Feb. 11, 2008 - Things that go bump in the night

Whats a catamaran useful for? - answer a fender - read on.  0100 in the morning in Portsmouth Harbour Dominica swinging around a mooring buoy -  bit windy but not too bad.  Except we weren't - swing around a buoy that is.  A series of loud bangs woke us up and we shot on deck to see a large catamaran bouncing down our starboard side, looking forward I could see the mooring buoy so asssumed he had hit us.  Not so - the whole damn buoy had come adrift, we had missed at least 5 other boats and just caught him with our anchor.  Another 6 inches to the left and we would have either woken up in the middle of the Caribbean Sea or on the Cabrit rocks (which were not far away).  Fi was great in containing the panic (just lik me) and helped to get the anchor down and then the kettle on.  In the morning, we were amazed to find no damage to us and just a scrape on the cat - who now has my insurance details.  The locals are now really worried as the moorings are only 4 months old and at 9 tons we are not the heaviest boat on them by far - and its forecast to blow up tomorrow night.  So it'll be two anchors in a clear area for us.  Who said Caribbean cruising was all a doddle?  Oh and its Fis birthday.