The sun is slowly setting while we are still racing around the bay on the minicat. From afar a beautiful square rigged ship is approaching the bay. As we get closer I recognize it to be the Tres Hombres, an engineless sail cargo ship that I have seen several times on my various sailing adventures around the world. She is tacking to get further into the bay and finally drops anchor close to Guppy when it’s already near dark. I sail past to see if there is anyone on board I recognize. There isn’t, but we are invited to come on board that evening. So we sail back to Guppy and get everyone in the dinghy to have a look on board this very old wooden ship. Even though she is only about 8 meters longer than Guppy, it’s a completely different sailing ship and life onboard. Everything is done the old fashioned way and for our young crew it is interesting to see this different world of sailing, where the word comfort gets a whole new meaning to them.. no water maker, no warm water, no big power supply, no washing machine and half the ship is used for its cargo, so the living space is a whole lot less as well.

The following day we head into town to top up some of our food supply. There is a good supermarket a short bus ride away and the bus rides on these islands are always fun. Quite often the buses are 9 seater vans that squeak in every corner and to compensate that they play loud island music. We drive past lots of small wooden houses. A lot of the buildings have an English influence in building style but they are all very colorful from blue, purple, yellow to green. There is enough to see along the way and before we know it, it’s our stop to hop out. Back on the beach everyone helps to get the groceries on board and in its proper place. Then it’s time for a swim and making pancakes for lunch, we spontaneously decide to make a whole bunch more pancakes for the crew of the Tres Hombres which we bring over by dinghy. They are very happy with it 🙂

Our neighbors with the two teenagers on board come over for a few more games and Sander gets on with putting the inner staysail back. We had taken it off for the Atlantic crossing because it’s not a very useful sail going downwind. However now most of the downwind sailing is over so we will use it again. The last two days going for a sail on the minicat seem always to include a visit to the Tres Hombres, to say hi to the crew and learn more about the old fashioned way of sailing. They also gave us some coconuts and a machete to open them. One coconut to eat and one to drink the coconut water from. Yum yumm, everyone agree that’s the good life 🙂 

Laura