Happy New Year

January 1, 2020

Everyone in the Magie household wants to wish our family, friends and those who read these scribbles a very happy new year. As usual, nobody on my side of the family got a decent call because, deep down, I’m a horrible person. This is my penance.

We do wish everyone the best in 2021.

Our New Year’s Eve celebration was quite boring really. For many of the past 20 years or so, we have enjoyed dinner and conversation with our friends Rich, Susan and Alex along with their various guests. This year that didn’t happen and we were asleep by 12:02 and that was without any champagne in our bloodstream.

We were treated to a nice fireworks display (featured image and below) and we did a bit of a year in review, but we also missed the mix of friends that usually occurs at this time of year. 2021 will be better . . . I am sure of it.

We have opted to stay at Highbourne another day as strong winds were expected to continue. They did continue, but the water was surprisingly flat, and we could have moved South but being stuck here isn’t so bad either. The folks on Utopia IV obviously didn’t care much about the weather and moved on . . .

Those of us on the poor end of the docks did some sleuthing and think it was J-Hey from the Chicago Cubs and whoever he was travelling with. If we are right, he makes $12MM a year so $500K per week perhaps isn’t such a high price to pay for a week of Utopia.

We did take some ‘family’ photos (sorry Andrew, we can do more ‘family’ photos when you come down and Megan isn’t here 🙄😁). Here are the highlights.

Tomorrow we will head toward Staniel Cay, not all the way, perhaps to Bell Island, and anchor for the night. By end of day Sunday we need to be within cell phone range as Megan returns to the world of work on Monday morning. She’s working from home, which will just happen to be anchored somewhere near Staniel Cay.

Canada’s new policy on COVID testing for anyone returning to Canada is not exactly shocking, but in the small islands of the Exumas it will make Megan’s return to Canada a bit tricky. Getting a PCR test in the Exumas may be difficult and it seems that she can’t board a plane until she gets such a test. The worst case scenario has us returning to Nassau (a two day journey) by Thursday so that she can get tested. Alternatively, she will need to extend her stay here in The Bahamas for another week so that we can figure out somewhere to get her tested in the southern Exumas. Oh the fun of living on a boat during a pandemic.

This is what Megan looked like after hearing the news that she may have to extend her stay. I’m sorry if your pandemic experience doesn’t get the same reaction.

Happy New Year to everyone!

(P.S. Everyone missed the ‘A Few More Photos’ post because I didn’t post it on Facebook. It’s okay but those pictures were taken by the two photographers on board who know how to frame a shot, so they may be more interesting, at least if you like pictures of Megan.)