Family Islands Regatta, George Town, April 24 to April 28, 2011

Boats arriving

We have been doing a few chores, cleaning the boat, etc. while waiting for the annual Regatta to begin here in George Town.  The weather, while warm, has not been very sunny, and we have had three days of off-and-on showers.  Also, we have not had much wind, certainly not enough to make the races exciting.  We went out to watch one of the races yesterday afternoon in the dinghy.  

Pulling up anchor and sails!!

The boats all start out at anchor with their sails down. So when they blast the starting gun, the crew lift anchor and hoist their sails, and away they go!  It is quite fun to watch the beautiful handmade boats all jockey for position.  We followed the lead boat in our dinghy for most of the race, but learned later that that particular boat, Rupert’s Legend, came in second.  Oh well…

And they're off!!

Rupert's Legend comes in second!!

We are leaving early tomorrow morning for a long run (85nm) as far north as Shroud Cay.  We have had a lot of fun here in George Town, and now it is time to start heading north. We spent last night playing cards with Dirk and Nancy, and we got together again for brunch this morning.  We will have to say goodbye today, and hope that we will meet again, either stateside, or back here in the Bahamas!!

George Town, Saturday April 23

Today is St. George’s Day (he is the patron saint of England  - actually reputed to be a Roman born in Syria!!!), so in honor of his saintship we are today flying both the British red ensign and the closest we have to the English St. George flag – actually the number 8 pennant.  Also, because of St. George, Irina allowed me to write the blog today for the first time since we left the US!!

Nearly an English St. George's flag!! (Number 8)

Red Ensign - Go UK!!

Leftover (till tomorrow) X cross buns

It is also Easter weekend – a big holiday here in Bahamas. Most shops etc are closed Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Monday. We got local hot cross buns – very tasty, though the crosses need some work!!

Tuesday the regatta begins – there must be 30 local stalls erected in town – probably all selling beer, rum and conch and the Bahamian racing sailboats have started arriving in port. We’ll post photos of the boats and the races next week. Suffice it to say at this time that they are only small dinghy-type boats with large sails and crews of ten or more, mostly hanging out over the side on a large board to balance the boat underway- more to come on that.

The other reason I get to write this blog is to tell the story of the dinghy collection. We now have 2 dinghies and a kayak on Auriga (actually off Auriga at this time)..

3 for the price of 1????

This story began March 3^rd when were at Warderick Wells but to protect the innocent and avoid alarming Irina’s parents unduly we delayed writing about it until now!!!

So there we were just beginning to lower our 700lb dinghy on a bright sunny day at Warderick, when without warning it suddenly dropped 20 ft into the sea upside down!!!

Oh shit!!!

The immediate concern was how to right the dinghy and avoid an environmental catastrophe (not quite the Exxon Valdez but 10 gallons of gasoline and a few pints of engine oil do not exactly help the Exuma national sealife park maintain its beauty!!

Anyway, after several nearby boaters saw the situation, we were helped to tow the upside down boat ashore and eventually to turn it right way up – it is very heavy and took several people to turn it over. Fortunately, there was hardly any spillage of gas or oil in this process. We then towed the dinghy back to Auriga and began to think about what had happened and what to do next.

It turned out that a stainless steel shackle (probably made in China!!) had snapped completely - it had obviously been corroding through for some time but looked normal from the outside. When the shackle broke it put a shock strain on our stainless steel lifting cable that then also snapped, dumping our boat in the water upside down.

Needless to say, even though the dinghy motor was not running at the time of immersion, it did not like the experience and refused to start, so we began a long process of cleaning, drying and fiddling to sort out the problem(s).

Anyway, after a couple of days with no obvious progress and no way to get ashore from our anchored boat, we began to think seriously about what to do next. Fortunately, our friends, John and Travis were scheduled to fly in from Boston via Ft. Lauderdale the following weekend for the Selene Rendezvous week. John, with the help of another friend, Capt. Rolf Taunton Rigby, in Lauderdale, purchased a new dinghy for us at West Marine and brought it with him on the small passenger plane to Staniel Cay. And, because I am so smart (!!!!), I already had a small 5HP 2-stroke outboard on Auriga (much to Irina’s amazement) and voila, once again we were mobile and able to get ashore.    

So then we had 2 dinghies – one working and one dead!! Incidentally, John also brought new shackles and cable with him, so we were able to repair the boom lift and winch the dead dinghy back on board. Once on board we continued fiddling with the engine. We changed the engine oil several times, changed the spark plugs, and continued drying the engine with WD40 and sunlight. Finally, it coughed and spluttered a few times. By this time, our friend Dirk from Tybee Time was really committed to making this engine run again. We disassembled the 3 carburetors and over the course of several days and multiple goes finally got the engine firing, though it still ran very poorly, especially at lower speed. The final step was to remove the carburetor jets completely to clean them (probably grains of sand in the jets) but only one jet would come out. Despite our best efforts and lots of carb cleaner fluid, there was no way to remove the other 2 jets. So finally we arrived in George Town where we were advised to contact Mr. Perry Brown, the local engine guru. 3 Days later we got our carbs back with removable jets. And 2 days later with Dirk’s help, the engine is now running better than ever!!! So now after 6 weeks, we are up and running once again.

In the meantime, we have grown quite used to having 2 dinghies – a very fast relatively dry dinghy and a shallow draft slower boat that we get in closer to shore, though we shall probably sell the new dinghy after we get back to Fall River. Next step with the big dinghy is to see if we can get some help in Lauderdale on the return trip, to stop the slow seepage leaks that necessitate pumping it up a bit every few days. It is 10 years old and the inflatable tubes are getting a bit tired --- as I am sure you all are of this long drawn out story!!!

Enough said, Irina will be back as usual next time with her “girly” non technical accounts of life in the sunny Bahamas – by the way we just found out that we missed naked volleyball last week, damn!! In the meantime, here is a very rare Bahamian rainbow. It even rains here once in blue moon.

Where is that crock of (pirate) gold??

Long Island and back to George Town, April 15 to April 19, 2011

Hog Cay

We left Thompson Bay and moved north along Long Island to Hog Cay.  We tucked into an incredible anchorage, just West of Hog Cay, in what was almost like a lagoon.  We had Hog Cay to our east and a series of coral and rock mini-islands to our West, and Galiot Cay to our North.  In this much protected setting, we spent three days of solitude, snorkeling and sunset watching!!  Hog Cay is a private island, but there was no one there.  However, the island was inhabited by a hundreds of goose-like birds and a pair of ospreys.  We spent many hours watching these birds.  We will try to find out what type of birds the “geese” are once we get on the internet.  

Geese at sunset

Osprey waiting for dinner...

High Tide...

Low tide

On Monday, we arrived back in George Town after a leisurely cruise.  We immediately re-connected with all our friends, including Dirk and Nancy on Tybee Time, Sharon and Wayne on My Sharona, John and Kathy on Mystic Moon, and Luc (with his two nieces) on Innu.  The last three boats are all Selene’s, and were with us on the Rendezvous. 

We went into town yesterday evening to hear the “rake and scrape” band playing at Eddie’s Edgewater Café.  They were excellent, and we danced to the great music.  The band had a great singer, who also played the saw (yes, it is really a large saw!!). 

We are now here through Easter, and will stay for the sailing regatta that starts on April 26 through the 30^th. We are planning a solid week of cleaning and tlc for the boat while we wait.  We will surely have some fun as well in between cleaning sessions!!  As you can see, we have all our toys out and ready for fun!  Our original dinghy, our kayak, and a new smaller dinghy…I wonder why we have a new dinghy….you will have to stay tuned for the next blog to read “The Dinghy Story”….!!

Which dinghy you want???

Long Island, April 10 to April 14, 2011

We arrived in Long Island on Sunday afternoon, after a sunny and gentle cruise from George Town.  Chris caught another barracuda, but we put him (her??) back in the sea. 

Our first anchorage in Long Island was at Grays Bight, where we went ashore to see the oldest Catholic church on the island, now in ruins.  We read different reports of its age, one said it was built in the 1500’s, the other in the 1700’s, but suffice to say it is really old!  It was quite small, and we wandered through the church itself and the grounds.  It had a lovely old bell tower, which was by far the most interesting feature of the church.

We then took our dinghy over to a “blue hole” that was not far from where we anchored.  It was quite visible, being an almost perfect circle of dark blue in the otherwise turquoise and much shallower water surrounding it.  Blue holes are sections of very deep water, sometimes more than 100 feet deep, surrounded by much shallower water.  The next day we moved to the anchorage in Thompson Bay where we rented a car for a day.  We traveled south to the deepest blue hole in the world, at almost 670 feet deep, Dean’s Blue Hole.  They were having a free-diving competition there over a few days.   Free diving is where the diver drops to depths of a few hundred feet with no breathing apparatus whatsoever!!   We watched a few of the competitors dive down this incredible chasm and compete for world and national records.  It was pretty amazing!

Dean's Blue Hole

Free dive competition platform

663 feet deep!!

We drove up and down this island which is about 80 miles long and only 4 miles wide at its widest point.  The island is famous for being one of the first places where Columbus made landfall, and there are many very old Catholic churches here that were built by the Spanish settlers who came after, though most have now been converted to Anglican churches.  

Old Catholic church in Clarence Town

Yesterday afternoon we trekked down an overgrown path to find one of the natural caves in the area.  We found it by using excellent tracking skills (!!), and it was quite impressive.  Apparently, these caves were used by the original people of the island, the Lucayans, and many artifacts have been found in the island caves. 

Light at the end of the tunnel...

 

 

 

Ancient Lucayan cave dweller!!

Last night we had dinner at the Club Thompson Bay.  We were the only ones in the restaurant, and were a bit apprehensive of our chances of getting a good meal, but boy were we in for a treat!  They put on an amazing show for us, starting us out with several huge local crab claws (fabulous), followed by the best cracked conch we have had, and fried snapper.  YUM!

Last night, as we were returning to the boat after dinner, we saw two Selene’s coming in to anchor alongside us.  It was Wayne and Sharon from MySharona, as well as John and Kathy on Mystic Moon, both boats who were with us on the rendezvous!  They are on their way back to George Town, so we will plan to catch up with them back there. 

We are thinking now seriously of staying in George Town until after Easter for the annual sailing regatta,  apparently one of George Town’s biggest annual events.  We will think carefully about this over rum drinks and let you know what we decide!! But first, Chris has to get down and dirty in the engine room. Time to change the generator oil and filter, and freshen up the watermaker RO prefilters!! A sailorman’s work is never done!!

George Town, Saturday, April 9, 2011

We have been relaxing and having a great time in George Town.  We are anchored off of a large island to the east of George Town, called Stocking Island.  On the highest point of the island, there is a large concrete monument, hence the name “Monument Beach” of the anchorage.  On Thursday, we climbed up to the top with our friends Dirk and Nancy, and took some amazing photos.  We had a swim at the end of the hike.  The water temperature at the beach was about 82 degrees!  

At the Monument

View from the top of the hill

Turquoise water

We have been to town to check out the groceries, and also had the great experience of getting our propane tank filled, Bahamas style!  The propane truck comes once a week to town and all the boaters that need propane come into town to get filled up.  Everyone lines up their tanks as they arrive, and this made for some pretty funny photos…

What a collection!!

Waiting in line

Friday night we went to the local hot spot called the Two Turtles Bar.  They had a barbecue, and a live band.  The band was great, and played a lot of Bob Marley tunes.  We danced and partied until late, and had a beautiful dinghy ride back to the boat.

Yesterday I went for another hike with Barb and Steve and their dog Molly, a beautiful chocolate lab.  They were with us in the Selene Rendezvous on their boat Maerin. 

Tomorrow we will head out to Long Island, a 35 mile run southeast of George Town.  We will probably stay there for about a week, and perhaps rent a car.  We will most likely return to George Town before starting our trek North toward Nassau and the Abaco.

Look at those smiles!

George Town, Sunday, April 3 to April 6, 2011

Sunset at Lee Stocking Island

movie star iguana!!

Well, here we are!  The farthest south!!  To be precise, we are at latitude 75.46 West and longitude 23.315 North, just slightly north of the Tropic of cancer (23.30N). Our next move south to Long Island will cross the line!!  Pretty exciting!

We traveled down from the Exuma Land and Sea Park back to Blackpoint.  From there, we moved onto the Perry Institute for Marine Research on Lee Stocking Island.  We spent a couple of days there, hiking the island, and attending a tour of the research facility.  Woods Hole it is not, alas. At one point, many years ago, while its founder was still alive, it seemed to thrive.  These days, it felt like the institute was in much need of some TLC, including some better advertising and funding!  A worthy cause, but also quite a challenging one.  We did see a very photogenic and vain iguana on Leaf Cay, who came running out to have his picture taken as soon as he saw Chris with the camera!!   In any case, we moved on from there to visit Barraterre and Rolleville, both on the way to George Town.    Chris did some fishing on this route, and caught two 3 foot long barracudas!!

business end of a barracuda!

We arrived finally in George Town, and immediately found many of our friends from the Selene rendezvous here.  We also reconnected with Dirk and Nancy, and have already had some fun playing cards and generally hanging out.

George Town is quite a small town, but Great Exuma Island, where George Town is based, is quite a large and happening place.  There are many businesses here, and quite a lot of new construction.  Some of the construction seems to be stalled, but it is truly a lovely place well worth visiting.  We have already spent a couple of days exploring, and will most likely stay here for a few more.  There are many boats here, and there is quite a community atmosphere.  There are volleyball games most afternoons, yoga, and other organized events. 

We are anchored just off a lovely beach, and have been taking our dinghy into George Town the last couple of days, though the winds have made it a pretty wet ride across the channel into town.  We are starting to think seriously about our next move, as we have about 6 weeks before we have to start heading back north.  We will think about it over a rum drink, and let you know!!

Our anchorage at Monument Beach near Georgetown