wire and duct tape. (necessary ingredients for this boat) and we continued westward.  After five minutes Captain Pedro asked me to take the wheel again because he was going back to bed.  Roberto went to bed also.  In fact Roberto went to bed three times that day.  That left just me and Pedro# 2 on the bridge.  (That is, whenever he wasn’t sleeping)

We cruised six more hours that day and planned to tie up to a large can buoy just west of the Port of Borinquen at the west end of Puerto Rico.  As I was leaning over the bow trying to make fast our line to the buoy, I heard some Spanish spoken and the boat went in fast reverse with me damn near flying over the bow.  After I recovered Captain Pedro said, “Wee will anchor instead” I wished that I had known some Spanish cuss words at the time.  We went to bed at midnight and got up to haul anchor at 3AM in order to cross the infamous Mona Passage, which has been known to be pretty rough.  The trip wasn’t bad at all.

As we cruised into Samana Bay on the southern side of the Dominican Republic, Captain Pedro took over the boat and did a fantastic job of docking the boat under adverse wind conditions.  We were met by two guys with guns trained on us. They wouldn’t let us off the boat until they made sure of our identity and our reason for being there.  After we were cleared for entry, the guns were removed and Captain Pedro had a man come aboard and cook dinner for us.  The cook brought aboard a 15 lb. yammie (like a large white sweet potato) to cook with dinner.  It was delicious.  That night the whole town turned out to party at a nearby local hangout. Several people were having a good time trying to teach me Spanish.  Pedro# 2 had already taught me some Spanish.  A dog was “El Doggo” and a cat was “El Catto” etc.  When I used his language, he rolled all over the boat laughing.

About 3 AM I went back to the boat and slept on the deck of the tuna tower, where there was a nice breeze. One hour later Captain Pedro woke me by screaming my name very loud, over and over.  He didn’t know where I was and feared that maybe I had tried to abandon ship again.  We reluctantly left this fun place at 4 AM and headed east around the east end of the Dominican Republic.  The steering broke again after about 5 minutes of running.  More panic, more duct tape and more wire, and then we were on our way.  The scenery was beautiful with sandy beaches, steep hills and palm trees.  We had a rolly polly ride of about 125 miles ahead of us.  The depth of the ocean was so impressive that I decided to make an experiment.  I filled a coke can and sunk it.  I calculated the can would not hit bottom for about three hours. Then Pedro# 2 came up on the bridge and commented, “Hey, did you notice all the nice Mommies in Samana Bay?”

Roberto and Captain Pedro went back to bed.  (Guess who was steering)  I actually enjoyed steering from the bridge, so I had no complaints.  When I had to pee I would call for Pedro# 2 to take the wheel with his one hand, while the other was holding his rum and coke.  We backed into a dock at Puerto Plata at 5 PM.  The apparent friendliness of the island changed demonstrably.  Two tough looking hombres aimed guns at us until we answered several questions, gave them some cash and a bottle of liquor.  While all this politicking was going on, an old man on shore was having a heated discussion with Pedro# 2 in Spanish.  In his arms, the man had a cute little goat, weighing about 20 lbs.  I was waiting to go ashore and pet the goat.  As I got ashore and walked up to them, the old man laid the goat down on the ground and cut his throat.  The heated discussion had been about the price of the goat for our evening meal. This made me mad; I had never eaten goat before and I wasn’t about to begin that evening.  The rest of the guys made fun of me until I relented and took a bite.  It was so good that I almost didn’t leave any for the rest of them.

During our short visit the crew and guests, except for me, went to town.  Every place we docked they went to town and returned with more food, (which we didn’t need) and more often than not returned with a present for everyone on board.

Now I understood why it’s called downhill from Puerto Rico to the USA.  The Easterlies would drive 20 foot swells up our stern, and then we would zoom downhill for 200 yards at a time until the next swell came along.

At the West Caicos Islands, north of the Dominican Republic, we went to the house of a friend of Captain Pedro’s to drink and shoot pool, while some locals delivered fuel to our boat in 50 gallon drums.  The people living in the house tried to get Pedro# 2 to stay and live with them as their local hairdresser and wig seller.  He refused but I do think he was considering it because he said out loud to everyone, “Some nice Mommies here, huh?”

The next night we anchored about 30 yards from an uninhabited island, Plano Cay.