GT to Little Farmers Cay

Four Seawinds lifted anchor at 7:15 to make a formation fly by in Georgetown Harbor.  Jono and Mili were in the dinghy to take pictures as we approached Kidd Cove.  The boats in order are: closest to you sv “Zephyros”, second away is sv “Jumanji”, then sv “Morning Glory” with “Sea Yawl Later” in the distance.. but leading the pack.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Ted and Mili on Morning Glory sailed out of the harbor with us but returned for guests arriving later in the week.  The trio of Seawinds continued on to Little Farmer’s for the evening.  It was a glorious downwind sail in 4’ swells and 8 knots of wind.  My fishing prowess (or lack thereof) remains intact.  I did everything I knew of to catch a fish and didn’t get a bite.  Almost 40 miles of trolling and we got nothing…..  Mike and Frank caught barracuda but no game fish.

Arrival drinks were shared on Jumanji until 6:30.  We all returned to our ships for the evening meal.  Jono had thawed out some of Linda’s chicken and sausage gumbo.  We ate it over rice and crackers with plenty salt and hot sauce….  Great finish for the day.

Stargazing was nice, I spent 15 minutes watching satellites move through the night sky – still lit strongly by the sun.  It’s quiet here, no generators running, no boats running thru the harbor all night… Little Farmers is much different than Georgetown on Regatta week.  The “zoo” was fun to see… but this is better!

SYL

GT – Wednesday the 27th

Today is Seawind photo day, our plan is to get all 4 boats together for a photo.  Jono and I may be leaving GT tomorrow, so the opportunity for a group shot is waning.  I need to be back home in roughly a month, and we are talking about making some of the out islands on the way back… so we are at the apex of our argosy.  All good things must come to an end I guess.  This picture is of Morning Glory’s arrival (with the new stern extensions)

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Today was a great day… again.  Everybody rode on Morning Glory over to the Georgetown side of the harbor.  We all walked the town, I got a Batelco prepaid phone “top up” Jono got some more Gumbay Punch 2 liters, and we all watched the first two regatta races from the bank.  The third race (the big 28’ “A” boats) started at 4PM.  Moring Glory with all on board was on the starting line to watch the big race of the day begin.  Red Stripe and Tida Wave were my favorites… they are historically the fastest two boats.  Both boats took an early lead but had problems during the race.  Running Tide #5 took the win.  The SW flotilla all went back to their respective boats and re-convened at the Chat-n-chill for ribs and chicken dinner.

After hugs all around we left in the dark heading back to our boats.  Tomorrow everybody but Ted and Mili are leaving GT heading back North.

SYL

Tuesday April 26th – Georgetown

We charged batteries with the generator last evening; I cleaned the solar panels so we will see how they perform today.  Solar charging has been OK, but not up to par.

Jono is at work this morning.. which means he’s on an outer beach hunting relics.  With the dinghy waiting for glue to cure, he took the Kayak into hurricane hole 1 to walk across to the ocean.

With a light breeze picking up in GT harbor, it is becoming a nice morning.  I forgot to ask about a boat count in the harbor on the net this morning, but I did pick up a spare autopilot on the boat trader segment.  A boat named Celeste bought a new wheel pilot and is giving his old unit away, it will make a good backup for SYL.  It’s nice to see the regatta boats out practicing this morning; we have a ring side seat.  The little boats slide across the light blue water like a leaf in the wind.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Having our Seawind friends around us is really nice.  Ted came over this morning, Mili has her sewing machine out and I need a little bimini repair.  Ted said to bring it on over and she’ll fix it up.  Richard and Laurie from “forever young” came by in their small boat; they came in the harbor yesterday evening on their 78’ Hatteras motor yacht.  She said she caught fish every day and her freezer is full… she wants to go fishing every day here in GT but she didn’t have anybody to clean fish for her so I volunteered.  Jono and I may be able to put up a nice store of fresh Mahi as barter.  Their dinghy is a 16’ boat with a Honda 90 on it, so they use that to go fishing.  I’m glad I bought that second jar of Wasabi….

“High Noon” just came by in his Dink after a grocery trip across the harbor.  I don’t remember his but his wife’s name is Mary.  They are long time seasonal GT residents from Canada.  The first time I came to GT they were parked in the same spot they are now.  High Noon is a 65’ sleek looking monohull that must go to wind like a 747…. It’s a narrow hull so it looks like it’s 100 feet long.  There isn’t many of the old guard left; life is a revolving door out here in cruiser paradise.

There is a 36’ monohull parked behind us; they bring their dog to the bank to do his business every morning.  When they get close to the boat on the return trip the dog bails off the bow of the dinghy and climbs the ladder back up into the boat… it’s the oddest thing you have ever seen.  He looks like a black and white spaniel breed… perty smart I guess.  Dogs on boats… I guess some people can’t make real friends…. Lol.  I love a dog, but when that dog consumes your life (and you don’t want to live for someone or something else) you need to rethink your situation.  I’m not callus; I just guard my heart against loving a non-human to a fault.

Conditions should be ideal for the Family Island Regatta.  I’ve been keeping up with weather and it looks really fine for the races this week.

Zephros invited everyone for drinks and snacks tonight.  I think I’ll go over and visit everyone.  Mike came and picked me up earlier, we went to all the other Seawinds looking at how they were set up.  Our dinghy is out of service while the glue dries so Mike is carrying me around these days.  In a couple days our dink will be good to go.  We used 3M 5200 for the repair, it’s brutally efficient but slow drying.

SYL

GT Monday

Today was a calm day, we shopped at Exuma Market via a dinghy ride across the harbor.  When we got back I started trying to diagnose a charging problem with the batteries.  We haven’t had to charge much… but with the sunshine we have, we should be seeing more power from our solar panels.  It looks like one of our panels is all but dead, and the other is limping.  That would explain the problem.  We have some tests to run tomorrow but I suspect we found the issue.  It’s not something we can or need to fix on this trip… and from what I hear the manufacturer of the panels may give me free replacements so it’s something to do when a shipping address is easier.

While I was working on the solar panels Jono heard something outside.. the dinghy blew out on a long seam, one side went flat.  I took the engine off and Mike and Jono hoisted the boat up on deck where mike made a repair.   Mike has all the right glue and cleaner and the experience so he did it all.  Tomorrow we will see if it holds.  Often there are small leaks to patch after such a large blowout.  We aren’t sure why the blowout occurred, it just may be that the tube over pressured in the hot sun…..  All the Seawind owners pitched in tools and experience to solve my problems, even with the issues it was a good day.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The regatta boats are practicing in the harbor today.  Bahamian sloops were the work boats of past decades, now their heritage is preserved in what is now the country’s most coveted sport, Bahamian sloop racing.  This week is the “superbowl” event of the season… the culmination of months and months of local contests.  The government pays to ship all the family island local winners to Georgetown every year for the “Family Island Regatta”.  This year is the 63rd annual event.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

We chimed in this morning on the “cruisers net” to announce our arrival.  Georgetown draws a large number of cruising boats to watch this event, and the previous event last month where the cruisers actually compete in a big race with other crusiers.  The net happens every morning at 8AM, a host calls on channel 68 (the local harbor hailing channel) to switch the VHF radio to channel 72 for the “net”.  Moderators offer local knowledge to new cruisers, there is a boat trader section where people can sell or trade boating items, if anybody needs help somebody on the net knows how to help with that specific problem so knowledge and spare parts are shared.  One of the segments announce new arrivals, all four Seawind owners told of their adventures, who was on the boat.. where they are from etc.  Then they go into who’s leaving today and where they are going.   The cruiser community is well established here in GT.  There are seminars by professionals on the beach on several subjects including everything from battery maintenance to local history.  Beach church is held every Sunday around the picnic tables at the chat-n-chill.  GT is sort of the furthest distance most cruisers ever go.. the “destination” for many because everything from here South is upwind, remote, or difficult to find good protection.  GT is called “Chicken Harbor” because most people chicken out of going any farther south.

There is a large contingent of Canadians boats here.  Many leave after Cruiser Regatta in March but quite a few are here for Family Island Regatta this year.  March signals the end of the harsh Canadian winter.  Instead of second homes, lots of canooks buy a big boat and park it or sail it here for the season.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

It’s getting dark, our sunset was as beautiful as always, this time with about 300 aluminum trees (sail boat masts) in the picture.  Tomorrow morning I’ll ask to see if somebody has a boat count, normally they announce how many cruisers are here.  At events like this, cruisers often outnumber the locals.  There are some large boats here, even a 60+ foot Gunboat.  If you don’t know what a Gunboat is.. google Gunboat catamaran and see what pops up.  I have never seen as many catamarans on the water as there are now.  Catamarans may outnumber monohulls these days, apparently many new cruisers are opting for a cat, and there are more cruisers this year on the water than I have seen in the past 15 years.

Last night I opened my hatch fully to watch the stars.  Light pollution is low here so your vision to the heavens is much clearer than on land.  I’m thankful for the experience.

SYL  Rusty.

Georgetown Sunday – The SW Crew

Jumanji, Wings and SYL made a fine sail from Lee Stocking.  The contest of the day was a fishing tournament, we all put out lines and did our best but the only fish caught was a Little Tuney on Jumanji.  However, Morning Glory caught two nice Mahi a few miles from the harbor.  The coolest thing is…. All four Seawinds planning to unite in the Bahamas made it to GT this evening. 

Jumanji sails out of their in harbor home at Port Aransas, Texas.  She is a very nice well equipped 2001 boat, they have been sailing alongside SYL since we caught up with them in the Gulf of Mexico heading to Florida’s West coast.  Mike and Laurie are avid sailors, she was the helmswoman and he trimmed sails for many years racing Farrier trimarans.  Mike was president of the F24 and F28 classes for many years, he currently does the PHRF performance ratings for racing sailboats on the Texas gulf coast.  This is Jumanji’s first year to cruise the Bahamas, both sailors successfully retired from Conoco Phillips a few months ago.

Morning Glory hails from Stuart Florida, she is a well sorted out ship with almost every Seawind extra or addition you can attach to a 2000 model Seawind 1000.  If it doesn’t have it yet.. I’m sure it will soon…. The highlights of her many extras include extended transoms, an extended hard top with custom made sunbrella enclosures, bow sprit and screacher and front opening windows.  Ted and Mili are wonderful people, as are all out Seawind friends.  Ted brings a two person Hobie revolution Kayak, a single kayak and an inflatable paddle board with him.  Ted is an avid spearfisherman and Mili sews all the canvas for the boat.  They too (like Jumanji) are lucky enough to keep their boat at their home.  Ted is a retired Miami Beach fire fighter / first responder.

Zephyros is the newest in our little fleet, she is a 2009 XL model that comes from Seawind with extended transoms and front opening windows as well as other changes SW made to their new models.  Frank and Pat live in the Tallahassee area where Frank is a retired pilot and Pat was a teacher.  They have never been this deep into the Bahamas.  They; like Mike and Laurie are ex trimarans racers, they started with an F27 and went to an F31.  It seems there is a natural progression from Farrier racer… to Seawind cruiser in the sailing community.  Zephyros has a bow sprit and screacher like Morning Glory so they are both fast nice riding examples of the Australian brand.

Sea Yawl Later !! is of course the old man of the group, hull number 37, she’s a 1998 model but doesn’t look her age.  When Linda is on board she stays pristine, but Jono and I have taken some liberties in that area.  We don’t live for the boat. We live on it… lol.  It’s not too bad this year, but assuredly not up to Linda’s standards.  My little ship is the most “stock” model of the group.. no extentions of any kind or big headsails.  I’m known for carrying too much weight but still being one of the faster boats in the fleet.  Seawind did good when they built SYL, she’s solid as a rock and pretty darn fast regardless of her deep waterline and lazy captain.  I’m loaded for cruising with a watermaker, radar, single side band radio, and the heaviest dinghy in the fleet.  I’m not sure if Zepyros has a watermaker, but I know the other three boats do.  We are all self-sufficient fully rigged cruisers.

SYL

Saturday the 23rd

We raised anchors right at 7AM heading for the shallows of the Pimlico Cays.  It’s always a little stressful because you’re in the shallows (4 to 6 feet) for a long time.  It seems like hours, but it’s probably only one.  The shallows went well, Mike had all the waypoints in so I followed him.  It was my least stressful trip through there every because I wasn’t in the lead.  Our ETA for the days trip is before 11AM so it will be a short run today.  We only used our mainsails today with all the direction changes..  winds are pretty light anyway.

We are stopping at Leaf Cay for an hour or so, there is a beach Jono wants to check out… that will also allow time for “Wings” to catch up.  They are sailing the deep water this morning in the Exuma Sound.

Wings did rendezvous with us at Leaf Cay – Adderly Cut.  We traveled together another couple miles and stopped for the evening at Lee Stocking Island.  The small beach provided great overlooks to the ocean as well as back toward the boats on the calm side.  It’s a highly rated anchorage for the scenery and its geography.  You should never see much of a current here so the boats sit facing the wind all the time… which is nice.  If the boat isn’t facing the wind you don’t get a breeze in your hatches, and facing the wind.. the waves go right under the boat rather than rolling it side to side so “no current” is a good thing.  This evening wind direction is supposed to clock all the way from SE to South, to West, then from the North by nightfall as the next weak front comes through.  This time of the year fronts don’t normally make it this far south so it will be a very weak front with almost no wind… perfect for the offshore section of run to Georgetown.

Jono and Mike are back from their gris hunt, I guess I’ll go over and see how they did.

No score on the ambergris, more scratched legs than anything else walking through the brambles to access remote beaches.  About 3:30 we all dog piled on to “Wings” to check out Jono’s prospective purchase.  Mike and I looked at it pretty closely.  It’s a well-kept for a 1968 model, it has several cruiser features that Jono would need and I think it’s a good option for him.  I am a little concerned about the mast and rigging (if it’s heavy enough) but other than that it’s a usable boat with lots of extras.

Winds are shifting as expected.  I took a nice warm shower after my swim earlier, we do a good job of conserving water but sometimes you just have to break down and do a full fresh water shower and rinse.

The little anchorage is filling up, Mike and I were the first two boats in, now there are 7 boats here.  I am surprised by the number of catamarans I’m seeing this year.  When we first started sailing it was odd to see another cat, now… half the boats you see are catamarans, even the powerboats have gone to two hull boats.  1 of the 7 boats in this anchorage is a monohull.  There were supposedly nine 57’ Horizon power cats at Staniel when we were there, at 4.5MM a copy they must be a pretty nice rig.  It was a Horizon rally, I didn’t see all 9, only 5 had arrived before we left.

We have good cell service today, I talked with Linda, there were several good things going on back home so that’s a refreshing change for this trip.  I have about 30 minutes left on my prepaid Bahamas phone, I may load it back up in GT so I can keep Linda in the loop, and find out how it’s going back home.

I fed the iguanas on Leaf Cay today.  It’s a one boat beaching opportunity.  I slipped in and hung my anchor in dry sand, stepped down in knee deep water off the bow and went ashore.  We saved some old bread so the iguanas had a feast.  Leaf has great memories for me and Linda, it’s still the same.  The picture on my boat card is at Leaf Cay.

It was black box wine on Jumanji tonight…. They are planners so we talked about where to anchor in GT tomorrow.  As long as Laurie and Mike have a plan they are quite happy.  The plan is to anchor in Kidd Cove so we can go into Lake Victoria and the exuma market for provisions tomorrow evening.  It looks like a wonderful downwind drift tomorrow.  We all agreed not to race, the goal for the day is fishing!  The winner is the one that catches the biggest edible fish.  Anchors aweigh at 7:30…. GT here we come.

SYL !!

Rudder Cut Cay

We left Black Point about 8 and we got to Rudder Cut about 1.  The wind was on our nose a bit so we traveled a further distance due to tacking on and offshore, so it took a little longer than expected but not a bad trip.  We were able to sail all but the last couple miles.  We trimmed steadily to maintain 7 knots over water, it was nice sailing.

Jumani and SYL are the only two boats now, Wings dropped off at Farmers Cay, they may catch up later.  Our goal is to stage tomorrow evening (Saturday) for a short outside run to Georgetown of only 16 miles.  Morning Glory is ahead of us a bit, they may already be in GT.  The day was mostly overcast and windy, not the best day to enjoy Musha Cay but it was pretty as we drifted thru the shallows.  Rudder Cut is as far as the big boats can go before taking the ocean side to GT, it’s an easy exit and it’s deep.  From here on down if you draw 4’ it can be tricky taking the back roads.  Luckily we only draw 3’-1”.

Mike, Jono, Laurie and I dinghied over to dove cay for a walkabout.  It was nice on the remote beach, albeit a bit rough on the evening ride home.  We gathered on Jumanji for evening drinks, laughed, joked and capped off the evening well.

SYL !!

Thursday – Black Point

The wind is howling but the sun is out so the weather is not ugly, just not perfect.  I suspect there have been some gusts over 25 mph.  Jono is getting increasingly better at beach combing.  He’s looking for beaches that are hard to access and he is find better stuff.  I think he has four pieces of “gris” so far.  Nothing big but if they prove out to be the right stuff he may have several hundred dollar’s worth.

Another Seawind 1000 showed up today, he’s from California, boat name “Manyana”.  I heard him talking to Morning Glory yesterday so we invited him to stop by on his trek North.  Manyana is a very clean 2000 model.  You don’t normally see even one other SW in the Bahamas, so besides the 4 of us that planned a rendezvous, we have seen two others that just happened by!

My morning project was to fix the windlass.  Yesterday we sucked up a rope in the winch and sheared a pin between the motor and the gearbox.  I wasn’t sure of the problem until I took the motor off.  Sure enough it was fixable, I had a spare roll pin so we installed it and we are back in action.

Castle Beach developed a roll coming in from the South, it was rocking our boats more than necessary.  With winds projected to swing more that way we all moved to Black Point anchorage.  I went over to check out the possibility and stayed.  Calling back to the other boats they all decided to come around the point.  Manyana was first, then wings followed closely by Jumanji.  It’s 4:45 so I expect we will go over to Manyana for an evening drink soon.

6:30 –  I just got back from Manyana, Tom keeps his boat nice.. it was a good afternoon – everybody visiting together.  Jono is ashore at Scorpio’s with Greg and Angie at Black Point for happy hour.  I suspect I’m done for the evening here.  I’ll kick back and watch the sunset, tonight it will go directly into the water so I’ll look for the “Green Flash”.

No green flash tonight, too many low clouds but the sunset was pretty.  Tomorrow if the winds lay by lunch we will head down to Rudder Cut for the night.

SYL !!  Rusty

Wednesday the 20th

The whole 3 boat crew enjoyed Black Point yesterday.  We walked the main road then looked in a store and the laundry mat after the great meal at Loraine’s.  We didn’t need anything.. just looking around.  The flotilla of dinghies made it back to our boats at Castle Beach just fine.  Wings joined us this evening in our little bay, so there were four boats for the night.

Last night the Mexican train domino game was on Jumanji.  I went over to watch for a while and left about 8:30.  Jono invited “Wings” over to watch a movie on SYL.

This morning Jono was up at daylight to go beachcombing.  I got up before he left and had some of mama’s coconut bread for breakfast, what a treat…. The ocean side of Black Point has some major junk washed up, that’s prime hunting grounds for any floatsom you desire.  Shoes.. always shoes… I don’t know why but every island you stop on has shoes washed up on the beach.  Ever since we started coming to the Bahamas you always see shoes on the beach.  Jono has picked up several fishing float balls so that’s a nice find.  Hopefully this morning he will come across something awesome.  My friends on Crooked Island call the beach Wal Mart.  One family was building a house and needed a big 6” wide beam for a support, he found just what he needed washed up on the beach.

Crooked Island acquires some interesting beach trash.  My buddy has two military torpedoes and a jet drone aircraft they use for target practice, all was found rolling around on the beach.  You never know what you will find.  In fact I think I’ll put my hat on and go join Jono on the ocean side.

I walked about a mile or so but didn’t get as far as Jono went.  He came back with two more hard plastic fishing float balls and one Pre-war aluminum ball.  The metal and blown glass floats are hard to find.  I’ve never found a glass ball.

While Mike and Laurie went to the Black Point laundry I put up my giant American flag, I’m talking about a 15 foot long flag.  I have been ragging on Mike about his “larger than normal” American flag for weeks (It’s not but that set up the big flag gag).  When he rounded the corner coming back from Black Point he saw this huge flag half as long as my boat flying from the top of the mast.  He couldn’t believe how big it was… lol.  The other day I told Laurie why I kept talking about how huge Mike’s American flag was, so she knew immediately what was going on… it was fun.  With Mike it’s all about bigger or faster so the gag went well.

Morning Glory has to be in Barraterri tomorrow so they can deliver their guest to the Georgetown airport via rental car.  They made the short hop down to Bock Cay to stage for the drop off and reserve a car.  They left before 10 this morning.  The rest of the rabble is beach combing at the moment.  At 3:30 we (Me-Jono-Mike-Laurie-Greg & Angie) are all loading on SYL for a trip back to Loraine’s for more of that great food!  The wind is blowing a little too much to dinghy over, so I’ll park us at Regatta Point on the big boat for the short walk to town.  I have my eye on some of those conch fritters, but man that fried fish was some of the best I have ever eaten!  Maybe she will make me up a combo platter.  Lorraine has very good internet so I’ll bring the computer and upload again.  Maybe we can get some pictures on the web as well.

SYL!!

Castle Beach Tuesday 4-19

Jono is about to go treasure hunting on the big water side of the island, I’ll probably make a second cup of coffee and ride over to MG.  Winds are supposed to be high all week, then drop for the weekend.  I suspect our transit of the 16 miles of offshore into Georgetown might happen Sunday.

We all got back to our boats, well except Ted and Skyler… they are spear fishing.  It’s 2PM, we decided to take dingys over to Loraine’s restaurant for dinner at Black Point about 4.  We tried to call her on the radio but haven’t had any luck yet, I wanted to get her mama to cook me a couple loaves of fresh bread.

Jono found another small piece of ambergris.  He’s been hunting hard here at castle beach.  He’s not covered it all yet so tomorrow will be another big beach combing day.

Earlier Ted and I fixed the stripped bolt in my traveller.  He brought me some new bolts from Florida.  We had to do some grinding on the heads to make them fit so he also brought his bench grinder.  We brought it and the Honda generator to the beach so we wouldn’t get metal shavings on the boat.  We installed the new bolt so now we can move our main sail traveller to center.  That is the default position so it’s good to have that back.

Castle beach is one beautiful spot to park your boat.  Normally we are the only boats here but yesterday there were 5 or 6 other boats (besides our three) in the anchorage.  Now there are only two boats that are not Seawinds tucked over along the backside of Black Point, distant but we can still see them so we own the beach!

Ted and I raced our dinghies today…lol. He has a hard bottom boat with a 15 hp two stroke Yamaha so he was feeling pretty cocky about racing me (with my 20 hp 4 stroke Tohatsu on a soft bottom boat).  It was dead even right up to the point I put mine in gear….lol.  It was an easy win.

The wind has been as forecast, brisk and gusty… but it’s a wonderfully clear day and our protected anchorage is taking great care of us.  The next two days may be more so, then calm for the weekend.

At this moment we are sitting inside Loraine’s Cafe, it is now air conditioned (with an actual front door) It’s expanded with a nice big deck out front!  The old internet room is now the “bar”.  Pretty cool!  I’m having a fish sandwich and onion rings, Jono ordered a cheeseburger and rings.  We got some of mama’s coconut bread and some regular bread for the boat, so we are hooked up!

Sea Yawl Later !!