sittononthebeach.com

I got this recipe from another cruiser our first year of cruising and I have used it ever since.  The recipe was given was for two loafs but this recipe is for one loaf.

Amish Bread

1 c warm water, 110 degrees

1/3 c sugar

1 pkg dry yeast or equivalent

3/4 t salt

1/8 c oil

3 cups bread flour

Dissolve sugar into warm water.  Sprinkle yeast on top ( I usually gentle stir to get yeast wet). Cover, put in warm place ( I put it in sun) and let proof ( it will look foamy).  After yeast is foamy, add salt and oil and gently, gently stir.  Add flour one cup at a time.  Knead and form ball.  Place dough in oiled bowl, cover place in warm place and let rise.  After dough has doubled, punch down knead just enough to form ball without air pockets and put in well oil pan either loaf or I use a round stainless steel pot ( I have the removable handle stacking pots and I use the 2 qt pot.  Cover and let rise (should double in size).  Place in preheat 350 oven and cook for 30 to 35 minutes or until top is golden brown.  YUM!

We have been anchored at Monument Beach since we arrive in Georgetown.  We have also been reclusive since we arrive just regrouping.  Yesterday we decided to join the world again and moved SYL to the local cruiser hangout, Chat n Chill.  We beached SYL and I immediately went to my favorite place, under the boat.  Last time we were here they had just installed mooring balls on one side of the Chat n Chill and created quite a stir.  People had been staying at “their” spot for years and now they were going to charge you to hook to a mooring balls.  The cruising community was up in arms.  I guess because tensions were high when we beached SYL on the Chat n Chill beach we were told by “Elvis” ( the fella that runs the water ferry) that we couldn’t park there.  Rusty asked why we were any different from the other power boats and dinghy’s that were beached there and finally we were reluctantly allowed to stay for a few hours.  

This year it does not seem to be the cruiser hangout.  Most of the people we met had flown in and were staying at local hotels.  Also, we were treated ver differently and welcomed when we beached SYL.  My guess is that the cruisers to some extent may be boycotting Chat n Chill……I really don’t know.  But we decided to anchor close by since it would be easier to dinghy income Lake Victoria from here.  We were very energetic this morning.  I baked some more bread which we had with smoked Oysters and Wasabi and the traditional Feta Cheese,olive oil, seasoning and greek olives.  Yum!!  I cleaned the ice maker and another cabinet.  Rusty got the water maker working and we are now putting water in the tank.   

We haven’t been here since Rusty won the Georgetown Regatta in 2011.  They have a plaque in Chat n Chill with all the winners listed.  It was the first time we got to see it.  It was kind of cool to see Sea Yawl Later listed.  Rusty went to the St Francis today which is a resort in the same cove as the Chat n Chill and interestedly they had the winner of the Regatta as their entry……….I guess when you own the building you can create your own reality…..funny!

Last  night while Rusty and I were reading in our comfortable bed, Rusty turns to me and says, “When are you going to bake me some bread”.  I said, “Tomorrow”!  I frequently bake bread when we are on the boat but I rarely do it any other time………..that is probably a good thing!  We just demolished 3/4 of a loaf!   We continue to be kicked back.  Rusty has already finished his first book.  We listen to the morning net here at Georgetown that comes on the VHF every morning at 8:00pm.  They  give us the 6:30 am weather from Chris Parker for this area, welcome new cruisers, say bye to those leaving, local businesses make announcements, make taxi hook ups to the airport and in community news just express any needs.  Today we needed a tennis ball which was readily given to us and we had an extra dinghy gas can that we gave to some cruiser’s we have known from past years.  Rusty continues to work on his RC sailboat…I think he is having fun!

Linda here:  I LOVE organization, tidiness and above all clean.  I am pretty good at the clean part but I am lousy at the other two.  Ok, you are probably thinking….Let’s see she has finally arrived in paradise reaching the destination we are likely to be at for at least 10 days to two weeks and day 2 she is talking about organization.  Well, today I got up while Rusty was still snoozing. I don’t want to make any noise so I get on the net.  Rusty and I have been following Bumfuzzle.com pretty much since they started 10 years ago with their sailing blog.  They now are RVing with their family but I still keep up with them.  They are touring in a 27 ft Dodge Travco van.  Now this is a family of four and Pat has redone it completely but it is neat as a pin with two kids.  I have at least twice as much space on this cat and it looks like someone turned it upside down and righted it.  I  “organize”, clean, “organize” and even when I feel it is “organized” it still looks messy.  I have been an avid consumer my entire life and have always liked my “stuff”.  When we sold the “big house” I did get rid of a lot of “stuff”  but apparently not enough.  Man, it is hard for me to let go of my “stuff”.   I recognize I will never be a minimalist and really don’t strive to be but I sure would like to live in less clutter.  It is just real hard for me to decided what is “clutter” and what is not.  Erin, my daughter, married a year ago and is now pregnant and she regularly asked me can she have such and such and I say……I don’t have it anymore.  She has said, “Please don’t give anything else away without asking me first”.  So here I am, in paradise and still trying to figure out how to declutter.   But in the big scheme of things………….it is not such a big problem.

I never left from Blackpoint with the intention of making it all the way (51 miles) to Georgetown.  But I had an itch to to get closer since the last 15 miles must be off shore.  If it was to be a challenging finish I didn’t want to have to weave through all the shallows before going off shore all on the same day.  We left Blackpoint about 10:00am and to our amazement there was still a little North left in the wind so sailing down the Exumas was quite easy.  We expected the wind to be on our nose Saturday and Sunday but it wasn’t.

Linda and I decided to sail until it became uncomfortable or late.  It never got uncomfortable and we enter Georgetown Harbor at 6:30pm.

Our shallow water work was fast and easy with the ENE winds at about 12 knots.  We zipped through Little Farmers and comfortably passed Big Galliot.  Favorable winds stayed with us as we passed Cave Cay and found the narrow passage around the sandbars the precedes Musha Cay.  The Explorer Charts are an absolute MUST for sailing the backwaters of the Bahamas.

Interesting information about Musha Cay.  It is owned by the famous magician, David Copperfield.  We have watched it being developed over the years.  We understand that many of the islands are own by celebrities but none have been developed to the level of Musha Cay.  There are several large homes on the island and it comes equipped with various boats, jet ski’s, hobi cats and every water toy imaginable.  It can be yours for a week for a paltry sum of $350,000.  I doubt it is BYOB.  We were told my a sailor in Blackpoint that Copperfield had a full size grand piano made out of stainless stell with a mermaid seated on the piano bench and is submerged in 15 feet of water.  We were given the coordinates (N 23-52.163  W 076-14.157)  We plan on taking a day trip after the Family Regatta and after the water warms up a bit to go snorkeling on what is sure to be an amazing site. Right now the water is cool and takes a bit getting use to.  Plus the wind is still fairly cool so the fun water time is to come.

Leaving Musha Cay we decided to stick our nose outside at Rudder Cut to check the sea state.  It is always rough going through the cut but today the wind and current were traveling in the same direction so it was pretty calm for a cut.  Initially the winds were due east by now so we had enough wind to fill the sail, but just barely.  The swells were only two feet and as the waves and the wind came around to the SE the sails came down and we motored 30 miles with long, slow waves off our port bow.

As we approached Georgetown the swells picked up to 4ft, then 5ft and occasionally 6ft.  These waves were slow, rolling swells with long intervals so they did not present a problem.  The wind continued to clock to the SE but dropped off so we motored all the way in at 6 knots.  Much of our inside work was slow because we didn’t intend to make the full passage so we just meandered along.  A very enjoyable day.  We don’t normally do 30 miles outside in the Atlantic Ocean but conditions were light which made it doable and much more direct.

As soon as we entered the harbor we saw old friends on Cats Meow.  It was fun to see them.  We dropped anchor, got into the dinghy and said a quick hello.

We are here!

Sea Yawl Later!!

I’m working on my boat in the prettiest place…….

Yes, I take time to get in the water here at Black Point “Castle” but today was a workday.  Since the boat was standing on its keels in shallow water it was the perfect opportunity to change the shifter cable that was about to fail.  The project meant that I needed to get under the bridge deck, undo brackets and open the plastic conduit that contains the shifter cable to the port hull.  That is best done when you can stand on the bottom, not swim about trying to work overhead under the boat.  The tide was out and the boat had settled into the sand about 6” so I actually had to work on my knees but the height worked nicely.

Most of the project was straight forward, but with any job there were challenges.

One bolt that holds the shift handle together was seized, I had to drill it out.  After many trips to the tool box, under the boat, down to the garage, back on deck… under the boat and back…. I eventually got it done.  The port engine now shifts like butter….. smooth and easy.

Another big project I’ve been mulling over is how to fix the floor in the dink.  The wood floor in the bow had deteriated, Mark made a temporary fix so he could use the dinghy on the trip to Florida.  I tried ordering a complete new floor from Achilles, but it would take longer than I had to get it, and it was about ½ the price of the whole boat!  The plywood Mark cut worked out well actually, all I had to do is remove the aluminum connecting joint from the old floorboard and repurpose it a bit.  Normally the deep side of the connector faced forward, I hammered it in place onto the existing floorboard, then pried the new board forward so that it locked into the aluminum channel.  It worked great and the dink is ready for full service.  The board is not treated so it won’t last forever, but it will undoubtedly make this trip.

Project wise that’s about it, I did some “rearranging” moving things around on the boat that we had just loaded on boat to get away from the dock.  Linda has been nesting.. getting her boat like she wants it.  Today we finally got the boat where we wouldn’t be totally embarrassed if we invited someone on board….  We had stuff stacked everywhere.  The last thing will be scrubbing the floors in the salon.  I’ve gone around the boat with cleaner and gotten the bumper marks and grease spots off the sides,  there wasn’t much but there’s always the odd gunkiness on the white sides… she’s getting more presentable.

About 5 this evening the tide came back in and floated the boat.  I moved us out past the second sandbar so we are floating again.  There have been several boats in and out of our little piece of heaven.  Right now I can see 4 other sailboats and two mega yachts.  This has become a popular beach, much more known that when we were here last.  There have been times when we didn’t see another boat… I guess the word got out.  This truly is the best beach in the Bahamas.

Linda and I took a short dinghy tour this evening between projects.  We took some nice photos of the area.  When we get better service we’ll post a bunch of pictures.  We may stay here again tomorrow and enjoy the water.  Today we worked too much, tomorrow we might stay here and play in the water.  I may pull out my RC sailboat and sail it around.   It all depends on when we intend to leave for points south.  Georgetown is only a one-day run from here if you go outside in the deep water.  50 miles is easy to do outside, it’s probably 65 weaving around thru the shallows on the West side of the Exuma Islands.  I expect tomorrow afternoon we may knock off some of the miles and stage around Galliot or Rudder Cut.  It makes the day to GT easier, you get there during the day rather than late in the evening if you take some of those miles off the day before.

For now, I’m happy in paradise…. It doesn’t get much better than castle beach at black point.

The last big project I need to do is bring the water maker to life.  I need to flush it out and replace the primary filter.  I may decide to do that here… but then I may not.  We were having battery issues, they were needing to be charged every day.   Yesterday I added about 48 ounces of water to the two batteries I can get to without a lot of rearranging.  I have high hopes the batteries were just low on fluid.  This morning when we woke up the batts weren’t drained like they usually are doing almost nothing during the night.  Tomorrow if I have 12 volts or near it in the morning I’m digging out those back 2 batteries and repeat the process.. fill them up too.

The trip from Allen’s to here was impressive.  We saw 20 knot winds quite a bit, initially waves were dead astern.  By noon the winds had clocked from behind us to the port beam.  It doesn’t get much better than dead astern waves with beam reach winds….. That worked great for a few hours until the waves began following the clocking wind.  As you traverse the Exumas in a southerly direction, you heading goes from due south to SE.  By the end of the day I was fairly tight on the wind with waves coming at 45 degrees on the bow.  I saw a lot of 9 knot periods, some sustained 10 knot an a couple peaks at over 11.  My moving average for the 42 mile trip was 7.9 knots.  Most of the way the gps showed an 8 knot average, but the pinch and wave change the last hour or so dropped me to 7.9 still a very respectable all day run average.  The new main seems to accelerate the boat to speed quickly, so it averages better than my old main.  The quick acceleration helps me surf waves at lower speeds too so I’m pleased with its performance.

This house is why we coined this unnamed beach “Castle Beach” many years ago.

Sea Yawl Later!!

The norm for us is kind of like Texas weather; if you don’t like what we are doing or planning on doing then just wait  a few minutes and it will most likely change.  This charteristic of Rusty and I drives Erin crazy.  Thing is I totally understand her frustration because I use to be a planner just like her….or I guess she is like I was when she was growing up.  I have been under the fluid influence of Rusty for 13 years now, and I find I like the freedom of “flying by the seat of your pants” so to speak.

Wednesday we had dinner at the famous Poop Deck and when we returned to the boat we decided to stage at Rose Island which is about an hour sail from Nassau.  We had anchored at Rose Island several times butalways on the Leeward side.  This time the winds were from Northeast instead of the prevailing  Southeast winds so we were going to anchor on the windward side of the island.  We didn’t bother looking at charts because we had been there so many times.  Rusty found a spot that “looked” nice and sandy and dropped anchor.  It did not take long to figure out somethingwas amiss. The anchor didn’t hook up and it sounded like it was dragging on rock.  Rusty tried another spot and the same happened at which point I pulled out the charts and the Windward side unlike the Leeward side is mostly coral reefs with just a few inches of sand on top.  We spent the next hour seeing if we could find a spot, finally headed to an anchorage indicated on the chart but it was so far out it didn’t offer any protection.

We decided to head out instead of waiting until morning.  The wind was behind us at about 15 knots and the seas were 2-4 feet but they were also behind us so it was a sleigh ride.  We made it to Allens Cay about 11:00pm and anchored.  We had cut off enough of a leg that we thought we could comfortably get to one of our all time favorite spots and that is the beach behind Blackpoint we have coined “castle beach” because of this home

The winds and seas had come around and the sleigh ride turned into a rollar coaster ride…not my favorite.  By three o’clock we were anchored. We were surprised find four boats already there and two of the were the kind of mega yachts you would expect to find at Big Major.  Our unnamed, undiscovered beach is no longer undiscovered…  Again I have this premonistion that the Exumas are forever changing.

We did what we usually like to do and that is to beach SYL, drop the ladder and get in the water…….but wow it is still a little chilly especially with the cool wind.

We had a little weather but it didn’t amount to much safely tucked into the marina.  Today is Wednesday and we have decided to take the public bus to the Straw Market.  We knew that there were several buses that would get us there but we delibertly chose the bus that would go through the residential area of Nassau.  The buses were well used and in bad need of repair cosmectically but seemed to mechanicallyget the job done.  The fare is $1.25 a person as opposed to $6.00 to $10.00 one way to the Straw Market by taxi.  Not surprisely we were the only non locals on the bus.  Once people boarding got over the initial shock of seeing “tourist” on the bus everyone was very friendly.  The residential part of Nassau was pretty much what we expected. There were churches on every dedomination literally on every corner.  Infact on the bus was a prominent sign listing God name in three different languages asking “Who is your Father?”  This is a public bus, sadly you would not see that in America .  .The second most common sight was beauty/barber shops and beauty supply companies.   Third was schools.   This residential area close to downtown business is not that different from any major American city.  The bus route was about four blocks from the Straw Market.  The market structure has changed from a tent to a nice stucco building. However, the inside was unchanged.  Booth after booth of people hawking mostly the same wares.  Their principle businessisfrom the cruise ships which dock a block away.  Quite frankly I had forgotten how uncomfortable that environment makes.  It makes me nervous to have someone constantly pushing there wares on me.  Rusty feels pretty much the same way so he got the one item he wanted and I bought a little Bahamian dress for a little granddaughter I may have (we find out the sex on the 14th) and we left.  The ride back on the bus was direct.

Note:I am typing this on an ipad and I can’t correct mistakes easily so there will be typos.

Atlantis

Tuesday: 7AM – Waiting on a cold front to come thru to leave for the Exumas. We didn’t get the blow we expected last night so I’m hoping for a more comfortable frontal passage than what was forecast. We listened to Chris Parker this morning, he confirmed what we thought, a Thursday departure would be best. It tried to rain a bit early this morning but little came of it.

Linda and I may take the bus to the Straw Market today. I have a couple small parts I want to pick up for the boat today. Yesterday I found the perfect switches to use for chokes. These new Yamaha motors have an electric choke that make it easy to start. The ignition switches I have do not have a choke actuator, so I mounted these two push buttons right under the keys for each motor. I need a couple join splices to finish the wiring. Man it will be nice to have those chokes working without opening the engine bays like I have to do now.

I may tackle the shifter cable replacement soon. My port engine shifter cable is almost inoperable. The sheath is cracked right at the motor, so salt water has corroded the innerds. I bought a replacement in Key Largo. It would certainly be nice to have the boat beached so I could stand up under the stern to run the cable. I will probably defer that job until we get to shallower waters.

It’s 8AM, we just decided to try to make the straw market by 9 so I better go… Sea Yawl Later !!