to the bus station laden down like mules, rode a jam-packed bus back to Port Louis, and walked from the Victoria Square bus station back to the marina, sweating and lugging our groceries through the crowded streets. Back on Nine of Cups, we got it all unloaded and stowed. We'll head back one more time for a second load. This foraging stuff is hard work. Whew ... time for a beer.