Last Wifi

This is our last shot at wifi.  We will check weather in the morning and then take off.  We will leave here, Green Turtle Cay, and then go to either Fox Town or Great Sale Cay.  We will then head out to cross back to the states on Monday.  We were going to leave Sunday but we are going to wait for the waves to settle down.

It's about 500 miles to Charleston.  If we can we will keep going to Beaufort, NC. 

Once there we will travel on the Intra Coastal Waterway.

When we get back we will activate our phones and get internet all the time.  

Tonight we are supposed to have some high winds and rain.  We just had a bad squall with high winds.  We are hopeful that it is over but we may get more.  We tired and ready to get back.  We have met some really great people but I think we are ready to move to land if the boat sells.  

I can always tell where Elyse's head is.  She has been online for two days looking at houses in Baltimore.  We think we can afford it there.  She has even been searching for opportunities to house sit. 

We will check email in the morning before we leave.  We love you and can't wait to see you.

Dad (John) & Mom (Elyse)

Heading back to the USA

This may be the last update until we return to the States. We spent Easter Sunday in Great Guana watching the egg hunt at Nippers which is a very popular outdoor restaurant overlooking the Atlantic. The staff hides eggs in the breakers for folks to hunt with their snorkel gear. We just watched from the restaurants upper deck. We have really enjoyed being anchored for the past few days in Fisher's Bay. We watched several sea turtles swim just off of Spunky's bow. There was a little excitement when a boat began dragging in the anchorage and the owners were not on board. Troy form Dive Guana went out in his motor boat and let out more rode and backed down on the anchor so they wouldn't run up on the rocks or hit another boat.

On Monday due to a shift in the winds we sailed back over to Treasure Cay to wait out the west wind. When the winds come from any direction with a westerly component in the Abacos boats try to find a sheltered anchorage as many of the Cays are exposed to the west. Tuesday morning when the winds became favorable we left Treasure Cay again to sail around the Whale to Green Turtle Cay.

The Whale is a Cay that lies along the Atlantic and boats must go around it out of the Sea of Abaco and open to the swells and waves from the north. It needs to be passed in calm weather. We made it around and we are now on a mooring ball in Black Sound off of Green Turtle Cay. Our outboard is not starting so John rowed over this morning to see if we can get it serviced. Once that is done we will move into Black Sound Marina as we will not be able to easily get to shore and back to the mooring without our outboard. 

The weather guru has forecast high winds and bad squalls for Friday into Saturday morning with gusts from 50 to 70 kts so everyone is trying to find safe harbor for the blow. As I sit here typing the Sound is beginning to fill up with lots of boats. It will be fairly crowded by tomorrow and then the issue of boats dragging their anchors in the high winds becomes a larger problem. It means folks will sit up late watching the boats around them and being prepared to deal with a dragging anchor. We will leave here at the crack of dawn Sat. morning after the winds die down and head for either Strangers Cay or Great Sale Cay and anchor in preparation for crossing the Gulf Stream on Sunday through Tuesday Those cays are both just rocky islands with nothing on them but they provide sheltered anchorage in prevailing winds. We hope to end up in  either Charleston or Beaufort where we will continue up the ICW to the Chesapeake. 

It is really lovely here today. Warm temps and soft breezes. It is hard to believe that things will get really rough on Friday but then we never know for sure how things will be. Often it is not as bad as forecast and sometimes it is worse. 

Yesterday we filled our fuel tanks to the brim so we will have almost enough fuel if we had to motor all the way across the GS. It is mostly just for safety backup as we sail a lot of the time without the engine running. It looks like the wind speed and direction will get us by sail alone at least to the Gulf Stream and then we can ride the GS up to the Carolinas.  

We look forward to being back stateside soon and seeing some close by friends and hearing from the rest of you.

E and J

Great Guana

We left Treasure Cay this morning. Treasure Cay is a beautiful resort on Grand Bahama. The beach is long with clean powdery sand lined with huge homes and the town homes along the harbor are all painted with bright colors.

 We spent two days at anchor in the small anchorage with our friend Debbie on Illusions. We also caught up with Ken and Sara on Alegria a beautiful Cabo Rico 38. We went to pizza night at Treasure Cay Marina on Thursday. It was mobbed with locals, cruisers and all the families with kids on spring break that have flown in from the States. 

We arrived in Great Guana this morning and came in to Grabbers for a beer and internet connection. Our booster will have to be returned to the manufacturer when we return to the US as we cannot get power to it no matter what we have tried so we only get internet when we come into shore. 

The high temps are in the low 70's and the lows in the 60's. Too cold for me!! Tomorrow things will start warming up once again. We are watching the weather to see when we can head back but it doesn't look good all the way to next weekend. We hear that the temps are low on the east coast down to Florida so we are just as happy staying here rather than going back even if we could (which we can't) to cold windy days on our way up to the Chesapeake. 

We just looked at the forecast through next Sunday and don't see an opportunity to cross back to the states.  We were hoping to sail from the top of the Bahamas to South or North Carolina.  Last year we were able to make it to Charleston.  Monday we will move farther north and west.  We had hoped to go to Green Turtle Cay and then to Great Sail Cay and on to the US.  We are looking at other islands now where we might stop along the way such as Manjack and Spanish Cay.

Hope you all have a Happy Easter,

Happy Easter

We are now in Treasure Cay.  It's a beautiful resort.  Tomorrow we will go to Great Guana.  We will be there through Easter.  We will then move to Green Turtle Cay where we will top of with fuel and wait for weather.  This morning the weather guy said there would be no window until at least Friday a week from tomorrow and then there are no promises.

Elyse has been walking and I think the exercise helps her back a little.  We keep looking at the weather in the states and wonder why we are rushing back.  We heard it was 39 in Palm Beach.  It is in the low 70's here and in the 50's at night. Great sleeping.


We are going to a friend's boat for drinks and then taking the dingy in for pizza night.
Hope you all have a great Easter.  We are really looking forward to seeing you.


Love,
Dad along with Elyse

Marsh Harbor, again

Well we are still in Marsh Harbor. On Friday with our raw water strainer leaking big time and our fridge not working at all, we decided we had better make a determined effort to get assistance before everything closed up for the weekend. We removed the broken bolt on the strainer and John took a taxi to a distant boatyard to have a new bolt fabricated to fit. It only took a few hours once we figured out who could do the job so we were very hopeful that the strainer issue would be resolved. 

The refrigerator was another deal. We had been fussing with it for a week or more trying to find a bad connection. A call to the boatyard that installed it brought the suggestion of water in the coolant which would have to be drained and recharged. John just didn't think that was the problem. Last year after the freezer and frige were only 1 year old the controller went bad on the freezer and we had to have it replaced. John thought it was the same issue with the refrig but the tech at Frigoboat and the guy at the boatyard had different thoughts and not being confident we decided to get someone to look at it. For over a week it would go off for several hours and then start once again. In the off times we would take ice from the freezer and pack the refrig in order to keep 3 months of my VERY expensive medication at the proper temp. By Friday it had been off for 2 days and we were pretty sure it was not coming back on. We called around and found a refrig guy who was working on 2 other boats but said he would call on Sat. when he was finished with those jobs. By 4 on Sat. there had been no call (island time) so we were set to give up and just keep icing down the frig until we could get back to the states but lo and behold at 4:45 pm Sean called and said he was on his way and could we pick him up at the dinghy dock? (in the States one always has to take the boat into a marina as the contractors almost never come out to your anchorage). He came out with all his recharging equipment and after trying another controller he confirmed that the controller was indeed dead. So this was the second one to fail in a system less than 2 years old although we had been assured that it was very "rare " for any of the parts to fail on these units!!! 

Now we have our two major issues resolved. John did a temp fix on the third leak. We could now leave if it were not for another cold front moving through which brought high winds and t-storms. We are waiting out the weather and are hoping to move on to Treasure Cay or Great Guana by tomorrow or Wed. 

The good news is that we were able to get to shore today to fill our propane tank, grocery shop and pick up email (our booster antenna is still not working).

 Life is good and the Bahamas are beautiful. 

E and J

Marsh Harbor

We are in Marsh Harbor at anchor and visiting the internet cafe as our booster which allows us to use internet on Spunky is not working for some reason. We just returned from Maxwell's Grocery Store. It is very well stocked and either I'm just getting numb to them or the prices aren't as high as the rest of the Bahamas. 

We moved Sat. afternoon from Spanish Wells where we anchored off the shore of Russell Is., as the winds were supposed to be 20 kts out of the North, to the west side of Egg Island in preparation for our crossing of the NE Providence Channel early Sunday a.m. We were anchored with 2 other boats. One left at around 3 a.m. and we were anchor up at 6:30. It was a good motor sail. The sea was fairly flat and we were through Little Harbor Cut into the Sea of Abaco  and anchor down at Lynyard Cay by 3:00. 

John spent the rest of the afternoon trying to repair two leaks in our cooling system. One was the raw water strainer.  The bolt holding the lid on broke and it could not be tightened enough to keep it from leaking. The broken bolt set up required drilling a new hole and finding a piece of metal to hold it in place. The second leak involved a broken piece where a pipe screws into the heat exchanger. John rigged a repair with 5200 and rescue tape. Both are temp fixes but will get us home to States we hope. 

By Monday a.m. I was anxious to move up to Marsh Harbor hoping to find more permanent parts for the repairs. No luck with that so we are going with Plan B and hoping things hold together til we get home. 

We got together with our friend Debbie on Illusions who has spent all her time in the Abacos this winter. We will meet her for dinner tonight. We spent the late morning with her catching up on old friends and what she has been doing since we saw her last in Melbourne. 

We are both enjoying our trip. My back has been giving me trouble again. We will stay in Abacos for a few weeks and then look for a weather window to cross to Charleston or Beaufort, NC. 

Hope the winter is over wherever you may be,

Elyse and John

Marsh Harbor

Took this last night from the boat.

Marsh Harbor

We are now in Marsh Harbor.  Great place.  The biggest town in the Abacos.

Spanish Wells

Hello all,

We are in Spanish Wells.  The island was settled by Methodists.  John Wesley visited.  There is no alcohol sold on the island.  It's like living in the 50's.  The economy is based on fishing and not tourists.  They speak a dialect that is different from anywhere we have been.  I am standing outside a store with the computor on a 55 gal drum.  A woman just stopped and invited us to go to her house.  

We are going to move the boat this afternoon a little west to Egg Island and in the morning take off for Little Harbor in the Abacoes.  The Abacos are the last chain we will visit in the Bahamas.  We plan to visit about 5 or six islands and then head back to the states.  That will probably be in about 3 weeks depending on the weather.

The weather is great and the islands are beautiful.  

I hope your life is wonderful.

John & Elyse  

It's too cold!

Hope your life is good.  Elyse has been complaining because the temp has only been getting to the high 60's.  I think it will get back to the 70's by the end of the week.  We may slow our  progress north.  We went to the grocery store.  A real treat.  I think we may head out north toward Spanish Wells tomorrow.  Winds look good.  There will be another front coming through later in the week.  From Spanish Wells we will jump off to the Abacos.

Take care.

John

Rock Sound

We are anchored in the bay by Rock Sound, Eleuthera. After a couple of bouncy days in New Bight on Cat Island we asked what Chris Parker, weather guru, thought of us sailing to Little San Salvador and on to Rock Sound the following day. He said with the 13-14 ft. swells from the NE in the Exuma Sound we would not be smart to anchor in West Bay at Little San Salvador. By the time we digested that info it was 8 a.m. but we decided to pull anchor and see how far we could get up the south coast of Eleuthera. Our bail out would be Davis Harbour Marina even though the cruising guide and chart said the channel depth was too shallow for us to attempt. At that point we would be committed to traveling the remainder of the way through Davis Channel after dark which is not recommended due to shifting sand bars and shallow coral heads. We felt, however, that if we didn't leave then we would be in Cat bobbing around all night for at minimum a few days. So off we went. It was a good sail although a little intimidating. As calculated, we just made it to Davis Harbour about 1 hour prior to sunset and were grateful to hear that we could enter with no problem. 

The following morning we pulled up to the fuel dock and filled our tank to the tune of $6.00 per gallon. We departed and arrived in Rock Sound about noon. This is one of our favorite settlements as it has a great protected bay, the best grocery store south of Marsh Harbor, and Pascal's, a great bar/restaurant, where we enjoy a cold Kalik after running our errands. 

I neglected to tell you about Sandy the Manatee who lives in the waters just off the dinghy dock at Long Island Breeze in Salt Pond, Long Island. He appears to be a young manatee and he comes up to the back deck of the restaurant where the owner has left a hose for him to drink fresh water. He comes up and drinks right out of the hose. Very amazing as I assume most manatees don't get to drink fresh water. 

Anyway, yesterday "we" (my part was to crawl into the rear lazerette where I could physically fit and screw the wire to the tuner box) installed a KISS ground for our SSB as we were not getting very good reception and John cut pieces of pvc pipe to use to hold our antenna off of the back stay. We were pleasantly rewarded with improved reception this a.m.  We are here for at least one more day and then north to anchor off Pigeon Cay or in Hatchet Bay and stage for our trip through Current Cut, which has very strong currents so we must time our passage to slack or ebb tide, and on to Spanish Wells. 

We turned our clocks forward Sat. night a time I always look forward to as it means spring is near and the daylight hours are getting longer.

Best to you all,

Elyse and John

Cat Island

Here we are in Cat Island after a good sail straight from Long Island. Looks like weather and sea state will keep us here for a week!!

Elyse and John

Long Island

Hey Gang,

We are in beautiful Long Island.  The water is 80 degrees and flat.  We are doing laundry and a little food shopping.  Yesterday we swam in Dean's Blue hole.  Over 600 feet deep and where they hold world champion deep diving championships.  Lots of beautiful fish and clear water.  Tonight the wind is supposed tp pick up so we will be sure to be back on the boat.  There are a couple of weather fronts coming through and I think we will wait till they pass which may mean it will be next week before we head back north to Cat Island.

We just finished our laundry at the Island Breeze resort.  There is a manatee hanging out next to the dingy dock.  When we finish with the computer we will walk over to the grocery store.  

I hope your life is good.  We feel like we are living the life.

John & Elyse on Spunky

Last Stop South

Here we are in Long Island doing laundry and catching up on internet. The winds are supposed to get to 25 gusting 30 tonight with squalls so we are prepared to hunker down. 

Yesterday we shared a rental car with Hayden and Raydeen from Island Spirit and went to Dean's Blue Hole which is 664 ft. deep and used for Free Dive competition. There is a platform in the middle of the hole for divers. We swam out to the platform. It is a little intimidating and there are warming signs saying to stay out unless you are a good swimmer. I figure you can drown in 20 ft. or  600+ ft. either way. We also visited Clarence Town and on the way saw one of the island race boats under construction from local trees. We visited two of the churches that were built by Father Jerome who retired on Cat Island and built the Hermitage on the hill that we saw last year. 

We had a good time in Georgetown playing dominoes and attending the opening ceremony for Cruisers Regatta Week. There was a "No Talent Talent Show" and a Doggie Parade. 

We departed Georgetown on Thursday morning and had a great sail down. We may be here for a week waiting for good weather to move on to Cat Island. 

Elyse and John

Georgetown

We have arrived Thursday Feb. 21st. at Emerald Bay Marina about 10 miles north of Georgetown. We sailed here from Black Point yesterday. We left the anchorage at Black Point at 7:15 a.m. hoisted the main and headed for Dotham Cut. Because the tide was against the wind at that time of the day we hobby horsed out the cut to the Exuma Sound. The Sound on the east side of the Exumas is more like being in the ocean. The waves are higher and the water a lot deeper than on the Banks which is on the West side. We had anticipated 12-14 knt winds out of the east based on Chris Parkers morning cast, but the winds were consistently above 20 and the waves 4-6 ft. We had about 40 miles to go to our destination. It was a bit rough.

Our stay in Black Point was very enjoyable. We had dinner at Lorraine's Cafe (a Bahamian buffet) and met a nice young couple from Montreal who were on a captained charter for 10 days. Their experience was very different from ours. No boat repairs, meals cooked and served, taxi service to and from shore, and no cleaning up.They want to buy a boat and bring it down sometime in the future. 

 We visited "the garden of Eden" which is a garden of driftwood sculpture that takes some imagination to define the subjects. The sculptor, Willie, lives in a house in the middle of the garden and he came out to give us a tour. He is an elderly gentleman with a great sense of humor. He described what each sculpture was in his mind but understood that we might envision something else. There must be about 30 of them. He then took us on a tour of his vegetable garden and fruit trees. It was quite amazing to see how much he could grow in between the rock that made up his yard (apple, papaya, banana, grapes, peas, squash, lemon grass, almond and much more)

I forgot in an earlier update to tell you about the Pig Beach in Staniel Cay. It is a beach on the West side of Big Major Spot where the island pigs, expecting to be fed, swim out to meet the incoming boats.. They are huge and great swimmers. We went just before the big blow so it was a bit rough with the wind starting to pick up. We had heard from other cruisers that the pigs try to get into the approaching dinghies and can do damage. Fortunately for us, there was a tour boat bringing out guests with lots of food for the pigs. They swam to the tour boat and we were able to watch them and take a few pics. They ignored us and rightly so as we did not bring food. 

Today we did laundry and are waiting for the fuel dock to open (the fellow who mans the dock had to drive to Georgetown for a part) and then we will take a walk. 

Black Point Settlement

Well here we are in beautiful Black Point Settlement. We arrived on Monday and walked to Lorraine's Cafe and had a couple of Kalicks and got internet. Met up with good friends from Annapolis on Alibi 2 and spent the evening catching up. 

We left Warderick Wells mooring field in the Park last Thursday before the front was scheduled to move through the area on Sat. We found a protected anchorage behind Thunderball Grotto in Staniel Cay and we stayed there through the blow. There were many boats trying to find a safe place to be in the days leading up to the front. We feel like we lucked out as our anchorage was fairly calm throughout. John kept an hourly watch on Sat. night as the wind clocked around from S to SW to W to NW throughout the day and night. We don't know how high it got since our wind indicator is not functioning. It was noisy at times. Our anchor held fine. (Thank you again Sheila and Chris) In fact, in our anchorage, no one dragged. There was a 64 ft. Hatteras, brand new, that lost it's anchor up between the Majors (which is a narrow corridor between two large cays where many boats rode out the blow even though the current is quite strong). He ended up on the rocks and started calling for help around 4 a.m. Finally a salvage boat came to his rescue and towed him off the rocks and into the marina. We heard on the VHF that he had prop damage. He was very fortunate that he didn't end up with a hole in the hull. 

We snorkeled in Thunderball Cave when the wind settled down some. It was full of many beautiful colorful fish of various sizes and shapes. Many more fish than we remember from last year. (cousin Mary-my snorkel gear worked wonderfully well-thank you). 

After listening to the weather guru on Monday at 6:30 a.m. we decided it would be a good day to leave Staniel and head for Black Point. We had a wonderful sail down and found a good spot to anchor  just off the settlement. We visited Scorpios for happy hour on Tuesday and are now doing laundry and preparing for a long walk and later dinner at Lorraine's Cafe. Tonight is the special buffet. 

Tomorrow we plan to sail through Dothan Cut and on down to Georgetown.

Hope you are all enjoying the winter.

Elyse and John

Black Point

We are now in Black Point.  Had a good if short sail today to get here.  Hope your life is good.

Thunderball Grotto

Happy Valentine's Day 

We are in Staniel Cay.  We are anchored next to Thunderball Gratto where the movie Thunderball with James 

bond was filmed.  We will dive in the grotto tomorrow.  We are having a wonderful trip.  Hope your life is as good or better.

John & Elyse

Exumas

Our location in Waderick Wells, the Exumas Land and Sea Park and Elyse's update are below.  We are having a great trip.  Touch wood, the boat is performing well.  There are a lot of fronts this year so you grab your chance to move and then enjoy yourself and wait for the next opening.  Most evenings are spent with new and old friends on someone's boat.  This evening a Canadian couple we spent 10 days with last year in Rock Sound are coming over.  They are on their way back to Nassau for engine batteries.

We had talked about this being our last year cruising but as we spend time in beautiful places with warm weather we may come again.  

We will leave tomorrow for Staniel Cay.  That is the location where Thunderball was filmed.  We will snorkel into the grotto where James Bond climbed on the rocks.  

Hope you have a great week.

John & Elyse on Spunky

Exumas

We left Nassau and headed to the Exumas. Our first stop was Highborne Cay where we anchored for the night and were anchor up and heading south early with a destination of Hawksbill Cay which we thought would give us a little more protection from the winds than Shroud where we stayed last year. 

Hawksbill was beautiful. Just what you imagine the Bahamas should be. There are clean white beaches that taper into turquoise water. We stayed two nights taking the trail across to the Sound side. It is one of the cays in the Exuma Park and there are rules preventing visitors from fishing or removing any wildlife including shells from the park.

Each morning on VHF the park office announces openings for the mooring balls in Warderick Wells (there are 22 balls in the North Mooring Field). Our name came up at the top of the waiting list and we were assigned a ball so we pulled anchor and headed down. This will be our third day here. Yesterday we climbed Boo Boo Hill and left a piece of driftwood with our names on it along with many others left by cruisers from past years. We have been visiting with new friends from this year and also friends from last year who happen to be here. 

Right now John is listening to the weather which we hear each a.m. on SSB so we can decide if we shall leave here tomorrow for Staniel Cay where we will anchor and ride out 25-30 knt winds from the north or stay here through Monday when we will be able to travel once again.  

We are hoping the winter is not too harsh wherever you may be. Love hearing from all of you.

Elyse and John