At anchor in Falmouth Harbour watching all the world's classic yachts go by. Ranging from the humdrum, to huge jobbies, 150 footers with crews of 30 or 40. All beautifully kept. Varnish and brass sparkling in the sunlight. Anyway, there we are slightly hung over and waiting for Maurice Underwater and his crew to turn up to scrub our bum. They do turn up, fairly late and also fairly hung over. Their diving system would cause a British H&S man to slash his wrists. They have a rusty petrol compressor which lives in a swimming pool-type inflated circular tube. This is set floating in the sea by the boat. A rusty pipe with 6 or 8 connections comes straight off the compressor. Each diver has a long and patched hose and mouthpiece and is connected up straight to the compressor. They all jump in and untangle and tow the contraption along. The scrape and scratch for 40 mins or so. Maurice gives the anodes and prop a good burnishing and checks the log. The fee is 320 EC, about £80, which is fair enough compared to a haul out cost. I jump in afterwards to check the results out. OK but boat looks like a freshly shaved skinhead underwater. In the crystal clear water I notice we are hovering 4ft above turtle grass, so I can stand on the bottom and pretend to hold the boat up.
Underway by noon we are soon crashing along between Antigua's S.Coast reefs with our new found clean-bottom speed. Back to our anchorage off Jolly Harbour for Les' last sundowner, Carib Curry, and nightcap whiskey tots.
Up early 20th in very heavy rain. Up anchor and enter harbour. Alongside immigration for Les to check out. Into our Jolly Harbour marina berth for Les to finish packing, grab lunch, and organise taxi.
Final farewell at noon. Always sad to loose a good crew. Amazingly, Les survived his pedantic and obsessive skipper for a full 25 days. Almost a record.
Now onto RAPAREE's TransAtlantic preps.
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