Videos

We're in a marina for a night and they actually have fast enough wifi to upload some videos, so enjoy!

So...

… we motor sailed to Bimini because it looked like it was the only weather window Sister Ocean was going to offer. From there, the Abaco Islands were a day sail north on an easy downhill run.

But the weather window closed. We waited. The southwest winds blew hard. Kintala bounced and thumped against the dock for a long, uncomfortable night of checking and resetting fenders and lines every half hour or so.

So we decide that being anywhere was better than being here. If the winds eased a bit we could still make the run to West End, just a day or so later than we had planned.  After a night anchored off we could turn the corner and be in the Abaco Islands the next day.

But that day or so meant running out of south winds and facing building winds and seas under the influence of a low off the US coast. That would pin us down for nearly another week, in the West end, when anchoring out would not be an option.  I like the marina in the West End. It is a beautiful place and we had a good time there last year. If we wanted to spend a ton of money we could hang out there and have a good time again. We don't have a ton of money. And it isn't like we can't have a good time someplace else in the Bahamas that is equally as beautiful.

So we decided to forgo the Abacos via the West End and head to the Berry Islands instead. The Berry Islands are a place we wanted to visit last year yet couldn't make happen. Being further East they feel less of an impact from the relentless low pressure areas that keep swinging out from the States, so the weather should be more accommodating. With an evening departure and an overnight motor sail into a building east wind, we could be in the Berries with more than a full day between setting the hook and having the weather ramp up. We would still be pinned, though the anchor would be down in a place that wouldn't cost us anything to wait. And it should be weather that doesn't hang around as long, giving us a chance to get moving again.

But an overnight sail after a sleepless night spent resetting the lines in nearly 30 knots of wind started sounding like a bad idea. The cruising kitty isn't that thin.

So we decided that we could leave the next day and still beat the weather. The forecast easing of the south wind would make quick work of getting around the Island, and the first part of the trip would on a beam reach. Eventually the south wind would fade in preparation for a building blow from the east, so more than half the trip would be motor only. An afternoon departure would put us there shortly after daybreak. It would still be an overnight motor sail, though it would be after a good night's sleep and an unhurried departure.

But a morning walk to the point showed the channel to be a lumpy mess in the still stiff south wind. We watched a sailboat slightly bigger than Kintala make the exit. She buried her bow deep in the water several times, and seemed to have trouble steering through the channel markers. She turned the corner north and the jib spun into view. Making tracks she was hull down over the horizon in less than 20 minutes. She was also rolling gunnel to gunnel and pitching spray into the cockpit to get it done. In 12 hours or so she was going to have a much easier time in the settling wind, but she was paying a good price to get there.

Look Ma! Kintala has a rudder!

So we decided to wait another day. The cruising kitty is never thin enough to have me taking that kind of a ride on purpose, and the weather window was still showing okay. The plan was just as good as it had been, except it still meant a 16 hour motor sail into steadily increasing head winds. And afternoon departure would put us there mid-day again; this time with mere hours between setting the hook and the weather change.

But we got up this morning and started reviewing the plan in preparation for leaving. Nothing much had changed in the forecast yet, for some reason, the tight weather window and the 16 hour motor into steadily increasing winds didn't hold the same appeal as it had the night before. Both Deb and I started looking for a good reason why we shouldn't do what we were planning to do. Watching the GRIB file play out we realized that, in two more days, there was a chance of sailing to the West End on an easy beam reach on a fading east wind.

So that's what we are planning on now.

The only hitch is that the forecast has the building east winds pushing us hard against the “T” dock for much of the weekend. The boat that was ahead of us relocated to an inside spot this morning. But this is the inside spot that I crashed getting out of last year, and I am not too keen on the idea of trying it again. Instead I turned a stout piece of 2 x 6 into a fender board and reset Kintala in place, making sure the spring lines would hold the board at the piling. There is a second stern line to hold the bow off the dock at the winds pick up, while the bow line shares chaffing gear with the spring. It shouldn't matter as the bow line will not be doing much over the next couple of days. Extra fenders were hung in places where the boat shouldn't touch the dock, so long as everything else works out according to plan.

Which, looking at the above, doesn't seem all that likely to happen.

(By the way, I am still fumbling around a bit with the east / west thing. The East Coast is now West of us and that has messed with my internal compass. I keep saying "east" than looking toward where I know the coast lies. It will take a few days to re-calibrate.)

What a difference a day makes!

These guys were fleeing from a big bull shark.

Sharks and a cure for the winter time blues

(Ed note: Pictures will be forthcoming. We just don't have enough bandwidth for pictures here at Chub.)
 
Friend Kacey was scheduled to join us in Nassau, so Kintala took to a dock early yesterday morning at the Nassau Harbor Club Hotel & Marina. It was okay with a nice pool, good service, solid docks, and the price wasn't extortion level highway robbery. There were a handful of mega-yachts that, if you didn't think about what a thoughtful person could do with that kind of money, were pretty amazing bits of engineering. (One went by that rents for – I kid you not - $200,000.00 a WEEK!) But the bathrooms in the marina left much to be desired. I'm sure the mega yacht folks don't bother with them.

Taking a dock seemed the easiest way to get provisions, gas, water, booze, more data for the phone, do some laundry, and generally get ready for a guest. (Our first since departing Oak Harbor.) Kacey arrived without drama, we stopped at the Poop Deck for dinner, (nice place, good service, food was fine, not sure why I wasn't more impressed) then settled in for the night.

Deb and I debated the weather for a bit. This was to be Kacey's first open water experience and we were hoping to make a good introduction. (Not sure why he chose going with me for his first foray into the Big Blue; he has been reading the blog ...) Nassau to Chub Cay at the bottom of the Berry Islands is a nice, 40 nm run in deep, deep water; like 9770 feet deep under part of our track today. That makes for an ocean of color that just soaks into the soul and makes all well with the world. Especially so when the Water Goddess grants a day like today; a gentle Force 4 deep reach and run with waves of barely a foot riding a placid, 3 foot swell on something like an 11 second period. It just doesn't get any better and 7+50 later the hook landed on yet another perfect white sand bottom. It was the longest, best sail of the trip so far.

Deb served up a dinner of pork chops, corn on the cob, and sweet potatoes; after which Kacey hit the water for a tropical swim. He endured the mid-western season of subzero temperatures, howling winds, snow, and storm after storm. A day in the sunshine and sparkling turquoise water rolling up on a sugar white beach was a dream come true for a winter refugee, an opportunity not to be missed. A few minutes later he was back on board having caught sight of 6 feet worth of shark checking out the anchorage. Shortly thereafter it cruised under Kintala's cockpit giving Kacey and Deb a good look from a more comfortable perspective. (I was below pecking out this entry and so missed the first shark sighting of the trip.) Midwestern lake sailors and sharks are not well acquainted, and I think Kacey aims to keep it that way.

The plan for tomorrow is an oh-so-dark-thirty anchor up to make a 75 mile run toward Cat or Gun Cay. The edge of the Bahama Bank is about a 3 hour sail west and we hope to get there just as the sun comes up. Thirteen hours of daylight will then be ours in which to find a place to park for tomorrow night. I'm sure hundreds of boats have passed over the Banks on overnight passages in just the last couple of weeks, but Kintala isn't going to be one of them this year. On our three night runs since leaving the States we have taken three various kinds of beatings; cold and sick, cold and rough, rough and sick. I'm sure there is more of the same in our future, but I would like to hold off for a while before having another night like Hope Town to Egg Cay.

The intent is to send Kacey home thinking days like today are normal for full-time, live-a-board, curisers wandering the western edge of the mid-Atlantic. Someone else can spoil the illusion for him.