Cruising the eastern seaboard from Maine to the Bahamas and the Gulf of Mexico

Blogs, Pt. 4

Down into Florida

Florida greeted Puffin today with temperatures far less benign than snowbirds expect as they flock to Florida fleeing the frigid fingers of a frosty New England winter. (At times, I cannot resist these ribbons of redundant alliteration, no matter how lacking in meaning. The useless nuggets stream through my brain like a ticker tape - I am simply addicted to this diminutive stampede of sound-alike consonants and I apologize.)

If I have said nothing meaningful yet about our travels today, it is because at this point there is seems little difference on the waterway between southern Georgia and the very upper reaches of the Florida salt marsh. The rolling patois of the native Georgian is now largely disappeared from the VHF radio chatter between bridges, barges and other locals we meet. In Florida it becomes the more neutral, flat "American" dialect that is probably more characteristic of Florida today.

I see some birds I don't recognize and haven't noticed in Georgia. The birds are small, dark and flitter in small flocks across the water and I can't retain an image so I don't look them up.

Temperatures have been freezing at night since we left Charleston and little better during the day with a nasty wind to ensure a thorough penetration of the inadequate clothing we brought to wear. But the forecast is for warmer weather this coming week and we continue south with surging optimism.

Tonight Puffin anchored in the Ft. George River a few miles south of the Florida border and just off the ICW to enjoy another beautiful sunset. One of the several boats nearby was from Vermont, which we had learned earlier by radio. After coming to join us aboard, our new friends said they had endeavored to set two anchors. Unfortunately, the rode from one became entangled in his propeller. During that commotion, the current set the boat aground at the beginning of a falling tide of about 3 feet. His sailboat was compact at 27 feet and the wind had died down, so the boat wasn't in particular jeopardy. As he explained the plight, we concluded that there was little to do but drink wine, munch and wait for the tide's maximum ebb three hours hence. At full ebb, his boat was heeled over and the propeller was less than a foot under water. I brought over a serrated dive knife, along with an underwater spotlight. Our friend's diligent efforts at hacking and sawing with his arm immersed in the 48 deg water for an hour or more was finally rewarded with a freed propeller and at about 4:00 AM the stout little sailboat finally floated free. Bob - Dec 15, 2010

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Puffin continued south under a warm and soothing sunshine as she nudged into the mooring field at St. Augustine, Florida. Temperatures lifted to near 70 degrees, rekindling our enthusiasm for the south after the brutal cold snap. This is the south that had lured us south!

Shedding clothes to the appropriate level, we dinghied into town for a closer look at "oldest, continuously occupied, European-established city and port in the continental U.S." Wikipedia's long-winded parsing of the city's birth goes on to specify 1565. Other sources simply say America's oldest city.

The "Castillo de San Marcos" is a massive fortress completed by the Spanish about 1700. It still dominates a portion of the waterfront today and was responsible for repulsing numerous, but unsuccessful incursions by the British and the French. It remained under Spanish dominion until 1763 and the Treaty of Paris when the British took over and Spain colonial ambitions focused on Cuba.

The early Spanish and Moorish architectural influence is today what gives St. Augustine much of it charm and we marveled at the massive but detailed appearance of some of the early twentieth century buildings in the historic district last night as we continued walking around. Ensconced in this district are an incredible number of shops and boutiques, even shops within shops. The trees in the central park and elsewhere were stunningly draped with festive lights for the holiday season

The banner picture was shot at one of the sumptuous homes that line portions of the waterway as Puffin slipped toward St. Augustine. When a large home is already immaculately landscaped to a fare-thee-well, then the truly artistic landscaper discards restraint, grabs his handy hedge trimmer and make an eight-foot horticultural statement. Masterful! Bob Dec 16, 2010

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Unbelievably dense fog lay over the harbor at St. Augustine this morning as we awoke to depart. Florida - fog? What's up with this? We could barely see the boat moored behind us let alone the sides of the river. The weatherman indicated a wildfire ashore, which we could smell, could be exacerbating the poor visibility.

It was prudent to wait and I put the time to good use with a nap. By 9:30 the sun was shining brightly and we left. We are now leaving the "First Coast" of Florida that extends from the Georgia border to St. Augustine. The name is one apparently whistled up by developers in the eighties to compete in the marketing arena with other Florida regions such as the "Sun Coast", the "Treasure Coast" and the "Emerald Coast" etc.

Happily for us the salt marsh wetlands continued intermittently through parts of the First Coast with less development along the waterway than expected. We've continued to see some good birdlife including a first sighting of a little blue heron - little more than one-half the size of his large cousin. It's darker and doesn't have any whitish patches so is harder to spot in shadow along the shore and maybe we've just missed them before. We've been spoiled with all the light colored birds such as the egrets and the bold antics of the pelicans.

Tonight finds Puffin anchored on the waterway next to one of the myriad bridges here in a cityscape that is Daytona Beach. The navigation here is more assured and for the most part easy. But we already miss the waterways winding through the low country marshes of the Carolinas and Georgia and all the wildlife that it brings. Bob - Dec 22, 2010

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Headed to Vero Beach

Nancy and I received a splendid Christmas present today on the way to Vero Beach. Three dolphins swam alongside Puffin for over twenty minutes or nearly 3 miles! They did so in close formation with total grace and without seeming effort - They dove, they surfaced, they exchanged places and every so often turned on their side as if to get a better look at us.

Puffin was fortunate not to have been run aground from navigational neglect, so transfixed were the both of us with this spectacular display. At one point I actually heard Nancy - not a woman given to easy sentiment - actually talking softly to them. A transcendent moment. Bob - Dec 24, 2010

Merry Christmas.

Vero Beach

Puffin eased into Vero Beach Municipal Marina on Christmas Eve. As harbors go it's small but snug. Sausage-shaped, the little harbor is about 500 feet wide and a half-mile long. Low mangroves at water's edge and taller loblolly pines surround the anchorage lending a cozy feeling that's missing in many of the low-country anchorages we've seen.

Later side note: Apparently it’s well loved by many and has acquired the nick-name “Velcro Beach” because most visitors stay much longer than intended a few even buy homes and settle here. Puffin planned to stay for 2-3 days and ended up happily staying two weeks.

A small number of slips form the core of the marina on one side, while the harbor itself is filled with moorings for which the protocol is to raft two to three boats to a mooring ball. Perhaps to discourage the potential for elitist comments, mooring assignments seem to put sailboats with sailboats, power with power, catamarans with catamarans and so on.

Puffin shares a mooring with a Selene 43 whose captain is a bearded old salt who lives aboard and single-hands the boat between the Chesapeake in summer and Florida in winter - and enjoys talking about it.

Christmas morning's pleasant surprise was to see some great birdlife right off the bat. First, looking from a distance like a few tufts of cotton on a bush, the binoculars showed six or seven pelicans sitting in a pine tree, fallen over the water. Beautiful, sparkling, morning sunshine....out comes the Nikon.....click, click A scan of the shoreline soon revealed the elusive little blue heron....click. Only our second sighting this trip. And soon there were a flotilla of egrets in various places. And this morning there was an osprey waiting for me high in the mangrove bush. No click. It didn't wait long enough for my Nikon. (Like an antique collector, I always need one more picture, regardless.)

For Christmas Day at Vero Beach, everybody put together a very festive potluck dinner. I think there were five turkeys, six hams, cakes, cookies and everything in between.. An amazing display of the culinary arts considering the limited galley tools on these vessels. And where did the Santa hats and red sweaters come from? Hard to think about that stuff when you pack for a trip that begins in September.

Nancy and I wrapped up Christmas night with a movie stream on the Ipad starring Patricia Clarkson and no one else of any acclaim. Ms Clarkson herself is little known enough but N. and I find her somehow beguiling. Perhaps her best movie was The Station Agent. This inept digression clearly indicates I can find nothing further of use and I will resist further maundering. Bob - Dec 25, 2010

Serendipity Strikes

There's a problem with being from out of state - and in Florida, Nancy and I are way out of state. Walking around, we sometimes see something and don't know what it is, or what it does . This is never so true as when loitering in the natural world - what bird is that? What tree?

Today we went to take a closer look at a couple of monstrous trees at each corner of the Vero Beach Marina building. Regarding them casually on earlier walks, we resolved to look closely today and decide what they were, since they were so large and misshapen.

Perhaps 35 to 50 feet in height and five feet in diameter, the trunks weren't really trunks, but more a collection of thickened roots reaching down from branches a dozen feet or so in the air and which were supported by these very roots. The leaves are large, glossy green and elliptical. Strangest of all, each tree had a thriving palmetto tree springing from the mass of branches 15 feet up or so but completely enveloped by the crown of this mystery tree. Unexpectedly, the palmetto didn't appear to have a lower trunk of its own.

Back on the boat we reviewed the trees we'd learned about in recent weeks, but nothing fit. And I haven't yet figured out how to "google" an image. (Fellow geeks, holster your ripostes, puhleeze.)

A couple of hours later, I'm lookin' over the harbor and watching a 40- something power boat ease into our little harbor. I read the boat name as it passes: "Banyon Tree", home port, Vero Beach.....Funny name for a boat. Boat looks normal, not like a tree............Somewhere in my brainpan there is a small explosion. Local boat.......a local tree...hhhmmm.....maybe?

Yes! I'm all over Google like a cat on a mouse! And there it is. Banyon tree! Wow. Image and description all match nicely with what we saw. This borders on a moment to consider religion.

I mean, how serendipitous is that! Tree?....Question.....Look at a boat going by.......preposterous boat name....Shazam! (true story) Phew! I'm headed for a convenience store and lookin' fer the Pick Six tickets! As close as I’ve come to an out-of-body experience since I spoke to my long-dead Aunt in Christiansand. Norway.

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As a prosaic post-script for budding dendrologists, I've included a brief description of the banyon tree. Others should feel free here to return to the postseason replays on TV.

Info courtesy of Wikipdia: A banyon is a fig (stay with me here) that starts life as an epiphyte (grows in the air without benefit of soil, like Spanish moss). The seedling usually settles in a host tree, (the palmetto in our case) and after germination, extends roots downward to the soil. The roots often grow to envelop the host tree out of which this "fig" earned the name "strangler fig". The life cycle and history of this tree continue to get so much more bizarre/fascinating (Thomas Edison grew the first one in this country in Ft. Meyers, Fla.) that I will resist further description as you will probably not believe me and will wish to Google it for yourselves. Bob - Dec 25, 2010

Vero Beach, Brrrrr!

The storm that rolled up the coast Sunday started with a rare display of snow in Atlanta and did not leave Vero Beach unscathed. Puffin was content to be snuggled to a mooring as the winds blew at 25 knots in our mangrove-enshrouded little anchorage.

But the malaise that seeped through the snowbirds here resulted from the near record- breaking cold that continues to periodically pummel into the south in a series of unpleasantly chilly frontal systems that began in early December. Today the sharp winds hammered the daytime temps of 48 degrees right through our clothing.

I had earlier thought Florida's state uniform was shades, shorts and sandals with sun hats for the ladies. That now seems like a vacuous fantasy.

But Vero Beach is nothing if not an excellent place to get stuff. Vero Beach has a FREE bus system that is simple to decipher and a pleasure to ride. So when the going gets cold, the cold go shopping. That became our plan for the day.

Our boat neighbor John insisted that Nancy visit the Visiting Nurses Association (VNA) outlet store. John allowed as how the wealthy are legion here and as they pass away, their clothing is passed along to the VNA for resale as a fundraiser. There was a bounty of bargains in little-used clothing of epic quality, John avowed. Nancy is not ordinarily a shopper but really good bargains in books or clothing? The piper is playing Nancy's tune.

The free bus conveniently dropped us off in front of dozens of places to spend money. I chose a dive shop because we each needed wet suits for some anticipated snorkeling and diving. Nancy found a bargain there in a wet suit, too. I did not. Fitting a wet suit to my schmoo-like profile seemed to require some extra expensive stretchy material. The shopkeeper finally found a suit that fits well but it doesn't look good. If you're picturing a football in a leotard, you're not far off.

A little more window shopping kept us warm for the balance of the afternoon and the forecast for the balance of weeks looks really good. When we got back to the boat, neighbor John handed me a piping hot bowl of turkey soup right out of the blue.....Perfect!

Comments:

When are you heading to the Bahamas? Are you waiting for Dick Von Roth?

Craig Lewis (Dec 31, 2010)

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We're waiting on some last minute details and I've been under the weather with a cold and stuff. We've been talking to Dick and it could be that long before we depart........ Hey! This retirement stuff is hard work! Write one blog and I' m up for a nap. Identify a new bird - nap and a half......... Anyhow, as any sailboater will tell you it's the journey and not the destination!........Naptime! Bob (Jan 02. 2011)

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Anhinga

After the serendipitous encounter with a boat named after a tree that I had no name for, other good things have been happening at Vero Beach even aside from meeting nice people here who want to teach me new ways to fritter away money on little upgrades for Puffin.

This morning I was walking back to the dinghy dock, located almost all by itself in a little lagoon off the main anchorage. Snugly surrounded by mangrove bushes and perhaps two hundred feet across, it's like a little nautical aviary all by itself. Great blue herons, little blue herons, night herons, brown pelicans, cormorants, ring beaked gulls and egrets of all persuasions. All here. All stalking in patient earnest.

A few minutes looking around the lagoon revealed a bird sitting up on a piling that looks like a cormorant. But not quite. A few minutes more and it still just doesn't seem like the cormorant we all sometimes hold in lowly esteem.

I'm slowly learning to keep the Nikon with the 20x stabilizing zoom near at hand as much as possible. It's better than binoculars because it remembers what it sees. I often don't.

So I slip into the dinghy and get several shots, drifting as close as I dare. I'm just waiting to snap it on the wing - and my cell phone rings. Bird takes off while I'm fumbling to shut down the phone. Rats.

But back at the boat I download the pictures I did get. A glance at the bird book says we have a female anhinga. Certainly not a rare bird but the first one I've seen though several of the nature preserves we passed through in the low country are reported to have these birds in their inventory.

According to my Stokes, this large, (34") long-necked waterbird is sometimes called a snakebird. Like a cormorant, it cannot produce oil for its feathers and actually swims with its body below the surface of the water, only its long neck and head protruding above the water and looking like a snake about to strike. It has a long sharp-pointed beak and spears small fish, frogs and just-hatched alligators! Bob. Jan 2, 2011
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Stokes Field Guide to Birds

Vero Beach - A Convenient Stopover

When the dockmaster at Vero Beach asked how long we'd need a mooring, we replied "just a coupl'a days". We prepared to pay as usual and he said, "Oh no need, just settle up when you leave". The sly smile he offered suggested he probably knew something we didn't.

We arrived on Dec 24 - today is January 3. And we know we'll be here until the end of the week. Doing stuff. It's convenient here.

The sun is shining and it's seventy degrees. Puffin is in one of the coziest anchorages we've seen in the south. There's a sweet little aluminum dinghy dock, complete with its own little mangrove-protected lagoon with gorgeous birds at the edges, all stalking things. And it's all away from the hubbub of the city. It's all very convenient.

But when you're seeking some hubbub, there's a free bus to take you to it. Every hour on the nose. Comes right to the marina door and ten minutes later you're standing in front of a supermarket, across from a West Marine and next to a dive shop which is across from a TJ Maxx. Something for everyone. Walk through the marvelous Publix grocery cum pharmacy, you can get a flu shot. Feeling queasy, "that door sir, yes sir, right behind the check out counter, there's a little walk-in clinic". Very handy.

Then there are several handsome consignment shops for those feeling the urgency of a threads upgrade. Right down from the marina is a dog exercise field - about the size of the Daytona Speedway. And it seems every pub has happy hour from 3-6 pm, every day. So convenient.

We're stocking Puffin up with the victuals we'll need in the Bahamas. Got on the bus today, shopped for all we could carry and hopped the bus back to the marina. Bus stops right next to the dinghy dock with all our stuff. Convenient. So convenient, we stow stuff and get on the bus again and shop for more food. We coulda' taken a taxi and done it all in one trip, but this is fun. It's not only convenient but we meet people. Like this little woman who lives here. Seems her eyesight isn't so good and she' not comfortable walking across the highway here. She likes to take the bus, ride the four -mile loop until it returns on the opposite side of the street. She hops off, safe and sound and across the street. Does it nearly every day. It's so convenient.

More than one boater has made a stopover here and then stayed for the winter. It's not for nothing that Vero Beach is nicknamed Velcro Beach! Bob - Jan 3, 2011

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Saying Goodby to Vero

There was a time when I thought I was a handy person. I don't think so anymore, not since I've come to know some of my friends and others, too, who are unquestionably handier; making stuff, fixing stuff or figuring out clever solutions. Some of these handy people have cheerfully helped me from time to time, so I am quite happy to salute any handy person.

Last night however, I was compelled to fire a 21-gun salute, virtually speaking.
At a small gathering aboard a neighboring boat at Vero Beach Marina last evening, we got a closer look at the owners' 46 foot trawler. It was a standout boat by any measure, with a steel hull and aluminum superstructure, all handsomely and stoutly put together. Inside the cabin there was lots of woodwork, as beautifully finished as any commercially finished yacht I've seen.

You've already probably guessed that this is a custom built boat. Most amazingly, the owner designed and built the boat by himself in 7 years, in his back yard, using his garage for a shop building. The boat also had an aluminum dinghy he built in a week.

(Secretly buffeted by pangs of inadequacy, I looked closely at the metal finishing, the hull plating for dimpling, the welding beads for adhesion and uniformity. There was nothing but top-notch work on display everywhere.)

Other than obvious stock components like the engine, transmission, electronics, pumps and galley appliances, virtually everything else was fabricated. I'm talking two saddle tanks for fuel, a centerline day tank, water tank, steering components, complete flopper stopper system, keel cooler, steering system etc.

The boat was launched a couple of years ago in Washington state. Since then this amazing boat has been to Alaska, down to Baja and then part way down the coast of South America and back up through the Panama Canal, then through the Caribbean to the Bahamas and now to Florida.

We spent about an hour going through this great boat in some detail before settling down to wine, snacks and lots of laughter. Couple of glasses of wine and those aforementioned pangs dissipated pretty quickly. Great boat, great couple.

This morning Puffin finally left Vero Beach (so aptly nicknamed Velcro Beach) after 22 exceedingly pleasant days and about that number of new friends made. Tomorrow Puffin expects to take us to an overnight anchorage at Lake Worth and then on Fort Lauderdale. Bob - Jan 15, 2011

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Vero Beach - Still Here

Several days ago we posted an item about Vero Beach and the convenience factor. A quiet and easygoing harbor, free buses, just the shops one needs nearby by and so on. And did I mention the free street concert over by the beach last evening? Yes, the admiral and I were dancing in the street, (conveniently blocked off) to the tunes of yesteryear with a ten-piece band, in t-shirts, under the moon and surrounded by a cascade of palmettos. It's impossible not to be overcome by an occasional ethereal feeling, almost out of body, even as your feet pound the pavement to the unyielding beat of a James Brown cover. Not if you've lived most of your winters in northern New England.

But one still couldn't say it was perfect at Vero Beach - not honestly.

The Wifi, for example. There is a transmitter here, but the dock staff warns its output is mediocre and soon to be upgraded and they are spot on with regard to its mediocrity.

At the captain's lounge ashore, one soon learns to grab one of two window seats at a tiny table where the signal is best. One day I had sat there awhile, absorbed in the output of my laptop and then packed up to leave. All of sudden there was a commotion across the room as two gentlemen stood up with gear in hand to politely but earnestly vie for my seat. Yessir, that was the hotspot.

Please imagine my palpable excitement on a friend's boat recently as he demonstrated how he could pick up this destitute little signal from his mooring a quarter mile away! Yes! A quick shopping trip online and now I too sit at my mooring perusing the morning papers, digitally.

Another tear in the fabric of convenience at Vero Beach now fixed. Perfection lurks just around the corner. Bob - Jan 9, 2011

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4:00 AM and we’re headed for the Bahamas

Bahamas Bound

It was 2:30 AM when I awoke last night for any of several reasons that I'm sometimes awake at that hour, probably "pre-game tension is this case. Shortly afterward my better half is also awake and she looks uncommonly alert . "Wanna' go", I whisper quietly?

We had planned a later 5:00 AM departure for today's Gulfstream crossing, but I'm looking outside - bright moon, flat calm water, still air, a low pressure trof moving out of the area followed by a large high and an email from weather guru Chris Parker foretelling a 3 day window for a crossing. This combination all says "GO'.

So we run through ablutions, breakfast and engine room check in short order and Puffin is off the hook by 4:00 AM. Fort Lauderdale continues to be an amazing place at 4:00 AM. The waterways are totally devoid of human activity at that hour as Puffin glides down the canals. Each wealthy waterfront mansion is groomed with lighting - glittering beacons of success. The droves of docked mega-yachts glow softly with their own luminescence. Soon though we are out to a darkened and empty sea and Puffin feels the first lumpiness of 2-3 foot waves that will grow to 2-4 feet and accompany us for the 10 hour trip to the Bahamas - a little more bumpy than we'd like but certainly doable for the Gulfstream. First treat of the morning is to watch the sun rise on the ocean.

For us the excitement is palpable. All the travel over the months from Maine has come down to this - a crossing to the Bahmas. This is the famed Gulfstream; a huge, warm and unseen body of water that moves inexorably at two to four knots through the Florida Straits and up along the coast to Massachusetts and then across the Atlantic to Europe like an ocean river. It sweeps unknowing tropical fish to New York City in its potent grasp. Crossing it requires strict adherence to the proper conditions.

Today we had those conditions and Puffin arrived in Cat Cay 10 after a ten-hour crossing. Cat Cay is a privately owned island whose main attraction is that it is a tiny island on the eastern edge of the Bahama banks with a somewhat protected anchorage and a one room immigrations and customs office where we can check in.

As we enter the banks from the ocean through a cut between Cat Cay and Gun Cay (uninhabited) we are greeted by a small Bahamian fishing boat working its way home, spectacularly clear waters and the requisite pelican and palm trees. we are here at last! Bob - Jan 18, 2011

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An Unintended Overnight

What a day this was to be! Puffin left Cat Key yesterday headed for Chub Key, a distance of 70 plus miles. Because of the distance we'd planned to spend a night anchored on the banks and complete the trip over two days.

Departing Cat Cay under bright sun, blue sky and almost no wind, our first day cruising on the Great Bahama Bank found us sliding over a flat sandy bottom on about 12 feet of the clearest water imaginable. Three dolphins with a baby treated us to a display of "synchronized swimming" as they effortlessly swam only a foot or so apart off our bow while continually exchanging places and never bumping. What a treat!

A little later we gradually converged with a sailboat headed in the same direction. Then, surprise - Puffin cruised right into a fog bank with visibility gradually winding down to just a few hundred feet. In the Bahamas! Amazing. The radio perked up with boats exclaiming the rarity of fog in the Bahamas. There was a little tension as some boats, like the sailboat close to us, didn't have radar. Puffin does, so we were able to assist a little with position reports for several boats.

Throughout the afternoon we continued an occasional dialogue with the pleasant couple on the sailboat following us, (let's call the boat "S10). Later I checked the NOAA weather forecast that spoke of winds of 10-15 kts from the south and possibly increasing. The banks, where we had planned to anchor, now looked less appealing for a nighttime anchorage as there was no land anywhere for many miles. I began to consider altering course to the Berry Islands and Great Harbor Cay. I thought Puffin could anchor in the lee of the Berry Islands and continue the next morning into Great Harbor Cay as the weather was expected to disintegrate further.

To shorten the prelude here, a third sailboat perhaps an hour behind us, (let's call him "W5"), joined the weather conversation with S10 and ourselves. He mentioned he was sailing on to Frazier Hog Cay and planned to enter the anchorage at night as he had done it often over the years. No problem at all. S10 knew W5 and liked this alternative and invited Puffin to follow.

Unfamiliarity with the Bahamas and the possibility of a good anchorage conspired with the confidence that W5 exuded and I accepted the offer. About 7:00 PM, S10 and Puffin each dropped a hook to let W5 catch up while we each had a bite to eat. We were about 5 miles from the northwest corner of Tongue of the Ocean; a piece of the Atlantic that trisects several of the Bahamas Island chains from one another. It is an amazing piece of underwater geography in which the Bahamas banks, with water depths of less than 20 feet, plummet almost instantly to depths that range from 2,000 to 10,000 feet.

As W5 caught up about 8:30 PM we weighed anchor and fell into line behind him. I calculated that even with W5's slower speed of just under 6 kts, we could be entering our destination at a little after midnight. That sounded good. Winds were still light but building a little.

An hour later the winds were at 12-15 kts, but the seas on Tongue on the Ocean were at three to four feet on the starboard bow. All the boats were pitching uncomfortably so the thought of a snug anchorage only about 3 hours away was beguiling. However once out on the deep water, W5, with a 28 hp engine, continued to lose headway in the seas and we actually were averaging perhaps 4 kts.

At about 2 AM we reached the point where we should start to turn in for our approach to the anchorage. At this point W5 radio'ed Puffin and asked if he, W5, had cleared the shoals that would allow us to start turning in.

Whoa! Nancy and I look at each other in amazement. I hear my first alarm bells in my head. Our salty Bahamas hand is asking me? Does he not have GPS and know exactly where he is? There are no navigation aids so at night electronics are a must. I have been watching Puffin's GPS and radar and tell him yes, we are clear of the shoals.

Three boats turn in but as I watch the boats ahead on radar, we do not seem aimed at the charted approach. As we close with the shoreline I am about to speak up, but W5 beats me to the radio and promptly announces he is going to get close to the beach and drop the hook for the night in ten feet of water. He would enter the narrow entrance to the anchorage in the morning. Both S10 and we are astounded. The beachfront is a lee shore with 15 kt winds with the possibility of an increase. We are back on the bank but only about 500 feet off the Tongue of the Ocean with four foot waves rolling off the ocean directly at us.

As Puffin's speed comes off, she starts both rolling and pitching because her stabilizers are no longer effective. If I put an anchor down here, I would have to leave the motor running, I would not sleep and the combined pitch and roll would soon have me hurling over the side.

It took me no time at all to announce to the others that Puffin will not be staying with them and is heading for Nassau about 32 miles away. If I am going to stay up all night with the engine running while pitching and rolling, I might as well as at least go somewhere.

Puffin arrived safely at Nassau, Grand Bahamas at 7:30 AM and took a slip at the Nassau Harbor Club where we promptly fell asleep.

Mother always said, “Never hitch a ride with a stranger!” Bob - Jan 21, 2011

Make It

Sunrise on the Tongue of the Ocean. Nancy caught this nice shot as we closed with Nassau Harbor and I was busy with a nap.

Off to the Exumas

IPuffin left Nassau yesterday with no regrets and the promise of good weather.

An uneventful 6 hours across or so brought us to Highborne Cay and an anchorage on the western shore, sheltered from a northeast wind. We were right next to Mark and Emily on Grand Adventure who had left Nassau a hour ahead of us. This morning's plan was for both boats' crews to each dinghy over and visit the iguanas north of us on SW Allan's Cay.

These marine rock iguanas are the last surviving anywhere in the Bahamas. Even small as they are at two to three feet in length, but so ugly, they inspire trepidation in the first time visitor as they approach in search of a snack. Despite warnings not to feed them, people obviously do, so these creatures have learned to poke out from under the brush at the first sign of a dinghy and creep up to see what might be offered. At first look, the wary visitor, like myself, skitters back toward the nearby dinghy because these iguanas look anything but cuddly. In fact they are vegetarians and quite harmless. An aggressive step in their direction and they do the skittering.

Anticipating a wet, two mile dinghy ride in choppy seas, I didn't bring a camera so have cadged a picture of these critters from Emily who did bring a camera.

Both dinghies returned to the anchored boats that are now exposed directly to both wind and sea out of the northwest. After a couple of hours of relentless rolling, the geezer crew on Puffin opted for the comfort of a berth at Highborn Cay Marina around the corner from the anchorage. Grand Adventure's hardier crew opted to wait at anchor for the projected favorable wind shift and we expect to see them tomorrow for another adventure.