So much catching up to do!

 Wow! We’ve been in The Bahamas just over five months and have only seen a tiny bit if what this lovely country has to offer. We extended our immigration documents for another three months allowing us to stay her until June 19. As much as we would love to stay three more weeks, we’ve decided to return to Florida before Memorial Weekend. 

For those of you who may not know, we have decided to sell our little sailboat. It’s hard to believe we have enjoyed her for fourteen years. Literally, gallons of blood, sweat and tears have gone into this boat-and so many memories. It will be a very sad day when she sells. That said-if anyone wants a well outfitted, circumnavigate ready, 46 year old boat-give us a call:)

Anyhow-onto our travels: some words and lots of photos. We have had the trip of a lifetime, made new friends and had so much fun, adventure and some sailing, too. I regret we did not post more-but there were so many things to do & see. 

Lastly, before getting on I would like to encourage everyone to visit The Bahamas. The water is MAGICAL, the wildlife is abundant and the weather is most agreeable. Pictures do not do justice to the beauty of the seascape & beachscape; nor the sheer, sometimes terrifying, ruggedness of the all limestone landscape.

Definitely zoom in & see our boat framed in the background.

The greatest treasure of this tiny country is the people.  By far, the friendliest, welcoming, sharing people ever! 

Bimini Islands

Bimini has been our first and last stop both times we’ve come to the Bahamas. After the first time January 2020 and having Famous Joe’s Conch Salad we have made a point to go every time, even during our short window during COVID-19 with all the safety protocols.

Brown's marina North Bimini

Joe's conch fritters

Joe's Famous Conch Shack

Joe's Famous Conch Salad

Bimini is  very small, yet one of the most popular entry ports as it is only 45nm from Miami. For us averaging 5 knots, that’s 9-10 hours depending on weather, seas and the gulf stream. For a motor yacht that has a cruising speed of 20 knots, Bimini is just a little over two hours away!

Great Guana Cay, The Exuma Cays

Black Point Settlement 

This place quickly jumped to the top of my list when we did an overnight here in 2020.  Beginning with the stark white cliffs dubbed the”White Horses” that mark the cut from east to west in Dotham Cut into the pristine crescent white sand beach with an endless sand bottom shallow waters glowing in shades of blue and turquoise I’ve never seen.  Absolutely awe inspiring. Then an obvious but quaint looking settlement.  Super friendly to cruisers. Very dangerous & delicious 2 for 1 rum punches and a killer DJ! 

White point (a point just south of Black Point)

Our first intentional “buddy boat” anchorage with Voyager & Sandial.  Robert is crazy mad for snorkeling & had found several rocks near here the year before.  So it became a mission: find lobster, kill lion fish & snorkel, snorkel, snorkel! We did all that. We got 2 conch one day & 2 lobster the next and feasted on both.

Conch extraction

All the ingredients needed for conch salad

Carla's Famous Conch Salad

Little Bay ( possibly Carla’s favorite)

We anchored in 7 feet of water and so close to shore we could swim it in 3 minutes.  Our friends on Voyager talked us into leaving White Point and going here

Lounging on best couch ever.

The only building on Little Bay -I think it's a rental.

Little Bay

Insanely clear water

Promoting my favorite marine supply store!

There' so much more and just not enough time, so a few more pictures:

Sunrise over Little Majors Cay

The Atlantic coast on Stocking Island

Crazy rocks on Stocking Island

Sunset in dead calm anchored off of Big Majors Cay-Carla's first time to see the "green flash".

Until next time...

Brief update..

 Believe it or not, we have been busy.  We have made some new lifelong friends, been visited by old friends and for Matt’s 45th birthday we are headed to islands where we hope to be the only boat at the anchorage.

By way of pictures we will share a bit of the last 2 months…

Sunset View Restaurant in Blackpoint Settlement, Great Guana Cay, Exumas with crews from S/V Voyager & M/V Sandial

Man-O-War Cay sandbar-bucket list goal-check!

Ha!!! No funny face-just a beautiful smile

Escondida, Voyager & Sandial with visitors from Canada

Our people from Texas on windward side of Stocking Island, Exumas

Just WOW!

Chat-n-Chill sign post

Just a tiny taste of the stunning colors that exist here

Buried at Man-O-War sandbar

Exposed at Man-O-War sandbar

Finally made it to the Bahamas-thanks COVID!

 

January 7, 2022

1204 EST

24⁰ 11.126’N

076⁰ 27.479’W

Big Majors Anchorage, near Staniel Cay, Exumas, The Bahamas

 

Happy New Year All!  We are afloat and happy.  We wish you all had a festive holiday and this post finds everyone happy and healthy.

There is more to come, but I have to grease the wheels, so to speak, since it’s been so long since I’ve posted anything.

 

Timeline up to now:

11/20/21 Venice FL for Charlotte Harbor Boat Storage & Yard to paint boat

12/02/21 Charlotte Harbor FL with shiny new boat and heading East

12/19/21 Crossing from No Name Harbor, Key Biscayne, FL to Bimini Bahamas: anchor up at 0445, arrived at Brown’s Marina, North Bimini at 1530

12/23/21 Bimini to Chub Cay, The Berrys: threw lines at 0512, anchor down at Chub Cay at 2146

12/24/21 Chub Cay to Nassau, New Providence Cay: anchor up at 0945, anchor down in Nassau Harbour at 1640

12/25/21 CHRISTMAS DAY in Nassau with 40,000 of our closest pals

 

 

 

12/27/21 Nassau to Allen’s & Leaf Cays, Exumas: anchor up at 0815, anchor down between Allen’s and Leaf Cays at 1550

12/31/21 New Year’s Eve with our 40 closest pals

 

 

 

1/1/22  HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Allen’s Cay anchorage to Highbourne Cay West anchorage; anchor up at1034, anchor down Highbourne Cay West 1330

1/2/22 Highbourne Cay West to Highbourne Cay North: anchor up at 0700, anchor down at 1300 HC North anchorage. Those of you watching the tracker noticed we took the long route…

1/3/22 HCN to Norman’s Cay: anchor up at 0845, anchor down at Normans Cay anchorage south 1315

1/4/22 Norman’s Cay to Big Majors: anchor up 0950, down 1700

There will be lots more words and stories to come!

Leg 1-Galveston Bay to Tampa Bay Dec 1, 2019-Dec 8, 2019

Boat:  S/V Escondida

Location: Galveston Yacht Harbor

Time: 7:30 A,M. CST

Wind: North 22 knots, 28 knot gusts

Waves: Choppy 4-6, building to 8

Skies: Clear

Temperature:  57

Destination: Florida-Ft. Myers area, or somewhere close

  

    Run with the North wind he says!!!!!!!!

    The first two and a half days were quite an adventure until we turned south of the safety fairway and started heading east.  We got broadsided with a few walls of water that doused whoever was on watch and we got those opportunities to appreciate our foul weather gear and those easy to grab snacks that we always keep for that kind of weather.  About halfway through the third day our waves turned to glass.

   All in all, we motored 420ish miles over glassy seas, with an occasional 2-4 knot wind on the nose.  Several attempts 

were made to sail in any direction; we were vacillating between Carabelle and Key West.  Ultimately our fuel onboard and the lack of wind decided that we were going to Tampa.  After running the engine for 95 hours we pulled into Tampa with roughly 7 gallons of diesel left in the tank, total consumed for the trip was 33 gallons.

   Good thing we ended up in Tampa/Palmetto, arriving at the dock found us in the company of friends and acquaintances from Kemah!  There was a pretty sizeable list of things to fix while here that didn’t really fail on the trip, but needed a trip to knock the bugs out of them.  For starters, the watermaker that had worked flawlessly while testing in Kemah using a bucket of artificial ocean, leaked in several spots while processing actual ocean.  The aft stays on the mizzen mast needed to be tightened, the jib halyard let go of the headsail just before sunset on the third night (my fault for screwing up the termination and leaving it as good enough).  But most of all, the fuel injectors on the engine were at the age that Kubota recommends servicing them, after running for almost a hundred hours at near idle speeds, they were in need of attention.  Hopefully the engine purrs when I put the rebuilt injectors back in it!! Update: engine is purring.

   If all goes well, we’re going to continue heading south to Fort Myers Saturday the 14^th or Sunday the 15^th.   Update:  we are readying to leave today, Saturday Dec. 14th.  We'll try to post again when we have internet.

We’ll have more pictures as we get along.  For now all we have are some of the amazing sunsets that are worth the 30 knot winds and 8 foot seas.  We will miss our friends here as we miss our friends in Texas and look forward to making new ones.

Its been a while, but we’re ready to go again!

We’ll be leaving the dock almost 8 years from when we returned.  Our current plan is to head to Florida December 1st, then make our way as far east as Puerto Rico, head south to the Panama Canal then continue in a westerly direction.

More posts will be coming soon, mostly boring boat repair stuff, but the pretty pictures will be following after that!

We're home!!

For anyone wondering, we're home, the boat is in Mexico.  We left the boat in Isla Mujeres to wait for better weather to cross the gulf.

On our way

The weather is right, We're low on cash(2 transmissions, dinghy, autopilot)............Homeward Bound.

Here's the link to the spot

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0a4cNAoHyGP95UDtTJKZGBQCULqaZKdNq

Wish us luck!!