Same old, same old

Not a whole lot to report, really, except that we finally got the fricking boat on the freighter and we’ve moved to Spain. That’s about it.

If you must have the interminable details, read on.

After we knew we were going to miss the May 9 ship from Fort Lauderdale to Mallorca (due to a shockingly endless series of brand-new boat malfunctions), we sent the kids up to New England to hang out with Bert’s parents for a few days, then to visit with the Wicker family on Star Island. I’m sure you recall from your geography lessons that Star Island is part of the Isles of Shoals, a small group of islands about ten miles off the coast of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Anyway, there they hung, Rosie running feral with her friend Bea, and Nora working in the kitchen as pastry chef, under Sarah Wicker’s tutelage. (Need a chocolate torte for 50? Nora’s your girl.)

Meanwhile, Bert and I sailed the boat from Palm Beach to the Pier 66 Marina in Fort Lauderdale. We spent the next six weeks sweating like whores in church as we labored to get Sparrow ready for the big trip. We replaced the old, ill-fitting propeller. We replaced the Furuno GPS chart-plotter with a Raymarine one. We moved the autopilot panel and the cockpit shower head to more sensible locations. I realize suddenly that I’m saying ‘we’ a lot—actually, I didn’t do a lick of this work. But I did sweat a lot and I offered many extremely well-received opinions.

We spent our last week in air-conditioned splendor at the marina’s adjoining Hyatt Regency hotel (below is a picture of Sparrow, taken from our room).

Then, on the 17th of June, at about 8pm, we got word that the time was right to load our boat onto the good ship Snoekgracht (try saying that name out loud. Now say it out loud really loudly. Gesundheit! Hah!). We dashed out of our hotel room, untied the boat and motored under the 17th Street Causeway bridge. There, in the distance, under a suitably dramatic sky, lay Snoekgracht, or Snoeky, as I like to think of her.



We drew close and circled around a few times, until a guy from waaaay up on the deck of the ship shouted down to us to bring Sparrow alongside. Bert generously allowed me to take the helm for this tricky maneuver, and I executed the landing with a most singular feeling of exhilaration (and a most copious flow of sweat). The tiny man at the top of the container ship lowered two lines to us, and in no time we were holding fast and fending off with great care to keep the spreaders from banging alongside the great hulking metal sides of Snoeky.

Then the tiny man up top shouted down and asked us if we wanted to get off our boat and take a launch back to the hotel, or if we’d like to stay aboard while they hoisted Sparrow up with a crane. “But you’ll have to climb off on the rope ladder after you get up here,” he added. Bert yelled, “Sure,” as I nervously eyed the ladder. A two-hundred-foot descent from that swaying piece of line seemed, I don’t know, like something I would NEVER DO IN A MILLION YEARS AND BERT OUGHT TO KNOW THAT BY NOW.
“I’m not doing that,” I said.
“Oh, come on, you can do it,” he said, smiling encouragingly.
Just then, a man in a wetsuit began climbing down the ladder, Or, rather, he took a step down, swung a bit, then was slammed, twisting, elbows and knees, against the side of the ship. This action was repeated until he reached bottom. Bert and I watched in silence, then Bert yelled up to the the tiny little guy, “Actually, we’ll just take the launch.”

At this point, it was about 10pm. We stayed aboard long enough to watch a sailboat in front of us get hoisted up, and to swig a few drams of rum and eat some Pirouline cookies. We gave the remaining cookies to the guy in the wetsuit (that rum was gone) and hopped onto the launch. When we got back to the hotel, we dashed off and grabbed a pizza, then drove to an empty lot across from the harbor, and watched as Sparrow was lifted onto the Snoekgracht. If you look at the photo below closely, you can kind of see her, just left of center, raised just above the great ship's decks. I'm sorry. It was late, there'd been rum, and my camera sucks.


Oy, this is taking forever. So then we hightailed it to Rhode Island, got the kids from the Wickers, said goodbye to family and friends (and it was so great seeing you all, we miss you already), and on Wednesday, June 28, we flew to Mallorca, where we await the July 4th arrival of Sparrow.

We’re comfortably ensconced at the stunningly beautiful Hotel Dalt Murada, (check out their website, www.hoteldaltmurada.com, we’re in suite 3) in the achingly beautiful town of Palma. That's Nora out on the terrace, and Rosie in the living room of our suite.



We’re feasting on tapas, sipping Spanish wine, seeing the sights and tentatively trying out our rudimentary Spanish. As soon as Sparrow shows up, we’ll provision, then sail off for a summer cruise of the Balearic islands (quick, dust off the atlas!). Then, in early August we head for our future home: Port Vell Marina in Barcelona. Ya’ll come see us!
This is Sparrow, standing by.