A Fool's Gambit

I've got a lot to post, and I've decided I'm going to post each location in a separate post, and back-date the posts to when I finished the section of the trip - a little dishonest, perhaps, but it will keep the chronology of things straighter, I think. Most of the posts will end up being pretty short, though. Let's begin.

So, the trip to the Exumas had an eventful beginning. We planned to leave Friday, the 27th, and set up just outside of Nassau so we could make the trip to Allen's Cay all in the daylight. It didn't work out. I set off to get fuel, but my engine started acting up. There was a massive current that I was fighting, and it was too much for the engine. It finally gave up under the second bridge in Nassau harbor. I scraped up and bent the stainless steel frame at the front of my boat (called a pulpit) as I drifted into the bridge support.

Don't worry, the bridge didn't suffer any damage.

I put up my genoa and sailed back to the anchorage, in the crowded harbor. I worked on my engine for the rest of the day, and we decided to leave first thing Saturday morning. I got up early, went to the fuel dock (that took a while, it was busy), and then we were off for the Exumas. Unfortunately, we were behind schedule, and we didn't make it to the Exumas until well after dark. We pulled up just behind Southwest Allen's Cay (24° 44.65' N, 76° 50.52' W) and anchored off for the night. It was 12:10 am. Happy Birthday, me.

So, the plan is to leave in the first half of next week for the Exumas. Since I'm not sure when I'll get internet before then, I figured I'd post what's been going on so far in Nassau.

I got in Sunday afternoon. Monday afternoon? Sunday afternoon? I don't know. I anchored at 25°4'39"N, 77°19'39"W, and have been there ever since. I've restocked on groceries; I've got to get water and gas before I leave.

Nassau isn't my kind of place. It's busy, it's touristy (and where it isn't touristy, it's a little dangerous, apparently). But you can find what you need, for the most part. I got some mint and cilantro plants today at a farmer's market. Hopefully those will thrive, and provide me with cilantro for ceviche and mint for mojitos for a good long while.

There's a separate island on the north side of Nassau called Paradise Island. There are huge hotels, luxury shops, a casino (lost $40), and condominiums. The architecture and landscaping are reminiscent of Disney World.

I'm sure there's a great night life here, or great snorkel trips, or swimming with the dolphins, or something like that that tourists would love. So I don't want people to get the idea that Nassau is a terrible place. It's just not for me.

Last night, there were fireworks. Surprised the heck out of me. I was in bed, and at 10pm, all of the sudden there's this huge bang. I'm thinking - gunshot? But no, there's another, and another. And flashes of light. The barge lighting the fireworks off was about 150 feet from my boat. So that was something. I watched them from the deck of my boat, and got an eyeful of grit. When I got down into my boat, there was actually a piece of a firework in my boat. Despite all of that, it was incredible. I got a few good pictures, check out the photoblog.

This post feels like it's nothing but whining, but I'm not in a bad mood. I'm ready to get moving to where I can jump in the water without worrying about what chemicals are in it, where I can snorkel around, and spearfish, and just relax. Soon. Very soon.

So the plan was to take two days to get to Chub Cay, then do one more day to Nassau. We would anchor one night on the Great Bahama Banks. Normally, it's suggested you do the whole crossing in one shot, preferrably a night crossing, but we wanted to have an enjoyable time for our crossing. Not so lucky, it would turn out. Day one, Wednesday, was a tough slog. The wind was strong and East-Southeast. Exactly the direction we wanted to go. We made about 20 miles the whole day. 20 miles out of the roughly 90 to Chub Cay. Oh, and I caught a barracuda on my trolling line. I threw him back, since I'd rather not get ciguatera poisoning. Anchoring, the seas were moderately lumpy - the kind of 'anchorage' that retired cruisers would call terrible, but we're young and resiliant.

Day two, Thursday, started great - wind on the beam, smooth sailing - but by mid-morning the breeze had died. There was no catching a break on this trip. Nursing sails the whole way, we made a total of about 15 miles for the day. I can say I took it all in stride, but I think the pace was a bit frustrating to my companions. At least the sea was calm when we anchored for the night. The ship rolled less than it did back in Key West. 55 more miles to Chub Cay.

Day three, Friday, was a day almost completely devoid of wind. Waking up, the sea was a mirror in all directions. Imagine that, miles and miles of flat sea - not even cat's paws on the surface. Or better yet, don't imagine it. Go to my photoblog posting. Anyway, the day didn't get much better. We nursed ourselves along in freshening winds (by which I mean the gusts got up to maybe 7 knots), and made a good strong day of 30 miles. 25 more to Chub Cay. Did I mention this is supposed to be a one-day crossing?

Saturday. Again, very little wind. We made the 25 miles to Chub Cay, but only because we motored the last 10 of it. I know that in two days I'll be wishing we had less wind, but at the moment, I really can't help but whistle. I got into the Chub Cay anchorage just minutes before sunset, and we made our plans to leave for Nassau early in the morning. 3am anchors up kind of early. But hey, it's only a 40 mile blue water crossing, who needs their wits about them for that? Oh, I anchored right here, to let you know where Chub Cay is.

2:00. Alarm goes off. 2:04. Alarm goes off. 2:08. Alarm goes off. 2:12. Okay, I'll get up. A little brekkie and then it's off into the great wide ocean. There's wind! My whistling must have paid off. Oh, no. Wait. Just after sunrise, the wind died. And we were making such good time. After nursing the boat along for hours, we finally crank up the engines so that we'll enter Nassau and get anchored before sunset. About 2 miles out, I hooked a dolphin. Not 'dolphin' as in Cetacean, not 'dolphin' as in aid to navigation. Mahi mahi. He was about 2 and a half feet long. You'll have to take my word for it, since there are no pictures, and he got free before I got him in the boat. But man, those are pretty fish. As you're pulling them in, it's like there's some kind of silvery green orb glowing beneath the surface. The glow isn't even fish-shaped. Then you get them up close, and they're vibrant greens and blues. Just amazingly beautiful. I'm sure I'll snag another one some time to show you pictures - if you're too lazy to just Google it.

So. Back on topic, we made it into Nassau and anchored up in the late afternoon, finally done with our 'easy sail' that turned out to be more - or less? -than we bargained for. Stay tuned for the next posting, when I'll talk about how my granfather and me roamed around Nassau, drinking to the wee hours, fighting, and other debauchery involving the cook and my grits. Oh, wait. My boat's not called the John B. But it is a sloop.

Clearing Customs and Immigration took about an hour, maybe less. It was very easy and very laid back. Because my boat is less than 35 long, total fees were US$150, which includes a fishing license. Very nice.

I moved my boat to the north end of the inner harbor (25°45'6"N 79°16'35"W) and hung out for two substantial cold fronts back to back. Temperatures dropped into the 40's. It was cold - I don't have good cold weather clothing with me.

The cold fronts finally broke Saturday. Conditions may be right for a crossing of the Great Bahama Bank - or maybe not, we'll find out the hard way - Wednesday through Friday. Winds are projected to move to the South in front of another cold front this coming weekend. It shouldn't be a big front, but even so, we plan to be in Nassau by then.

I've met a lot of great people here. There was a boat of people visiting for two days (which turned into 10 days thanks to the weather) for visa purposes - a husband and wife from Australia, Steve and Dee, and a South African girl named Claire. Steve bought his boat, a Hunter 36 (or 38?) that had been a charter boat, and is fixing it up to sail back to Australia where he'll sell it. Nice work if you can get it. I met a couple coming down from Canada (Toronto, I think - all the way through the Great Lakes!) named Ken and Diane - I think, I'm awful with names. They're retired military and are cruising aboard their Tanzer 26. That's a tiny boat. I'm impressed.

Then there's Grant, another Aussie. He's 51 (had his birthday last week - see the photo blog) and a first-time boat owner. He may have jumped the gun with his purchase, though. His boat has turned out to have several significant problems. He's fixed what he can in Bimini and is heading back to Florida to sort out the rest of it. Then he's hoping to catch up with us in the Exumas a little later on. I hope he does - he's quite the interesting character.

The 'we' and 'us' in this post isn't the royal we, by the way. I haven't gone crazy already. No, I'm buddy boating with a couple people on an Oday 34. Nathan, yet another Aussie, is pretty new to boating (and besides, who wants to singlehand?) so he picked up an able-bodied crew in Tyann, who's going as far as Georgetown in the Exumas, I think. Tyann is from Wisconsin (finally, another person from the United States), and has an Inland Waters OUPV (Operator of Uninspected Passenger Vessels) license, commonly known as the 6-Pack Captain's License because you can operate a vessel with up to 6 passengers. She's racking up sea time to get her Near Shore Waters qualification, so it's a win-win for them.

Anyway, we moved out of the harbor Tuesday, February 10th in preparation for a crossing of the Great Bahama Banks starting Wednesday. Wish us luck!

Saturday, January 24th, 2009. I got the boat ready and raised the anchor at about one in the afternoon. I went to the fuel dock to get water and diesel - talk about tricky. Single-handing up to a dock in brisk winds was touch and go. But, all stocked up, I got on the move.

I went east-southeast (the best heading the wind allowed), moving off the south of the Keys, into the Gulf Stream, which heads east-northeast along the Keys. Wind against current leads to steep, tall waves - 6 feet or so, with a period of about 4 seconds, just off the nose. This slowed me down considerably, and I got a little sea sick - I didn't keep food down for 12 hours or so. But it required less sail handling, and I didn't have to worry about hitting land in the night. Finally, 11 am Sunday I tacked back towards Lower Matacumbe Key, where I was going to visit Joey, former captain of the Jolly II Rover, who now works for Sea Base doing week-long Boy Scout trips. I made it into the small bight on the south end of the key a half hour before sunset. Right, and I crossed under my first bridge.

I stayed longer than intended at the gorgeous, secluded anchorage by Sea Base. Monday was recovery day. I slept in, worked on my engine (which was, and is still, overheating), and cleaned up the boat a bit. Tuesday I socialized with Joey and a few other friends, stocked back up on water, and grabbed some sundries at the small store across the street. I had been watching the weather forecast this whole time, and saw a possible Gulf Stream crossing window Wednesday or Thursday, before a cold front would arrive on Friday. So I left in the late morning on Wednesday to cross the Stream, hoping to catch the soft south and southwest winds. I left too soon, it would turn out. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

I left Wednesday, mid-morning. While raising anchor, I ran onto a sandbank. I raised the mainsail and got enough room to motor off the bank. My friends saw it all from the shore. Embarrassing! Anyway, back under the bridge and out to the open sea. The winds weren't cooperating, and it took me 8 hours to make it 25 miles. The winds picked up around sunset, and shortly thereafter, I made it out into the Gulf Stream. The winds were out of the south the whole crossing. The waves were 3 to 4 feet and on the beam; relatively comfortable, compared to my previous passage.

I made it across the Gulf Stream with almost not attention needing to be payed to the sails, other than tucking in a reef just before dawn on Thursday. At 10 am, I crossed the 12 mile line, and raised my Q flag for the first time. (The Q flag is the international symbol used for vessels requesting clearance into a country - I think might stand for 'quarantine'. It's solid yellow.) At about 11:30, I sighted land, and I had my anchor down inside Bimini harbor by two o'clock. I went ashore and cleared through customs and immigration in less than an hour. Piece of cake. Oh, right, but I ran onto a sandbank coming into the harbor. The surge helped push me off in short order. No harm, just a cleaner keel.

I've met several cruisers here, and already have at least one buddy boat I'm planning on traveling with to Nassau, and on to the Exumas. Another boat that arrived Friday reported that the Gulf Stream was practically glass Thursday night, and winds were perfect. So I guess I jumped the gun a little. But I'm glad, because if anything had slowed me down, I would have been out in the Gulf Stream Friday evening, when the cold front hit and things got ugly. A couple of nights ago, I visited on another boat for a while. While there, a big catamaran ran aground a couple hundred feet away. We went over to help get them off. Three or four hours later, we finally got them floating. You know what they say, "you're not a sailor until you've run aground".

Bimini is smaller than I imagined - I think it was livelier in the past. The newest, nicest marina has closed up. I guess Bimini doesn't get the visitors it used to. However, while I was clearing immigration, there was a small parade down the street (welcoming me, of course!), with lots of singing and dancing little girls in their school uniforms. I wish I'd brought my camera. The cold front has just let up today - it was a decent-sized one - and precluded many activities, like going snorkeling. So I haven't done much.

That's life so far. Check out my corresponding photo blog entry for a few pictures. I'll try to be more diligent with the photography in the future.