How I Came To Love The Painkiller

Not my strong suit, packing light. Honest, I try and really have gotten better over the years. Pretty much since any form of travel included two small children and resembled Hannibal marshalling his forces across the Alps. With elephants.

That seems ages ago. The kids are almost grown up and I've since re-discovered the pleasures of traveling alone or with my boyfriend, leaving family issues and our Dickensian office lives behind for a couple of weeks. We have gone so far in wanting to leave at least our offices behind that our dream is to live aboard a sailboat before we get too creaky and cranky. Dave's interest in sailing predates his interest in me by some years and so he has done his valiant best to recruit me into the vision of a life on the salty planks. To that end he craftily suggested a week spent cruising the Virgin Islands, knowing that the trip might win me over with its perfect weather, easy sailing conditions and beautiful surroundings.

I'm here to let you know that it has.

Back to packing light.... After considering the dimensions of the boat that would be waiting for us on Tortola (37 foot Catalina) and warming up to the idea of life in swim suit, t-shirt or shorts with very few dressy occasions, I managed to keep it to one bag. A first for me. A few hours before our flight I sat on my bed next to my one bag, dubiously eyeing two small, grey, elastic terry cloth bands meant to go around my wrists, each with a white plastic button the size of a pinky tip snapped onto it. These were touted to be the surefire alternative to seasickness drugs which had always knocked me out for most of the day. I had visions of being either doped up or spending some time heaving over the railing. Ye of little faith.

Flying out of wet and freezing Seattle was a relief and we browsed through guide books, maps, scuba itinerary and discussed the ship board provisions list (plenty of rum) on the way to some airport in Texas, further on to Puerto Rico and then finally on to St Thomas. As we craned our tired necks for a view with the plane banking, we could see the breath-taking reality of our maps spread out below.