HAPPY NEW YEAR FROM THE BAHAMAS, AND HOW WE GOT HERE (Part Two)

Since the last blog two week's ago, we left the anchorage south of Hoffman's Cay and stayed just west of Frazer's Hog Cay for four nights. Both Hoffman's and Frazer's are in the Berry Islands chain. Then a week ago Tuesday we had a very nice sail down to Morgan's bluff, which is on the north side of Andros Island. That's where we are now waiting for strong winds from the north to come through tomorrow. 

While in MN/WI during August and September we saw family and friends, though because of Covid, not as many friends as we would have liked. We also did a lot in preparation for going back to the boat, including buying a new dinghy, which Delana then made chaps for. Chaps provide protection from chaffing, punctures and the sun. We also bought solar panels, controllers, cable, connectors and materials to build a structure to support everything; all sorts of spare parts; and a bunch of other stuff. We rented a cargo van to haul it all back to VA. 

Before I go any farther, I want to thank DJ and Jennie for allowing us to live with them for months at a time, each of the past three years. They may feel some kind of obligation to let Delana freeload off them, but for me it's strictly charity. They make us both feel very much at home.

 This is where we lived for the next month at Stingray Point Boatyard.  However, we were welcome to stay at Delana's cousin Joe's house (just a 5 minute bike ride away), which we did when we needed a break from the mess and/or cold. We really appreciated it.

The first part was more destruction than construction. We removed the old dinghy, the old solar panel system and ALL 75' of existing sanitation hose.

Then throw in all the misc. projects, along with finding places for all the stuff we brought back from MN, and the boat was a disaster.

Since we had the bottom painted in Guatemala just a year ago, scraping thousands of barnacle feet from the bottom of the boat was an unexpected project.

As was sanding and painting. All of which, along with boat yards being inherently dirty, made matters even worse.

We still had to eat though.

Along with sanding, painting, cooking, etc., Delana took over a corner of the captain's lounge to make covers for our eight diesel jugs and the four water ones, as well as storage pockets to fit on the new dinghy.

I actually worked too.

The nice thing about our location was at the end of almost every day after showering, we sat out on the dock, had a drink, talked about what we accomplished that day, what we were going to do the next and watched the sun set. So it wasn't all bad.

While in Deltaville we scored some free foldable bikes. Quite a few cruisers have foldable bikes, but I had never really wanted one.  I figured they were just a couple more things to maintain and fix. Plus in Guatemala and Honduras, riding a bike on those narrow roads would have been suicide. 

We first pulled out the hot chocolate and Schnapps while in Deltaville. 57 degrees might not seem that cold, but if you're in it all day and all night, it gets to you. We woke up several mornings with our cabin at 41. At the time I had no idea this would be far from the last time our drink of choice would include hot chocolate instead of rum. As we went south it didn't get any better.

While we were in Deltaville, the Baptist Church held outdoor services across from Joe's house. I went a couple Sunday's. Following one of the services two young women were baptized on a cold day in a frigid Chesapeake Bay. 

Then one day the new solar panel system was up and running; the new sanitation hose was installed; the bottom was painted; the hull was cleaned/waxed; almost all of the misc. projects were completed (they will never be all done); everything was stowed; and the boat was cleaned up.

This is our cabin in the owner's hull.

The rest of the owner's hull is made up of closets; cupboards; a decent size bathroom; and an "office" area, where we keep the washing machine, a pretty large chest freezer and printer.

The bathroom in the owner's hull, which  includes a separate full size
shower.

The aft guest cabin in the starboard hull.

The forward guest cabin in the starboard hull.

One of the two guest bathrooms in the starboard hull.

The salon area viewed from the cockpit, includes a sitting area, galley, navigation table, shelves, cupboards and storage.

The cockpit area, where we eat, entertain and spend a lot of time.

And the helm, where you can control the sails, engines, steering and anchoring. 

Once ready to go we didn't waste any time getting back in the water. By the way, one negative about catamarans is it's not always easy to find marinas with travel lifts wide enough to haul them out. We only had about 6" to spare on each side.

Though I didn't think it'd be necessary as we went south and supposedly got warmer, we left the cockpit enclosure on. As a matter of fact, it probably isn't necessary but we still have most of the enclosure on here in the Bahamas. 

We left Deltaville, VA at dawn on November 4th.

Above is some of what we saw as we sailed down the Chesapeake Bay, past Norfolk, Virginia Beach and onto Cape Hatteras.

As we rounded Cape Hatteras in the dark we were joined by seven other boats (green triangles) taking advantage of the settled weather.

Our next stop was Cape Lookout National Seashore in NC.

Besides the lighthouse and sand dunes, there's over 100 wild horses

And though the Seashore is only reachable by ferry, it can haul vehicles since driving on the beach is allowed in certain areas. This guy and his adult son were just wrapping up two weeks of fishing while staying in his camper on the beach. They were already planning to come back in two weeks.

After being anchored at Cape Lookout for a couple days we went to Beaufort, NC, which is only about 15 miles away. Since Beaufort in on the Intercoastal Waterway (more about that later) there were quite a few anchored boats.

Beaufort has a nice waterfront.

And of course all these historic towns have historic cemeteries that are always interesting to walk through.

When leaving Beaufort, as soon as we made it through the inlet we started trolling. Within seconds we had a fish. In this case it was a False Albacore, which really isn't edible so we threw it back.

And within seconds of letting the line out again we caught this nice Wahoo, which we didn't throw back. These are gold.

Next we rounded Cape Fear and went to Southport, NC. It has a cute little harbor, but not a lot of place to anchor. The highlight was Walt, an ISU/rugby friend, taking the time to visit us for an afternoon. Walt was also on-board in 2017 when we sailed from Punta Gorda, FL to Pensacola, as well as in 2018 while we were in Belize.

Our next stop was Charleston. Once again, we had a great sail which included dolphins. We probably see dolphins on 75% of our sails. Sometimes they're just passing by while other times they'll stay and play with the boat for quite a while.

We sailed past Fort Sumter on our way into Charleston's harbor.

This photo illustrates the tidal range (distance between low and high tide levels) in Charleston. The greater the range, the faster the currents. As I recall, while we were in Charleston the tidal range was over 6' because of a super tide and the current was over 3 knots at times. Generally speaking, the closer to the equator the less tide there is. So in Central America it was less than a foot, here in the Bahamas it's about 3' and in the Bay of Fundy, between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, it's nearly 40'. Anyway, tides and currents just further complicate navigating, anchoring and docking.

While in Charleston we streamed Delana's niece/DJ and Jennie's daughter playing a rugby match as part of the USA Women's National XV Team's training camp. We also went to the Charleston Museum, toured a plantation and had Gary and Beth over for wahoo dinner on the boat.

On our way to Beaufort, SC we went by Parris Island. That's where my Dad did his Marine Corp training.

Like Beaufort and Southport, NC; Charleston, SC; Jekyll Island, GA and St Augustine, FL, Beaufort, SC has many beautiful historic homes.

This boat's mast is an example of a boat that attempted to get under a fixed bridge on the Intercoastal Waterway. More about the ICW shortly.

We went past this on our way to Jekyll Island. It's a 656' long automobile transport ship that tipped over on it's side in September of 2019 with 4,200 cars on board. The plan is to cut the ship into eight slices, have the yellow structure lift each slice up using the handles that have been welded onto the ship's hull and then put each slice on a barge to be hauled away. I guess this has never been done before. They also set up a barrier surrounding the wreck to contain gas, oil, other fluids, as well as car and boat debris. The last I heard, the first slice was expected to take 24 hours, but instead it took 3 weeks. I'm not sure about the current status.

Then we anchored on the Intercoastal Waterway next to Jekyll Island. In the late 1800's Jekyll Island became an exclusive private hunting club for families like the Rockefeller's, Morgan's, Vanderbilt's and Pulitzer's. It's also where legislation for what became the Federal Reserve was drafted. In 1947 the State of Georgia purchased the island and it is now one of the Golden Isles of Georgia and includes a National Historic Landmark District.

Besides the Jekyll Island Club, there are also a bunch of large beautiful historic homes.

How could we resist.

On the ocean side of the island are a few newer hotels, stores, a convention center, etc., along with some nice dunes.

 

The Intercoastal Waterway (ICW) is a 3,000 mile combination of natural and manmade inland waterways running from Boston, MA, southward adjacent to the Atlantic coast, around the tip of Florida and along the Gulf Coast to Brownsville, TX. It provides a navigable route for boats without the hazards of traveling on the open sea. However, with Starship we really can't use it. Almost all of the fixed bridges along the ICW have a clearance of 65' in normal high tide and according to the notes from Starship previous owner, we need 70' of clearance. So we were resigned to the fact that we couldn't get under the Jekyll Island bridge and would have to back track around the north end of the island in order to continue our trip south in the Atlantic. However, about the time we were ready to leave, the forecast on the ocean side got ugly, which meant being anchored another three days at Jekyll. Since we were really ready to move on, I decided to measure the mast myself. Through a combination of hoisting a 100' tape up the mast; using a tape measure between the boom, rooftop, deck and water; and some guesstimating, I came up with us needing a clearance height of 68'-2". 

So when the next low tide arrived, which was the following morning, I dinghied over to the clearance board on the side of the bridge and used my tape measure to figure that there was a little over 69' of clearance. 

I then rushed back to the boat before the tide started to rise. And with that image of the boat with the broken mast fresh in our minds, we slowly motored under the bridge. From our angle on deck it's really impossible to see how much clearance there is, but there was enough.

Not only did getting under the bridge allow us to avoid the Atlantic during the bad weather, it also gave us the opportunity to travel through the very pretty estuaries from Jekyll Island to the south end of Cumberland Island. With that said, based upon cruisers we 've talked to, as well as radio chatter we've heard, even if our mast was lower we'd prefer the open ocean rather than the ICW. 

The ocean is faster, more relaxing, you can travel at night and fish.

The ICW also took us by the Kingsbay Naval Submarine Base. We've heard stories about boats just cruising along near here when a conning tower pops up out of the water next to them.

We were anchored next to Cumberland Island, GA on Thanksgiving Day. So naturally time for a haircut, which obviously doesn't take long.

Delana made a full-on traditional Thanksgiving dinner with all the fixin's, including pumpkin pie.

I don't have many rules, especially ones that apply to me. But one thing I do insist on is not leaving or entering a port that I'm not familiar with in the dark. Between all the lights marking channels, shoals and vessels, as well as all the lights on-shore it's really easy to get disoriented. 

Our next stop was St Augustine, and because of the distance, we either had to leave Cumberland Island in the dark or arrive in St Augustine in the dark. Even though we had been to both places last May and had put waypoints on our paths, we figured the Cumberland inlet was less likely to have changed, so we left there before the sun rose. 

 

On the way down we passed through Right Whale habitat, while over the VHF radio we heard several Coast Guard bulletins announcing whale activity in the area and reminding us to travel no faster than a certain speed, to keep a lookout and stay away if sighted.

In St Augustine we had a great mooring location, very near the Castillo de San Marcos Historic Monument. 

We were also right in front of St Augustine's Historic District, with it's annual "Nights of Lights". 

On our first night there, we went for a walk in the Historic District. Neither of us could believe how crowded it was, something we hadn't seen for months. 

This was taken from the boat, so you can see what a great spot we had. It really was pretty and festive.

Our location also put us on the route the tourist boats use to go by the lit up waterfront.

While in St Augustine, Mike and Dan, old Iowa State/Rugby friends who live in the area, visited the boat. I hadn't seen Mike for 40 years. Dan let us use his address to have a bunch of stuff sent. He then made multiple trips to deliver those things, as well as drove me to get a new battery. It was really good to catch up.

As most of you probably know, St Augustine is the oldest European founded city in the USA. It was founded by Spain in 1565. It has the oldest store, oldest street, oldest wood school and the list goes on, including the oldest protestant church in Florida, which is Trinity Parish Episcopal Church. 

I also went to mass, at of course "Americas First Parish", the Cathedral Basilica of St Augustine. I should do a blog just about church sometime. In the past three years I've attended services/mass in seven different countries, four different languages and 8 or 9 denominations.

OK, when I started this sailing thing I had no intention of EVER being any where I needed gloves, stocking hats, layered clothing and/or heaters. However, we bought this heater while in Deltaville and used it as recently as St Augustine. As a matter of fact, even here in the Bahamas it's only been warm enough to swim for the past week or so. Great working and sleeping weather though.

We had friends, who we knew from Guatemala, staying at a nearby marina in St. Augustine. Actually it's the same marina we had planned on leaving the boat during the month of December while we went back to MN/WI to see family and friends. Covid changed those plans though. Anyway, these marina friends organized a couple oyster roasts. The super fresh oysters were so sweet/salty that they tasted great without any sauces.

Delana humored me as we toured yet another fort.

Seeing how we anticipated going to the Bahamas within the next couple weeks and had been told that most things in the Bahamas are very expensive, we bought months worth of supplies while in St Augustine. This is the first of three dinghy loads.

We've turned the forward cabin on the port side into a storage room. 

We originally stored even more in that port side cabin, but the boat was actually listing that way. So we moved all the beverages, as you can see there were a lot, to various spots on the starboard side. We're pretty level now.

There are also places to store supplies under some of the floor boards.

Our intention was to leave St Augustine before sunrise. However, we could not find our way past a dredging operation. So we just motored around until it got light and then they had a boat lead us out.

Our next stop was New Smyrna Beach. The weather wasn't great and we never made it to the beach, which as I recall is known for shark attacks. We did check out the little downtown though and took our first Covid tests. In order to enter the Bahamas we were required to have a negative PCR Covid19 test result within five days of arriving. That sounds pretty easy unless you're on a sailboat that needs to cross the gulf stream, but has strong north and/or east winds arriving every couple days. So, our strategy was to take the test in New Smyrna, head down the coast, receive the emailed results, apply for the online visa, hope there's a good weather window and turn left towards West End on Grand Bahama Island. We received our Rapid test results within 15 minutes. They were negative. However, we didn't receive the PCR results until it was too late, which really didn't matter since there wasn't good weather for crossing anyway.

These two Lagoon's, which is what our boat is, followed us out of New Smyrna. They are two out of less than a dozen sail boats we saw in the open ocean the entire way from the Chesapeake to Key Biscayne, FL. 

On our way to Lake Worth/Palm Beach Area we sailed past the Cape Canaveral launch sites.

The Palm Beach area is really something with its yachts, mansions, condos, upscale retail, art, etc.

Sand sculptures.

This sand Christmas Tree that gets lit up at night.

I'm sure there are over a hundred mega-yachts docked in the Palm Beach area.

But like nearly every port we've been to, there are also boats that will never float again.

We took our second PCR Covid19 test at this free clinic in Riviera Beach which is a much less affluent area just north of West Palm Beach.

As soon as we took the Covid tests we again headed south in hopes the results and favorable weather would arrive simultaneously. With the Miami area being so big and us traveling so slow, we were able to see the skyline by both night and day.

Since leaving the Chesapeake we had nothing but great/comfortable weather in terms of winds and waves. Though that may sound ideal, there's one problem with being comfortable, at least for me. When it's rough, I have zero appetite and can lose some serious weight over a couple days. However, when the sailing is easy I want to eat all the time and can gain serious weight just as fast. See the above evidence after one night's shift.

We still hadn't received our Covid results so decided to wait for them in No Name Harbor which is in Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park at the south end of Key Biscayne. No Name is a pretty cool place, small and totally protected with easy access to the State Park as well as the very upscale community of Key Biscayne, which is also pretty close to Miami.

Since we hadn't received the results from the Covid tests we took at Riviera Beach and our five days were getting close to running out, we biked into Key Biscayne to take another test. While the others had us swab the inside of our nostrils, this one had us swab the inside of our mouths. 

Though I initially wasn't a real proponent of getting the bikes, the States are pretty bike friendly and they really came in handy. 

By the time we biked back to the boat, we had received notice that the tests we took a couple days earlier had come back negative. That gave us the green light to apply online for our Bahamian Visa, which we quickly received. Simultaneously we were checking the weather and saw a small opening on Christmas Eve when the wind and waves would start out the day coming from the east (not good), but the forecast said that by mid-morning they would move to the SE (tolerable) and by mid afternoon be from the SW (perfect).  

We left for the Bahamas on Christmas Eve morning, which was just one day short of being exactly three years ago (Christmas Day 2017) since departing from the other side of Florida for Mexico. These past three years have been full of new relationships, new experiences and quite a few surprises. I can't wait to see what the next three bring. Our departing view of the USA was Key Biscayne, with its lighthouse, State Park and city. 

The next blog will cover our crossing, which wasn't pretty, as well as our time in Bimini, the Berry Island chain and here on Andros Island.