April 1, 2023
My last post described the time we have spent in the Dominican Republic so far, but somehow there is a whole section about the people that we have met that seems to have vanished. I work on posts from two different devices and sometimes three, perhaps my draft copy wasn’t saved properly. As well, for those who may be new to the blog, my posts can reflect as much a log for my memory as a (hopefully) interesting story for you the reader. Bear with me as I recall some of the people we have met along the way.
Vitaly on Shiksa was our dock mate for our entire stay at Blue Haven Marina, and he followed us down to the DR, but is on a slightly different path. He is now in Samana, just a few days behind. His expertise is Sonar systems and does consulting work for Garmin.
Mabuhay has been travelling near to us since Black Point (The Bahamas) and is still in Samana awaiting new cushions from a local supplier. They look great from the picture we saw and are about 30% of the cost for the same work in Florida. Grant and Agnes are also Canadian, hailing from Ottawa originally and are retired and on an adventure to probably Antigua before heading back up the East coast to Baltimore. Wonderful people to travel with.
In Samana we ran into Kim and Pam Gregory on s/v Kemana (SailingKemana.wordpress.com) who hail from Mimico Cruising Club in Toronto. That is where we kept our sailboat for 10 years. We had a great chat and they are on a similar path to us by the sounds of it so we may see them many more times as we head south.
Likewise s/v Ileanna with John, Ileanna and Shelley proved to have some of the best stories. John’s last boat was featured on the front cover of McLean’s magazine when his captain/crew was being extricated from his boat, forced to abandon his new boat 500 miles off the coast of Nova Scotia due to bad weather and equipment failures. An interesting story. His new boat (a Hanse 50.5) is lovely. Once he is finished vacationing with Ileanna and Shelley he will be heading back up to Canada. Perhaps I will track him down at Port Credit Yacht Club to see how his latest adventure works out.
As we arrived in Cap Cana, we had a chance to chat with more Canadians, Tom and Monique from Miss Moni, a Fleming 55. Tom is a great story teller and in our short visit it was clear that spending time with them would be a lively affair, however they are headed north, back to Florida, and so our paths won’t cross again soon likely.
We continue to meet a lot of wonderful people and I am sure there are plenty more in our path.