Allen's Cay Anchorage

 The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday: June 13-17, 2017
We walked Hastings for the last time on Bahamian soil. We'd have stopped to contemplate how sad this was, but we were being eaten alive by a horde of hungry mosquitos, so we simply ran for our lives. 

We left the anchorage at 8AM and raised the sails. It was a beautiful day and we were making decent speeds. It's going to be an easy passage! 

Sails up on a perfect day

As the day wore on, our speed slowed to about 0 knots. It's not all bad: I used the calm seas to bake 7 layer bars. Just as I was going to bed at 8:30PM, Matt called me to help him reef the main. Why? Where did this storm come from? Why is it suddenly pouring buckets on rain through the open bedroom hatch? Why is there no rest for the wicked? As soon as we had reefed and gotten ourselves organized, the rain stopped. 

Midnight. The struggle began. On shift. Struggle to wake up. Struggle to light stove to make tea. Struggle to convince Hastings that I need him to stop blocking the fridge so I can get milk for my tea. It's literally a one hour ordeal to get tea organized, but at least there's only 2 hours of my shift left! It starts raining. Get iPad inside. Struggle to close canvas over the helm. 

Cargo Ship

 Day 2: 2.5 knots of forward progress, and pretty boring. Sure, we could head for the gulf stream and pick up that glorious free conveyor belt of the sea, but thunderstorms are just lined up over the gulf stream, and we have a large lightning attractor on board. 

At sunset, we put two reefs in the main and battened down the hatches for a storm. We got a good 35 knot downdraft. Our lazy jacks snapped and then our wind indicator stopped working. The ocean called. It says "the only easy day was yesterday". At least we are making decent speed: now up to 6 knots!

Storm cloud at sea

At 3AM, we were making 2 knots of speed. We started an engine to help us outrun a storm. It worked! Yay!

Sunrise. It's pretty amazing. It happens every day and brings great joy to all who have wondered if they will make through yet another night. 

Sunrise at sea - thank God!

Sunrise at sea

Our 24 hour Day 2 run: 86 miles! That's just sad. 

Day 3:  We're 156 miles due east of the Florida / Georgia border. See you later, Florida! (Actually, the human eye can't see 156 miles away).

Sunset over red cargo ship

Day 4. Better speeds today in the Gulf Stream, but we are paying for it: the sea feels like a washing machine. Waves come from un-anticipated directions, throwing my feeble mind off-course. After sunset, things got worse. The blackness made my feelings about the sea state even darker and I only managed 1 hour of each of my shifts. Hastings joined me on the floor of despair.  I had to get off the death bed to help Matt put reefs in the main in anticipation of yet another storm at sea. The rain came as did my tears. We chafed through our dyneema (super-strong) #2 reefing line. At least we did 160 miles today - double yesterday! 

At 3AM, I was on shift and it started raining. I hustled to get the iPad indoors. Matt woke up and started going for the helm. Crash! Running dead downwind, with no wind instrument, into a storm downdraft = crash jibe = good times. It's like parking a car at 60 mph instead of gently landing at 2mph. Something bad will come of it! We're over it. Our sailcars busted in the jibe. We pulled down the mainsail and motored with the jib up.

Day 5. A day of darkness and gloominess. It rained. We called Customs and Border Protection, but they told us it was Saturday, and they couldn't care less. Welcome to America! 

Rainy last day at sea

We made it! 100.8 tough hours at sea. MVP definitely goes to Hastings, who never complained. We had the dinghy in the water within 5 minutes of anchoring at Cape Lookout. He seemed pretty confused: wait, there's land? We're not trapped in Waterworld? We can get to land? I honestly thought we would both refuse to leave the beach, but after a long walk, we were all ready to get back to the boat. It's home, after all. 

Paws firmly planted on land!

Beer at Hoffman's Cay, Berry Islands

Salt Pond, Long Island grocery store.

1. A bag of, say, Doritos was $5-$7. I have a potato chip problem, so going completely without wasn't an option. I would buy Lay's Stacks (ala Pringles) for $2.50 each and try and make them last. Sometimes I could make them last a whole 10 minutes. Impressive. I switched to popcorn as a backup salt delivery vehicle. 
2. Onions and potatoes are easy to find and cheap. Other veggies are harder; we relied on our dehyrdated veggies. 
3. Eggs are cheap / US prices.
4. Cereal was expensive so we started buying bran flakes and oats and mixing our own Muesli. 
5. Crackers and cookies are US prices or cheaper if you buy the British brands (Hill's, Jacobs, etc). We actually miss the cheap British foods!
6. Foods are imported from random places. Eggs are often US, whereas butter is from Ireland and New Zealand. Seems like a long way for butter to travel! 
7. Bahamians must bake all their sweet goods because they did not have a lot of chocolate or candies for sale.
8. Biggest provisioning fail? We ran out of good dog food. Hastings loved Alpo, but he developed skin problems right away and started eating dinner with us. Ruff life. 

A typical haul from the grocery store

Independence and Ñandú, waiting for a cold front, Hoffman's Cay, Berry Islands

Typical Snack Shack, Eleuthera

Pizza and rum punches, Tiny's, Long Island

Sure, all this "going to a restaurant and ordering $13 cheeseburgers" makes us sound like real losers. We are! In the U.S., I never order burgers. But in the Bahamas, I craved them! You see, we didn't have meat on board; tomatoes, lettuce and red onions are hard to find, cheese is a luxury, and buns? you'll have to make them, and who has time for that? For us to make an honest to god cheeseburger on board would be nearly impossible, and we began to long for meat, veggies, cheese and bread all in the perfect package. 

Cheese Danishes, Governor's Harbour, Eleuthera

Do you love to eat out while you travel, or do you prefer to put your travel dollars towards something else? 

We were really looking forward to swimming and snorkeling every day during our Bahamas trip. We didn't realize it would be cold, windy, and wavy for most of the time! We were lucky enough to have the perfect day to snorkel Fowl Cay Underwater Preserve in the Abacos. We anchored in gorgeous blue water and couldn't wait to jump in! 

Clear blue waters of the Abacos

Sandy channels and corals, Fowl Cay

Damsel fish amoungst the corals

Elkhorn Coral

Friendly parrotfish

Fowl Cay isn't an overnight anchorage, so we headed to Great Guana (an entire 2 miles!) Halfway there, our starboard engine died, just to keep it real. (The impeller bit the dust, but we do have spares)