Arrived

Hi all,

Sorry for the group email but knew you'd want to know that we arrived safe and sound in Glover's Reef, Belize. Sorry we didn't check in yesterday. We left Utila Cays at about 5 pm and arrived here at around 11 am yesterday after an overnight sail. We were supposed to have a GPS track out of the Utila Cays, but for some reason it was lost. However, the reef was more or less visible so, except for a bit of stress (on my part) we made it out OK. We had a "boisterous" sail with 15+ kts of wind. We had a double reefed main up, for stability, and a tiny bit of the headsail out and managed to keep it down to about 4 kts. You can pretty much walk that fast! The problem was that it was only a 60 mile trip, or so, which is too much to do in the daylight, but too short to do in an overnighter and not arrive before daybreak. You want to arrive, with good light, so you can see the reefs and coral heads. The wind and waves were on our beam, so it was not a comfortable ride. The wave height was in the 8 foot range...not comfortable either! We took a couple small hits, into the cockpit, complete with one flying fish on deck and one in the cockpit. Amazing little sea life. We saw nothing enroute, no dolphins or anything. One lonely freighter or fishboat, during the night, and one in the morning. We arrived, bagged, to Glover's Reef and all the small reefs, at the entrance, seemed very clear on the chart, but not so much in person. Take a look on Google Earth. We managed to weave our way into the south entrance and are anchored near South West Cays. A large barracuda was visible, at our bow, when we were coming in. I hope he stays out there!! Last night was windy, but the water was calm and we stayed put. There's a lot of reef to snorkel on here, so hopefully it will be good.

Love,
Mom and Dad xxox
or
Cheryl and Ralph