Captain's Log Week 5

12/10/10 Peck Lake
It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.
Well not the worst, but certainly embarrassing. After a good day on the water we were pulling into a marina/anchorage for the night right as a sport fishing tournament was ending. I didn't know there were so many 50'+ sport fish boats in the state, let alone the same very crowded narrow channel as us. Also in the channel (directly into the setting sun light) was a telephone pole sticking out of the water. The kind which often has a navigation symbol attached to it. This one was just right in the center of the channel. I hit it.... full speed. As we went from 5 knots to 0 knots very suddenly, the anchor which Laura had just readied, no longer dogged down to an attachment point on the bow, kept moving and ended up running all the chain out of the locker and giving the line of passing sports fishing boats something even more comical to watch. Fortunately we were not the first boat to hit the pole and it gave readily bending as we hit it. In the end all that was hurt was our pride.
The best of times: was the anchorage that we found after leaving our originally intended anchorage with our tails between our legs. Three miles farther down the ICW was a beautiful little pocket off the main channel. 3-10 feet deep and very calm. We saw the usual dolphins (which we have seen every day since NC), and there were also Manatees! Very cool. Also anchored in the same cove was a boat named "Discovery Magic" Owned by two very nice brits Caroline and John. She is the prototype for a new production line from a company in South Hampton England. The Discovery 50 ranks second, right behind Chris White's Atlantic series catamarans, as our favorite boat design. Laura and I had actually been aboard this exact boat at the Annapolis Boat show this year. She is absolutely gorgeous both inside and out. I want her.

12/11/10 Peck Lake
We had a very peaceful night at anchor. Light wind and no waves. During the night we were wondering what the noises we were hearing were. They were kind of a non stop industrial sound. Well, as it turned out the sound we were hearing was surf. Just a hundred yards beyond the shore was a many mile long beach with just us and maybe one or two people in sight. Spent the day just relaxing on the beach and collecting seashells. Warm and perfect.

12/12/10 To North Palm Beach
This was the day of the bridges, and waiting for them to open....
People talk about making this section of the trip South an ocean section. I can see why. Narrow channels packed with fast moving power boats and punctuated by many lift bridges which do not open on demand but on a schedule (typically the hour and half hour but not at all from 7-9 or 3-5). This would have not been such a problem but for the fact that we still only have the one motor. This means we cannot make it from one bridge to another in the half hour between openings. We end up getting there just a few minutes late and have to sit using our one motor, the current, and the wind to try and stay in one spot until the next opening. Kind of stressful.
We did however end up waiting at one bridge with another Maine Cat! Always fun to see another one (there aren't many of us). We have seen two other 30' and a 41' so far on our trip.

12/13/10 North Palm Beach
I don't know why I am even a little shocked... Yamaha sent a defective power head to the yard in Southport. So I just paid the overtime for a guy to work all day Saturday for nothing. Useless.
We now have made the decision to go ahead and cross the Gulf Stream with one motor. There is a weather window in the forecast and it will likely be our only chance to get across before Christmas. This is a little scary.
Laura and I also rented a car and went shopping. It's an odd feeling to move so fast after moving so slow for so long.
We also finally saw The New Harry Potter Actually we saw it in IMAX which was really cool. Laura and I have long lamented the lack of a decent movie theater in Charlottesville so this was a real treat.

12/14/10
North Palm Beach (again)
We decided just to stay at the marina we have been at for the last two nights. Our other option was to go to the cruisers anchorage off Peanut Island, but it has been so cold these last few days that we have considered shore power for our heaters to be a must have.

A low point for the day was discovering that Yamaha can't or wont send our motor to the Bahamas. Something about import export regulations. So we are going to have them ship the motor to a freight company called Tropical Shipping and it will be loaded onto a container ship and brought over to us in Marsh Harbor next Tuesday. If this works it will be a miracle.

Laura and I went out to a very fancy restaurant for dinner. Cafe Boulud. This is one of Daniel Boulud's restaurants and the executive chef got the James Beard nomination for best chef south last year. It was very good.

12/15-16/10 North Palm Beach to West End Grand Bahama
In preparation for the crossing Laura and I installed new jack lines, built a new permanent anchor bridle, got the dingy motor fixed (old gas had messed us the slow speed valves in the carburetor). We also had the 100 hour service done on our one motor, oil, plugs, filters that sort of stuff.
At about 3pm we moved the boat over to the anchorage right near the ocean inlet. We actually got some sleep and were ready to go when the alarm went off at 10pm.


The crossing was really not bad. The swell was light and the chop minimal. In fact the sonar telling me that the water temp had risen to 75F was the only noticeable change when we hit the gulf stream. There were some problems however.
1) Laura was seasick from the beginning so I was on watch pretty much from 10-5:30. Not a problem, just one of those things.
2) Larry Jones called it.... Our battery is dying. =( It likely has been for quite a while but we have not noticed it. Basically during the day the solar panels are pumping out so much power that we can run whatever we want with out any problem, and at night we use almost no power as we are sleeping and nothing is on. While crossing however we were using a lot of power at night and obviously there is no sun to charge the battery. About 12am I looked at the battery monitor and discovered that it was down to 11.5V, not good. We turned everything we could off other than the mast head light, the VHF, and one chart plotter. The voltage stabilized and it was clear that we would be ok. I was able to periodically turn the radar on and have a look around. The one outstanding question I have is why the alternator wasn't putting out very much power.
3) We almost got run down by a 500' Coast Guard ship. I have no way to describe this other than to say that if Laura hadn't reacted literally the instant she did we would have been killed. It was as close as you can get and still be okay. I had seen them on radar a few minutes earlier but they were 7 miles away and not moving particularly fast. Laura took the helm for a few minutes while went below. Laura saw the ship about a few minutes before it passed us but thought it was not on an intersecting course. Then when she saw in next it was on top of us. They were traveling at least 20 knots and though laura accelerated and threw the wheel over they passed us no farther than 5-10 feet. It was so close that when they did see us they turned around and hailed us to make sure they had not actually hit us. We talked for a while, it was surreal.
Despite having a radar reflector and a mast light they never say us until it was over, I will think very hard about making a crossing like that again without AIS. An AIS transceiver would have given both us and them our exact positions, and course. It would also have warned both of us that there was a possibility of a collision miles before we passed each other.
Other than those things it was all good. Laura started feeling better as the sun came up and were treated to many schools of flying fish skimming the surface in front of us as we approached the Bahama bank.
We docked at Old Bahama Bay marina in West End about 12:00pm and cleared customs with no problems. Lowering our yellow quarantine flag and raising our Bahamas courtesy pennant was something of a triumph. We're here!

12/17/10 to Great Sale Cay
The water is just stunning, it is so beautiful. I think we are going to really like it here.
We motor-sailed all day anchoring just after dark in a broad anchorage with maybe 10 other boats. Good holding and no anchor issues.

12/18/10 To Spanish Cay
It was not quite as warm as yesterday but still very nice. We traveled a good long way today making above 5 knots the whole way. We arrived at Spanish Cay just at sunset and are well tied up. We had planned on anchoring a few hours back, but after getting some weather information we decided to try and make it to a good marina. We are glad we did, a front came through over night and there was a lot of wind and rain.
I'm also glad that we made it here as this is kind of the kick off of the central cruising grounds for the Abacos and we will have short travel days from now on. We can just sail for fun. We should be only one day away from Treasure Cay where the Aimones will meet us for Christmas.