I got up at 6:00am and made coffee but by the time Arturo and I were done with breakfast, the battery alarm went off. That meant we had to run the generator. Since we didn't need much water last night, we had turned off the generator early, and it turned out that wasn't sufficient to keep the battery charged. Since we planned to sail, we had to charge the battery so that we would have navigation instruments running once we turned off the engine. And no, you cannot run the generator while the boat is sailing.
Well, turning on the generator woke every one up, and while waiting for the battery to charge, Arturo took the time for one last dip in the Carribean. Massi, who was usually the first in the water declined to swim since she'd have to carry wet swim suits back onto the plane. We'd rinsed all the gear the night before with fresh water.
When the battery reached 94% charge we turned it off, started the generator, and started motoring to pirate's bight to clear Pelican Island before raising the sails. Once up, the wind drove us along at close to 8 knots, bringing us across the channel to Nanny Cay Marina's entrance in half an hour instead of the projected 45 minutes.
We dropped the sails and motor'd into the marina and headed for the fuel dock, with the crew scrambling to get fenders ready. There was already a Navigare sailboat docked there, and the Navigare yachting staff scrambled to move that catamaran out of the way so we'd have room to dock and refuel. Once docked, my responsibility for La Badine was over. I started packing the rest of my stuff, and Mark and Arturo took care of refueling. The bill came to around $159.89 for a week of motoring and running the generator which impressed me as I'd thought we'd used the motor a lot more than that.
Once the boat was moved by the Navigare staff to a slip we disembarked and prepared to settle up after using the land bathrooms for the first time in more than a week. We settled the final bills, and Arturo kindly remembered to bring back the cruising guide, the boat phone, and the ship's papers to the receptionist, and when they heard that we planned to catch the 10:30am ferry, they sped everything up and called a taxi to get us there by 9:45am. I was impressed by their customer centric-ness. The boat might have been in bad shape, but the Navigare Yachting staff cares!
At the ferry terminal, we bought tickets for everyone, and paid the exit tax. The wait wasn't very long before the ferry started boarding, and it was a much faster ferry than the one who took on the way to Road town. Arriving in Charlotte Amelie we were happy with how quickly the customs and passport office cleared us, and then the Taxi terminal let us store our luggage with them while we explored the town before going to the airport.
We had a slow lunch, then ice cream. I'd never been to downtown Charlotte Amelie before, but this visit made me realized that I hadn't missed anything. It was mostly a bunch of jewel and souvenir shops all looking for cruise ship tourists to buy. The place look pretty sad when a cruise ship wasn't disgorging its tourists to make things look busy.
We got to the airport with no trouble, and said goodbye to Kathryn, Mark, and Mingkuan who were staying another night in St Thomas. At Miami airport, we said goodbye to Stone and Ying, and had dinner with Massi and Arturo before we said goodbye to them as well, and slept in the airport hotel so we could catch the 8:00am flight the next morning. Our cruise was over.
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