As planned we arrived at Portobello late yesterday afternoon and caught-up with several other Rally boats. We went ashore for dinner with the crews from Working On A Dream and Anastasia. As reported in the cruising guides, we had a very nice dinner at one of the simple restaurants in town, had a great evening of getting to know the people on the other boats.
When we got back to our boat we discovered that the anchor had dragged and we had started to drift downwind. Because this harbor is well protected and close to the Canal entrance, there are quite a few boats anchored here, most of which are not in our Rally. Anyway, we had to raise the anchor and only after several attempts were we successful in finding a secure spot for the night. It is always an uneasy feeling when you go to bed not knowing if you are going to be awakened in the middle of the night by running aground on the rocks or colliding with another boat, but when we woke up this morning we were in the same spot as when we went to bed!
Because we only have about twenty miles to go today before reaching the Canal entrance and marina at Shelter Bay, most of the crew are sleeping in, it's 7:45 right now and they are being given an additional hour of sleep over what was promised last night. The girls got so bored yesterday that they actually wanted to learn how to use the chartplotter, GPS and AIS systems instead of watch movies or TV programs. They picked it up very quickly and are learning about electronic navigation and over-all seamanship. When they discovered that with a special cable they could probably watch movies from the iPad on the chartplotter screens, they re-doubled their interest in becoming proficient in operating the devices.
BRIZO Crew