Waiting in Fort Lauderdale

It has now been a week since we arrived in Fort Lauderdale. As much as it’s a nice place to be, and certainly warmer than home (although it IS cool for Florida) we are ready to leave and cross to the Bahamas. The weather has had other ideas.

The week has been busy, with both maintenance issues, and exploring the area. We are becoming quite good at using the public transportation, and have done our share of walking as well. 

We started off the week with big winds and cool temperatures, and were quite happy to be tied to the dock. It was so windy the first two nights that we both slept with earplugs to try to cut out the noise! Despite the fact that the beach is a five minute walk from the boat, it definitely has not been beach weather. However, we have discovered a wonderful French patisserie across the street and have become daily customers! And of course the search for the best Happy Hour continues!

One of the highlights of the week was an unexpected phone call from Hugh’s brother Adrian, who we mentioned many times as our “phone a friend” during our trip south last year. He is a semi-retired professional Captain, a wealth of marine and ICW knowledge, lives in Florida, and is currently driving a 125 foot private yacht. It seemed that he needed to move it from Miami to Fort Lauderdale and would we like to come along as “crew”. He did not have to ask us twice!

So Friday morning he picked us up at our marina, drove us to the marina where the boat stays, we all hopped in an Uber to Miami, and boarded Kimberlie.

Kimberlie

Wow, this is how the other half live! The owner of the yacht lives on it full time, so we really could not wander around, as this is her home. I did manage a quick peek around, and Hugh got a tour of the engine room with the boat’s engineer, which is probably twice the size of our main salon! The kitchen is huge, but despite the size they do not eat on board, ever!

Dining room

Main salon

The boat employs a full time engineer/manager and one full time crew, then hires Adrian and a stewardess as needed. We sat up in the pilothouse with Adrian and watched with awe as he maneuvered the boat away from the dock, out a narrow opening and into the ICW.  We passed through eight bascule bridges and arrived in Lauderdale and again watched him dock the boat in a space just about as big as the boat. Not much room for error! His many years of experience certainly was evident. Thanks again Adrian for a great day!

Adrian at the helm

So the maintenance issue we have dealt with while waiting is the house bank of batteries, which Hugh was sure were slowly failing. I will let him tell you what happened and the solution!

Before we left Fort Pierce, we unplugged from dock power to see how the solar and batteries survived the summer.  While the overnight electrical load was the same, we use about 65 amp-hours overnight between when the sun goes down and the solar panels stop producing electricity and when the sun comes up in the morning and the panels start producing again, the battery voltage (a measure of how much energy is left in the batteries) dropped to 11.7 volts meaning the batteries were less than 50% charged, whereas last year we never went below 12.4 volts or about 80% charged. Of course, the question is why … I left a solar panel hooked up over the summer to keep them charged, and the panels have a “smart” controller that is supposed to prevent overcharging the batteries.  To maximize the life of lead acid batteries they are supposed to be fully charged after being discharged and we had a hard time doing that in the Exumas when we anchored most of the time. Maybe that was the beginning of the end.  Anyhow, I wasn’t going to the Bahamas with suspect batteries and risk that we wouldn’t be able to keep the fridge and freezer running.  Three options were open to us, replace the batteries with the same mid level AGMs we had, although I was leery about that when we had not got the life out of them that we should have expected.  A second option was to go the least expensive route and pick up regular flooded lead acid batteries from Costco or Walmart, but of course that would mean modifying the battery boxes to make them fit, or, go high tech and get lithium batteries.  George and Bev, friends of ours on another Hanse 415 Breeze On went with lithium batteries a couple of years ago and are very happy with them.  Key advantages are that they can be recharged much more quickly, important for us when we want to minimize running our main engine or our generator.  They are happy living life between 20% and 90% charged whereas lead acid batteries shouldn’t be discharged more than 50%, so they offer much more usable capacity, and finally, they are much lighter.  George recommended Alex from Sea Tek in Marathon, so I gave him a call, and luckily he was planning to travel to Fort Lauderdale for some other business and offered to come up and swap out our batteries for the lithium (LiFePO lithium, ferrous, phosphate to be accurate) batteries.  The install went very quickly and after a night of charging we unplugged and in spite of a couple of days of very overcast rainy days where the solar put in virtually nothing, we consumed 190 Amp-hours of our 400 Amp-hour bank and still had a couple of days capacity!  Suffice to say I’m very pleased.  My only reservation is that the alternator will be working a lot harder with the lithiums because they accept a much higher charge for a longer period (hence the fast recharging).  Hopefully the alternator is up to the challenge.  I have a spare!

So now we are hoping to cross tomorrow, although we just looked at the ocean and there is no way we are going out there unless it calms down. I have never seen the horizon as “wavy” as it was today. The plan is to go overnight and get to the Berry Islands, check in there and stay a day or two, and then hop south to the Exumas.

Windy day!

Fortunately, we have met another boat also waiting to cross (Mike and Julie on Blue Train). They are also from Toronto, and even better, Mike grew up in the same neighborhood that I did, and his mother lived in the same retirement home as mine does. I love “small world” stories! So we are going to cross together, which is great, as they say, safety in numbers!

Unfortunately, we recently found out that our friends and buddy boat from last year, Bob and Sheila, have decided not to cross over to the Bahamas this year. They will explore the Florida Keys and west coast. We will miss their company!

So with laundry done, and provisions topped up, we are ready to go. Let’s hope tomorrow is a good day.

And so the adventure continues ... one day at a time!

There is always something!

Fort Pierce to Fort Lauderdale

It has been a busy few days (week?) since we last wrote.  We replaced the starter battery, finished getting the boat stocked, emptied the storage room, parked and covered my trusty Subaru. With the last day of the good weather we left the dock bright and early Friday morning and headed out to the Atlantic.  Seems crazy to have our first sail of the year (and in 8 months) in the Atlantic, but we knew that the seas would be calm and it was the only way to get to West Palm Beach without having to go under those nasty 65 foot fixed bridges. We had a lovely motor/sail, and even had a school of dolphins greet us as we came out of the Fort Pierce Inlet. A good omen!

We arrived in Lake Worth, which is a very popular anchorage for boats waiting to go across to the top of the Bahamas, or further down the Florida coast, and it was quite busy near the entrance when we arrived.  We found a lovely spot away from the crowded area, looking at a lovely mansion and its sailboat parked out in front. Not a bad view!

Our Lake Worth view

We were planning to do down the ICW (Intra Coastal Waterway) for the next section of the journey to Fort Lauderdale, as all the bridges between Lake Worth and Fort Lauderdale are bascule bridges, which open up from the middle and have no height restrictions. Or so we thought!

Bascule bridge

Hugh had been doing his usual research on the next day’s trip when he came across a comment on one of the sites saying something about there being a lift bridge at one of the bascule bridges (the third bridge down).  Further research did not support the social media comment, and there is nothing shown on the official nautical charts so we dismissed it as “bunk” and planned to leave the next morning at 8am and start the ride down, going through 22 bridges to get to Fort Lauderdale.

I was woken up at 5am by Hugh saying “we have a problem”. Turns out, it had been bothering him that someone had said something about a lift bridge, and after further searching, found that there really is a temporary lift bridge where they are replacing a bascule bridge. Now, for those of you who followed us last year, you might remember that our mast is 64’4” without instruments or antenna, and most ICW bridges are 65 ft at HIGH tide which gave us some room to go under at low tide. We called the bridge tender and she swore the lift bridge has a height of 65 ft at LOW tide We used our water bag three times last year to heel us over to make it under bridges that were too low and swore to each other we would never do it again. It’s too stressful and heart stopping! Now, with instruments back on top of the mast, we are about 65 1/2 feet high and were pretty sure we could not get under this bridge without heeling the boat.

Needless to say we did not leave, or sleep anymore that morning, but spent the rest of the morning discussing what to do. Should we go outside to Fort Lauderdale? That would mean waiting for a few days with big winds in the forecast. Should we just go over to West End, Bahamas like last year instead of our plan to cross to Bimini from Miami then down to the Exumas? Should we get the water bag out and do it one more time?

We decided we might as well enjoy West Palm Beach as we weren’t moving anywhere that day, so we lowered the dinghy and went over to the town dock and walked into town. The first thing we found was a huge “Green Farmers Market” with tons of stands selling food, crafts, flowers (beautiful orchid plants) and all sorts of environmentally friendly stuff. Great Fun! We even took a free trolley ride, thinking it would show us a bit of the town, which it did, but mostly it’s a free bus service for the local seniors! We had lunch in a cute little Italian place, then decided to take the dinghy and ride down to this lift bridge and assess it with our own eyes. The ride was a little wet, but not too far, and sure enough, there it was with all its glory, that damned lift bridge! We noticed that a sailboat was heading towards it and as they waited for it to go up we asked how tall their mast was. They replied it was 55 feet. So we watched them go under, and from where we were sitting it looked like they had quite a bit of space above their mast, but who could tell from the where we were sitting?

So we went back to Trekker and decided, with our hearts in our throats, that we would rig the water bag up and heel over to go under the bridge. Again. It’s actually crazy that we still had the bag on board, as it was in the storage locker and we were going to leave it in the car since we wouldn’t need it, but Hugh decided at the last minute to take it. Who knew we would need it so soon! We decided to go under at low tide, giving us as much clearance as possible, plus we spoke with Hugh’s brother Adrian, who said he thought that they are saying that the height is at low tide to give themselves a little wiggle room. They certainly don’t want any masts hitting it as it is a temporary structure. Finally, Hugh called the Coast Guard and they said they would never have approved a bridge lower than 65’ above high water … who to believe??

We left just before low tide, giving us lots of time to get through the first couple of bridges, then get the bag ready, fill it and go! As we got through the first bridge I heard someone on the radio call for an opening of the lift bridge, to which they were told there were mechanical problems and it couldn’t be lifted. WHAT?? I called the bridge and confirmed it was not working, but she would call me as soon as it was. How long? No idea. So, we decided to anchor and go tomorrow. But just as we were finished anchoring she called to say it was working. We looked at each other and Hugh thought it would be better to go tomorrow, but honestly, I just wanted to get it done and over with. So, we got the anchor up and headed towards it. With hearts pounding, and of course the wind blowing, we got the bag filled and headed towards the bridge. Honestly, I cannot tell you how close we were, but I did not hear the antenna hit the bridge, so we must have had at least a few inches to spare! (my heart is pounding while I write this!!) We quickly got the bag aboard and headed through a couple of more bridges to an anchorage that we had read about at Lantana. We were quite happy to put the anchor down and celebrate another bridge heeling success with a beer! We swear we will never do it again, but …

The next morning, we headed down the ICW through 17 more bridges, enjoying every moment of it. The houses (I should say mansions) along the canal are unbelievable. We even went by a family of Manatees as we cruised down. It was all very relaxing and enjoyable. 

We arrived in Fort Lauderdale and are now sitting at the dock waiting out the heavy winds that came through last night, and are probably going to be here all week. 

Trekker sandwiched between a big cat and power boat

We really hadn’t planned on being here that long, but it could be worse. The weather is lovely (a bit windy), we are tied to a dock, the beach is two blocks away, and there is lots to do in Lauderdale.

Of course, being a boat, there is another battery issue with our house bank, but we are in a good place to have work done. I will leave that story for Hugh once we know what is happening.

The adventure continues … one day at a time!

Preparing to go sailing!

Fort Pierce

First thing we had to do before we could check on Trekker was go buy a ladder.  All our neighbors had very inconsiderately  locked theirs up (as opposed to the spring when were able to borrow one)!  Having made a run to Home Depot to buy the ladder, roller handles, rollers,  brushes, gloves and other painting supplies we were able to climb aboard. Turning the key in the companion way lock I wondered,  what we would find, mould, mildew, bugs, animals?  As I pushed the hatch forward and climbed down it smelled – fresh – woo hoo! Closer examination was consistent with the odour, no sign of any foreign substances! Thanks to Cap'n Ron Hawn who kept an eye on her over the summer,  replacing 5 Damp-Rid bags each visit.
Over the summer Johhny  B Good washed and waxed the deck and stainless a couple of times and just before we arrived they cleaned and buffed the top sides, and she looked great! The only disappointment was the nearly black teak that, as we later determined, was very dirty. Guess they don't clean teak.  Apparently ash floats over the marina during controlled burns inland.
After checking on Trekker we checked into our condo for the week. 
Sunday we drove down to North Palm to have lunch with my brother Adrian and his wife Mary, to pick up our bottom paint and to do our first shop – at Costco. We bought a “boatload” of meat that we would later divide into servings, vacuum seal and freeze.
Next day, dressed in our work clothes, we headed back to the marina, and primed with coffee, took on the task of applying the first coat of bottom paint.  Two hours later we had it on, and were splattered in paint and hurting!  

Most of the paint went on the bottom!

After showers and lunch we headed up to the storage unit to bring our first load back to Trekker. And so it went, a second coat of bottom paint, trips to the storage locker, dinners in, dinners out, including $6.99 burgers and trivia night at the Second Street Bistro!  Interspersed with putting the boat together Karen slowly knocked off her grocery list, $xxx at Costco, $xxx at Walmart and $xxx at Publix, but we were able to rationalize the cost because we were buying for four months! 

Trekker ready to go 

We launched Thursday and all was going well until the starting battery turned out to be dead.

Trekker splashing down 

 We knew it was low so we had plugged in in the yard but for some reason the starting battery was not charging. I’m still trouble shooting this problem.  Anyway, I boosted the starting battery from the house bank and she fired right up! The good news is the starting battery is charging from the alternator. Off to the slip we went.
The next few days included more trips to the storage locker, moving aboard, stowing food wine and beer, putting sails up, going up the mast to replace the instruments and Windex, starting the Suzuki dinghy motor and Honda generator and generally making sure everything works and getting her ship shape.  

Freezer all stocked up!

Pretty well ready to go, we decided to replace the starting battery.  It's five years old and we figured better to do it in Florida than the Bahamas.  Of course it’s not your standard sized battery … and there are none in Florida, so after much Googling I found another brand that looks suspiciously similar with the same dimensions and ordered it from West Marine. Hopefully it'll arrive tomorrow. 
Plans are to take out the old battery, install the new, make the final run to the storage room for stuff that will stay in the car, visit Customs and Border Protection to recover our registration and get our permission to proceed and then leave bright and early Thursday for Lake Worth. From there we’re planning to go down the ICW to Fort Lauderdale.  Regular readers will no doubt think “what about the bridges" but amazingly all the bridges between Lake Worth and Ft. Lauderdale are bascule, meaning that they split in the centre and pivot up out of the way.  We're looking forward to the sight seeing! We are planning on meeting up with our boat buddies, Bob and Sheila,  either in Miami area or Bimini, Bahamas. Mother Nature will determine when!

Here we go again!

It is hard to believe that we are on our way south to get back on Trekker and out sailing again. The summer started off pretty slowly ... "Boatless and Bored" we called ourselves. We did our best to bum off as many friends as we could, including racing 5.5 Metre keelboats in Midland and visiting cottages up in the French River, Georgian Bay and Haliburton. We became quite the cinema aficionados, frequenting our little indie theater and seeing many of the TIFF movies for a third of the price. One of our goals was to find as many local independent coffee shops as we could and the Kitchener Public Library coffee lounge become one of our favorites. We also joined the Conestoga Sailing Club and did a few races.

But most exciting was our decision to move from Kitchener to Midland. We have been talking about moving to Midland for many years, as we have spent many, many summers up there boating, and have made a great group of friends from the sailing community.  Friends showed us a vacant lot that was for sale by a custom home builder, and long story short, we are building a home we have designed and will be moving next fall. It will be very busy once we get home from this trip, picking everything out for the house!

As fall came we knew that we needed to start preparing for our trip on the boat, but somehow we managed to avoid most of the prepping until the last few weeks.  Of course preparing our home for Christmas took up time.... shopping, baking, decorating ... I was definitely going to make up for missing Christmas last year!  Both of the kids came home for Christmas, they really didn't have much of a choice in the matter!! It was a wonderful time with family and friends.

Hugh bought spares for the boat and painted the propeller. We have a cupboard in the basement that is designated "the boat cupboard", and anytime we buy something "for the boat" it gets shoved in there and forgotten about. So our first job was to go through the cupboard and see exactly what we had collected.  I made a list  of things I needed to take back when we left the boat last spring, and slowly the list was checked off.  Unfortunately the list wasn't as complete as I'd hoped!  Trying to remember what we had brought home and what we left was a bit of a challenge. Did we bring home the towels? Pillows? Napkins?  What clothes should we bring this time? Definitely not as many as last year, as we went through three seasons and had lots of clothes and coats for each season. This year will be mostly warm temperatures, but I do remember it being cooler in January. Shoes, sandals, hats, bathing suits, sweatshirts and jackets ... all very necessary wardrobe items. 

Following Christmas we started making piles in the den of boxes and bags. I collected a few food items from home, including spices and dry goods already in my tupperware containers. I also bought a few food items that we aren't able to get in the States.  Games, card sets, cookbooks, and items from the drugstore such as shampoo and soaps, toiletries and medications, all went into the pile. On January 1st Hugh began packing up the car so we would be ready to leave bright and early the next morning. Everything fit in very nicely, and we were quite proud of ourselves at our great packing job, until we started looking around, and checked lists, and realized we had forgotten a few things. I don't think we could have fit another thing into that poor car!!  

We left January 2nd and took a two night side trip to Amelia Island, which is located at the very top of Florida, then arrived in Fort Pierce on January 5th and gave Trekker a big hug. We have rented a condo for a week while we put her back together. Those that followed us last year will remember that we emptied her into a storage locker, since this was the first year we had left her in the hot, humid Florida summer and had no idea what to expect. So now we have to do the reverse. We may rethink that idea in the spring!

The distance that took us 5 months to sail last year took us two days of driving this year! It is so awesome to watch the countryside slowly turn from browns to greens, and to begin seeing flowers, and palm trees. Every time we stopped for gas or a pit stop it was warmer and warmer. So nice! It was also fun recalling our trip down the U.S. coast as we drove past towns and ports that we had visited or sailed by.

Before she goes back into the water we need to paint the bottom of the boat. Once she is in the water we can load her up. Another big job that needs to be done is provisioning. We will be shopping for four months worth of food, wine and beer. The challenge is finding where to put it all!!

This year we plan to sail down to Miami where we will hopefully meet up with our boat buddies from last year, Bob and Sheila, on Her Diamond, and head over to Bimini Island. We will then head over to the Exumas, which we loved. The hope is to visit anchorages and  islands along the way that we did not get to last year. We will make our way up to the Abacos before heading back to Florida where we will leave the boat again. 

So we hope that you will follow as we explore the Bahamas again. You never know what kind of adventure we will have!
Here we go again.....one day at a time!

Re-entry

It's been a little over a month since we put Trekker away for the summer, so I thought I would give a brief update.  

Our drive home in the mini-van was pretty awful due to the non-stop rain.  Unfortunately the lovely scenery through the Appalachians was obscured in fog and rain. Thank goodness the van was nearly new and the tires were in good shape! Crossing the border was fun ...our conversation with the unseen Border Officer went something like this: "citizenship?" ... "Canadian" ... "why are you driving a vehicle with Maryland plates?" ... "It's a rental" ... "You know you're not supposed to drive a US rental in Canada ... I could charge you duty on it ... where and when are you returning it?" ... "Buffalo - tomorrow or the next day" ... "where are you coming from?" ... "Florida" ... "Why do you have so much stuff in the vehicle" ... "We sailed our boat from Georgian Bay to the Bahamas and back to Florida where it is stored for the summer" ... "Really!?  That's awesome ... well make sure you bring the van back tomorrow and have a nice day" ... The story of the trip always wins them over!

Within a week of arriving home and settling in, it was like we had never left, and that the last 10 months had been a dream. Did we really travel that far on a boat?

So what have we done since we've been home?

• Taken a few trips into Toronto to see Karen's Mom and the rest of the family.

Karen, Trevor, Alyssa & Hugh

• Registered for House Sitters Canada - our byline is "Boatless and Bored". We've had one inquiry but we're still seeking that perfect match!
• Went to see the Rocky Horror Show at the Stratford Festival with our friends Bruce and Laurie.
• We went to the Mennonite Quilt Auction.

Mennonite Quilts

• Karen went to Collingwood for a weekend with her girlfriends Cindy, Laurie and Wendy, and her sister Janette.

Karen, Wendy, Janette, Laurie and Cindy

• Alyssa, Trevor and I went to Canada's Wonderland and rode the mega coasters Behemoth and Leviathan.   For those that have not been to Wonderland for a few years ... those coasters make the old ones look like kiddy rides ... thrilling!
• We joined Conestoga Sailing Club, where we used to sail our Albacore. Karen helped me take my Laser up there and helped set it up. We helped out at the club's open house taking a couple of folks for a sail and we believe encouraging them to take adult lessons.  We also took a club Wayfarer dinghy out for Wednesday night racing and recorded a 4th, 2nd and 1st out of 5 Wayfarers.  We were very pleased with it being our first race! The looks we got from the regular members were priceless ... who are these old folks??
• Karen went to Whitby for the weekend to visit with her friends Colleen and JoAnn.
• I sailed a club Wafarer in the Warm Water Regatta with a new sailor and had my first dip in Conestoga Lake ... it was a very gusty and shifty day!
• We bought an Audi S5 Sportback to replace my Subaru WRX.
• We had a retractable awning installed over our deck.

Our new awning!

• We ordered new carpet for the basement.
• We're going to Midland where I'm going to sail in the 5.5 meter North American Regatta (think mini America's Cup 12 meter), and Karen is going to help on the race committee.
• We've got tickets for a couple more shows, include Come From Away.
• I've completed a couple of 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles and am working on the third ... it's  addictive!
• We're trying to keep active, walking each day.

It's a bit depressing being home and not having a boat to sail on wonderful Georgian Bay. It's also interesting trying to slide back into life at home while all our friends and acquaintances have continued on with their lives while we were away, without us. They want to see us, and we are quite willing to  tell everybody about our great trip, but we don't want to go on too long for fear we are boring them!! Its a strange dilemma.

Anyways, we are slowly learning to live as retired people on land, not on a boat. Its a totally different lifestyle.

Th...Th...That's all for now folks!  We're counting down the days till we are back on Trekker ... one day at a time!

Our Journey Ends

West End to Fort Pierce

The saying "time flies when you are having fun" couldn't be more true as we end this amazing journey that we embarked on almost 10 months ago!
Our final leg was from West End, Old Bahama Bay Marina, across the gulf stream, to Fort Pierce. It's always a challenge to get the right weather window to cross the stream. All indications, including our free Weather Routing information, our own assessment, and other boaters in the marina pointed to crossing Friday. With the distance being 85 nm, about a 14 hour sail, we decided to leave at 4 am to ensure that we arrived during daylight, which is very important when making landfall at a new inlet and marina.
We had a couple of great relaxing days in West End, however, we never did donate our extra canned food to the church. It turned out to be too complicated to arrange customs approval.

Old Bahama Bay Marina and Resort

Friday morning arrived early, with the alarm going off at 3:15 am. Dressed, tea made, and lines removed, we were off the dock at 3:59 am! It was pretty dark, but the marina had good navigation lights to guide us out of the basin, and once out it was basically point the boat towards Fort Pierce and go! Which is what we did. The sail started off great, however the wind (but not the waves) slowly died, so it ended up being a  pretty sloppy ride over. We arrived at Harbortown Marina at about 5 pm, and were quite happy to be tied up to the dock. We had  a beer and dinner at the marina restaurant to celebrate successful completion of our last leg!

Back in Florida!

Saturday was organization day. After Hugh picked up the rental van (yup ... a minivan!) we started loading it up with some of the food and clothes we had packed up, then checked into the condo that we rented for the week while we put the boat away. Next we found a storage unit for all the contents of the boat. We also visited Customs and Border Patrol for a "face-to-face" interview, as directed when we reported our arrival.
Sunday we started clearing out the boat and "summerizing" her for staying in hot, humid Florida for eight months. I will not bore you with all the details, but I will tell you that we have worked our butts off  for the last week, transferring the boat's contents to the van and then to the storage room, cleaning, purging, and doing maintenance on the engine, generator, outboard motor and dinghy. Removing all the sails and canvas was also a big job which needed to be done with little wind so we could fold everything up.

Naked Trekker without her sails and canvas

The boat was scheduled to haul out on Thursday at noon, and with minutes to spare, we were ready!
She came out without a hitch, with the able marina crew deftly manovering her into the slings and then slowly moving her over to the spot where she will sit until our return.

Trekker moving to her summer spot

It feels very surreal to be off the boat and have her packed away. The last ten months have been an amazing time, and we are both very proud of how much we have accomplished. According to Hugh's brother Adrian, who was our "go-to adviser and all around wealth of boating knowledge", we are now officially "seasoned cruisers"!

Here are a few of my observations from the trip:

I am braver than I thought I would be. This trip challenged me, and at times I wasn't sure if I would be able to continue.  Ultimately I was determined to finish what I had started. I'm so glad I did!

Boaters are amazing people. Friendly, helpful and always willing to share stories and information. We have learned a lot from other boaters. In particular we were very fortunate to meet Bob and Sheila on Her Diamond and Bill and Michael on Aquila and develop lasting friendships!

Trekker is an amazing boat. She sailed like a dream and never let us down. I guess that is one of the advantages of having a newer boat. She also has an amazing Captain!

We are so glad that we took our time and did not go with a "schedule". We saw so many interesting places along the U.S. coastline, and in the Bahamas. It is a big world with so much to discover!

Life is really nice when you slow down and enjoy it. The Bahamas had such a laid back feeling that is was hard not to "go with the flow".  

For almost ten months we barely saw, read or heard about current events. You'd be surprised how that reduces your stress level!!   

We live in a truly amazing world. With internet, data and cell phones I rarely felt far from home. Thank you to our family and friends for keeping in touch throughout our trip.

We would like to thank all our blog followers for coming along with us on our journey. Your words of encouragement and advice were always gratefully accepted. We hope you enjoyed the ride!!

We're looking forward to enjoying all that Ontario has to offer in the summer and fall, without a boat. We will be back to enjoy next winter on Trekker ... one day at a time.

It's been a blast!

Marsh Harbour to West End

After seeing Trevor and Kate off Friday morning we went back to bed for a couple of hours. The plan was to do laundry and then head over to Orchid Bay Marina around mid day, near high tide.  It appears many cruisers are much earlier risers than us because when we got to the laundry machines we were fourth in line! Changing plans, we decided to leave for Orchid Bay Marina.  Our timing leaving the marina wasn't the best, backing out in front of the small ferry that runs over to Hope Town. Ooops. Anyway the ferry courteously backed down and let me by, however I went the shallow side of him and saw 1.7m on the depth sounder.  We draw 1.72m so I guess we cleaned the bottom of the keel!  Once clear of the many boats anchored in Marsh Harbour we raised sails and had a speedy sail back to Orchid Bay on Great Guana Cay.  On the way we contemplated carrying on through the renowned Whale Cay passage. We put out an "all stations" call on the VHF radio requesting a report on the conditions in in the Whale and received a report from a smaller trawler that the waves were very confused and that he wished that he had not transited.  We decided to stick with our plan to stay at Orchid Bay for the night and run the Whale Saturday when wind and waves were forecast to be less. At Great Guana we walked to Captain Kidd's beach restaurant for lunch only to find it closed.  Oh well, back to Orchid Bay where we both had chef salads at Sunseekers restaurant.  Fresh greens are something we don’t get as much of in the Bahamas, so the salads with house made mango poppyseed dressing were outstanding! Karen made banana chocolate chip muffins and I checked the impeller that pumps cooling water through the engine (looked like new after 500 running hours) in the afternoon. Dinner on board and a game of rummy cube closed out the day.
Saturday morning we filled the diesel tank and headed for the Whale around 0900.  We heard a couple of favorable reports on the way, which turned out to be very accurate.  We had about 1 m swells spaced well apart with small wavelets on top.  The wind was kind enough to fill in part way through so we were able to turn off the engine and took off up the Sea of Abaco averaging 7 to 8 knots!  The joy of sailing with translucent turquoise water rushing by the boat is probably the hardest thing to describe to those that have not experienced it. Those that have know what I’m talking about!  After an absolutely perfect day we arrived at Spanish Cay an hour earlier than expected! Up at the bar the Masters golf tournament was on, so in the interest of beginning our assimilation back into our “normal” world we had a couple of beers and watched!
Sunday the forecast was for westerly winds, which is the direction we are going now, so we decided to sit it out, me watching the Bahrain Formula 1 Grand Prix and Karen chilling in the morning. In the afternoon we took a walk to the beach, watched the final round of the Masters and had an outstanding meal of blackened grouper at the restaurant. For most of the day we were the only ones in the marina!
Monday had forecast southerlies and Tuesday Southwesterlies (the direction we have to go for the last leg of our trip to West End Grand Bahama Island) so we decided to get as far as we could Monday, which turned out to be Mangrove Cay, a 60 nautical mile day.  We were very lucky with the winds, only motoring for 20 minutes when the wind disappeared under a black cloud.  We also came across a patch of very light coloured water which normally means shallow water on the cruising guide's suggested route, so decided to change course and tack around it.  Better safe than high and dry on the Little Bahama Bank! Arriving at Mangrove Cay at 1700 hours we joined 6 other boats also staged for their next legs. We were really hoping for a nice sunset but as the sun dropped we realized that there were clouds on the horizon … oh well, a dramatic sunset anyway.

Sun setting at Mangrove Cay

While the forecast had been for the winds to drop and shift to the west, they continued in the high teens out of the southwest through dinner and the 1st episode of the second season of House of Cards  (poor Zoe!).  We have been using an anchor alarm called SailGrib AA which lets you estimate where the anchor was dropped AFTER the anchor is set (because we never remember to set the alarm as we are dropping the anchor).  It shows the track of the boat swinging in orange.  You can see from the pic below that sometime overnight the wind did shift, as evidenced by the two blobs of orange.  

Trekker's track overnight at Mangrove Cay

We rolled out of bed to find only two other boats left in the anchorage. Based on the radio chatter we heard Monday, we think most of them left around midnight to travel straight to Fort Pierce, Florida. Looking like the wind was actually more northerly than westerly we raised anchor and left, hoping for a leisurely sail while we had breakfast. But is was not to be. Once out from behind Mangrove Cay the very light breeze was on the nose.  Motoring with the main up to give us a little push, we headed for the Indian Cut which, those of you that have been following the blog may remember, is where we saw 1.7m depth (our draft) on the way east.  Coming east I thought we were about 0.2 m above low water, so this time we planned on 0.3m above low water, meaning an arrival time of 13:19!

Trekker's shadow on the bottom of the Little Bahama Bank

Having motor sailed most of way and sailed for a short time we arrived at the cut at 13:19 (really!).  We passed through uneventfully seeing a minimum depth of 1.9 m this time.  

Trekker while under sail briefly to West End

We were tied up at Old Bahama Bay Resort and Marina by 14:45. 
Once connected to Wi-Fi all the emails came tumbling in including a free weather routing that I picked up at the US sailboat show in Annapolis.  Weather Routing Inc. thinks that Friday is the day to cross, which confirmed what we were thinking. So we're nearly done with the Bahamas.  We'll clean tomorrow and donate our excess canned goods to the St. Mary’s Church soup kitchen (once customs has given us approval).  Then it's across the gulf stream again to Fort Pierce and getting the boat ready to leave her for 8 months in the hot Florida weather. 
That'll be work … one day at a time!