From Linda

Late last night I heard from Linda:

This is all overwhelming.  After the shock wore off we were running on pure adrenaline.  Then the emotional crash for me.  Brad wanders around cleaning up the aftermath and sighs a lot!

Jane has made a post on the blog today with a couple of photos.  We'll continue with the updates.

I haven't been back out to see Kattywompus.  Evidently there's very little left at this point and it breaks my heart.  I loved that boat and can't imagine that we'll find another boat like her.  The insurance claim is moving forward and all seems OK with that.  We have feelers out for a boat here.  Will see what we find.

Our network of cruising and land based friends has been amazing.  John and Amanda Neal from 'Mahina Tiare' are among many that are constantly in touch.  Our good friends Mike and Marnie from 'Shelette' received the news while in Denver.  I quickly connected them with my best buddy Mindy there and they have arrived back here in NZ today with a duffel bag of clothes and other things for us.  Email and cell phones are amazing.

Our new family here, John, Jacey, Travis and Grayson have let us want for nothing (except a good night's sleep which is not their fault).  Their friends and family continue to dive the reef looking for more of our stuff.  The locals who walk the beach about a mile away also pick up all the boat debris as well as any of our treasures that wash up.  I don't know how we can ever repay them.  We would have to stay here a long time.  Hmmmm...I think that's a great idea!

I haven't looked yet, but as I recall we didn't back up the photos from the PC onto the external hard drive.  I will check that soon but suspect they may be only memories at this point.  The ipod, drive and thumb drives survived the reef quite nicely in their pelican cases.  The mac is in one too but has yet to be found.  No pearls yet either.

Many lessons have been learned.


They had two computers and an external hard drive on board; we have been discussing what to do with whatever might be found of them.  I advised that even if a computer had been wet, its hard drive might be recoverable with some initial, stabilizing care, and with attention by an expert in drive recovery.

Her three hard drives contain pictures that we want to see.

Her message addresses an issue that had been troubling many of us--the question of insurance. Apparently many cruisers find the cost to be out of reach, so we were pretty worried.  However, it does sound as if they had coverage, and so expect to be able to replace the boat.

We hope so.

("Pearls" refers to a purchase she had made a few months ago. I think it's mentioned in her blog.)

--Mark_
07:35 15 April 2010