We have honored the quarantine and are about ready to break loose but once again we are at the mercy of the testing sites. Unfortunately (I am not sure I have mentioned this before) there are no home test kits to be found anywhere in the area. Heck even Amazon says it will not have any available until the end of the month. So we will head to the testing facility tomorrow and once again stand in line and wait. It has been a long eight days now and I wish I had something to show for it. Maybe the floors could have been cleaned and all the windows…….I did get some of the louvered doors in the main salon and galley cleaned. But to be honest I have been lazy. I have allowed whatever this Omicron thing is to have its way so that I can get over it quicker. I have a tendency to fight through a cold and as I told others, I would typically have gone to work with this. But I have rested, drank my water, pushed my vitamins and eaten my well balanced diet. Feeling much better today I am still nervo

Another post about logistics that need to be considered when traveling.  Yes…..the boys!  They are adorable and have such different personalities.  Jaxon is the cautious one while Cooper still believes the world is HIS oyster.  Cooper tends to bring Jaxon out of his shell a bit but there are days Jaxon would just like to be left alone.  They are quite the pair.   So when you travel with pets you need to check to see if there are any importation requirements for them. In the Bahamas you must apply for an importation permit.  Some days this is an easy process and others it is most stressful.  We have been going to the Bahamas for five years and of those five, one has been a cake walk.  You can send away for the permit yourself by sending a money order along with the application or you can use a service that does that for you.  I have done it myself four of our five years and for three of those years I had to resend it again.  So I paid double those years as the first ones were “lost”.  

When considering what to write about some days, I have often been told that folks want to hear some of the “basics” about a cruisers life.  While Greg and I “cruise” for six months or so, we are not the typical 24/7, 365 days a year cruiser.  But whatever the definition is for you, there are some things that ALL cruisers must think about when planning their next destination. The most important for us is health.  While we both sit with positive COVID results, it seems we were not as diligent about our health as we should have been.  I will offer in our defense that we both had been on the road for 20 hours straight on a trip that should have been 14 and were tired and not as well hydrated or nourished as we typically are when aboard Paradigm Shift.  With the Christmas trip home to Waynesboro, we knew we would be in and our of rest stops, fast food locations, gas stations and such.  Somewhere it got us and while the where does not matter much with this new variant, it just helps to reinf

With all systems a go, all we need to do is get up and go get our COVID Rapid Antigen test performed.  A small window is open to crossed Thursday through Friday and not much thereafter for a bit so now is the time.   Ed and Mari-Etta were kind enough to loan us their car so we could drive to the “walk-in” clinic.  Forty-five minute wait to register and then a two hour wait to test.  That two hours gave us time to pick up our last minute greens from Publix and bring back to the boat.  We also had time to get a quick sandwich before heading back up to Advanced Urgent Care for the actual “event”.   A Rapid Antigen test will deliver verified results with fifteen minutes and is accepted by the Bahamian government.  I was the first one to get the call from the nurse.  She asked about my health history, weight and height and then instructed me to come in and head to room five.  We are almost done.  She told me the process for gathering the sample and my eyes were watering just at the thought

Much like the space shuttle command countdowns, we go through our own systems checks to ready for departure.  This is the last opportunity to get “parts”, oil, fuel at a “reasonable” price and within a reasonable amount of time.  While it is available in the Bahamas, it is actually shipped in with a hefty freight bill and VAT tax so we try to carry what we think we may need. Life on Paradigm Shift has been better than I could have imagined.  We really have a house on the water with her.  Our mornings we will sit out back and enjoy our coffee and then transition to the fly bridge for evening cocktails if not too breezy.  The comforts of having space to maneuver around one another and the ability to see outside while sitting in the salon are really two of my favorite features of a trawler. The boys continue to have fun and exhaust themselves with their toys and chew sticks.  There are days we still think Jaxon wants an explanation as to why Cooper entered his world, but most days he seem

Why does it always seem to be a mad “rush” to hurry up and wait?  We rush back from the holidays, rush to get provisions, fuel, Pumpout, refrigeration checked and now WAIT!  The weather has to be favorable, not to mention the tide has to be up for us to get out of where we are staying.  However the real mix in this game of wait is the Bahamian government.  We have to have had a COVID test within 72 hours of entry.  So that means, check the weather, the tide and see if you can get a test all in a few short hours.  Then if all that works in your favor, your application for your Health Visa from the Bahamian government must be approved before you can enter.  Hoops, hoops and more hoops.  Whoever called it March Madness for basketball hoops, may I kindly rename this January Madness?   With a constant eye on the regulations, we are lucky to have some folks already there receiving clarification on some of the new rulings.  Much like our own government, it doesn’t always make much sense, but