Cathy and Jon Dockter Visit – Antigua, April 12-19, 2013

Niece Cathy and her husband Jon left a late Midwestern snowstorm and arrived with luggage bulging with items we had purchased from the States and had pressed them into delivering.  A spare hydraulic arm for the stabilizers, a replacement wifi antenna, a 90-day supply of one of my anti-arthritis drugs (and a couple of other less-important drugs), a packet of marking pencils for recording fish counts during dives, a pair of sunglasses for the admiral, and the re-conditioned underwater housing for my camera.  Whew!

We had originally proposed that they join us in St. Martin and accompany us down to Antigua.  But the timing was wrong.  Good thing we later suggested an alternative.  We were concerned that we might not be able to get to St. Martin on the schedule they proposed, and suggested that we instead meet them in Antigua. They would not have been happy passengers.  Our three-day voyage (see previous post) to Antigua turned out to be lumpy, and the seas stayed that way for their entire visit.  So much so, that we had to abandon our intention of spending just a couple of days at the Classic Yacht Regatta and then moving to more remote anchorages on the northeast corner of the island.

Cathy and Jon were a super couple to host.  Congenial, helpful, warm and up for most anything.  We hiked up to Shirley Heights for the Sunday barbecue, took the bus to St. John and Jolly Beach, attended bunches of Classics parties, took a short trip out in the dinghy to watch the regatta, went out another day in rough conditions with Bodacious to watch the start of the race, played some Mexican Train on board, and generally acted like Antigua tourists.  We regret not being able to provide as much sea, snorkel and sun time as they probably had expected, but hope they had as much fun as we did.

In the album, below, pictures marked with “(JD)” were taken by Jon on his iPhone.