Crossing

Our crossing was beautifully benign.  Soft wind flowing in the same direction as the gulf stream.  Minimal waves.  8.5 hours in the middle of the deep blue sea.  Daylight.

We traveled well south of our rhumb line until we hit the Current and then headed for the Lake Worth inlet with the Current.  Wow.  Over two hours at 7.5-8 knots, topping out at 8.9.  That'll clean the ol' barnacles off!

Back in the U.S. at Riviera Beach where we'll get a new or rebuilt alternator and other chores.
America is both convenient and disgusting.

Bahama parting shots

Bahamas are great and we learned to slow down.  Here's Kathleen doing one of her favorite activities, shell seeking on the beach.

This pretty much tells you where I was.

But I was also productive.  Kathleen found an unharvested conch shell on the beach, which means it doesn't have a hole punched in it.  They make great conch horns to blow at sunset once you saw the tip off and clean it up.  This is a gnarly old fella but makes a beautiful sound.

So we'll leave West End on Monday morning.

Not so fast!

If, dear reader, we have portrayed this voyage of Rosie as a sequence of umbrella drinks and white sandy beaches, we have seriously misled you.  Shit happens.  Almost every day!  We just deal with it.
Like the day before we are to leave for Florida we are notified that our credit card has been hacked and we have to get a new one.  They mailed it to Riviera Beach City Marina which we hope to get to someday.

We bid adieu to Lucaya and headed to Florida on Friday.  Said good-bye to Fabian, our dockmaster and friend.

Got an escort from the Bahamian Navy (NOT!)

Travelled about 1.5 hours and the alternator stopped charging the batteries.  I headed into shore so we could anchor.  I climbed down into the engine room with my trusty multi-meter to figure it out,  in some pretty rough seas, and immediately got seasick.  But couldn't find the problem so we motored into Knowles shipyard which was nearby.  They pulled the alternator, bench tested it and said it was fine.  They couldn't find the problem.  But as long as we had our generator to charge the batteries we could go on.  So we went to West End, the western tip of Grand Bahamas to wait for the next weather window which was Monday.  But on Saturday the generator wasn't pumping seawater.  So this morning I spent the day, my birthday, in the engine room again.  After many explorations I found a hunk of rubber from a previous impeller stuck in the outflow pipe.

And Wesley Eldred, the previous previous owner of Rosie, left her stocked with so many parts.  Of course we had a new impeller to put in.  Thank you Wesley.

Cabbages and Kings

The time has come the Walrus said...

A great weather window presents itself tomorrow for crossing the Gulf Stream.  We'll leave at 0400  and hope to be in Palm Beach for sundowners (that's Carib-speak for cocktail hour). 
We're ready.  Shipshape is us.  Everything lashed down.  The dinghy and kayak are on deck.  Mr Beemer is rarin' to go.  Water topped off.  Batteries ful.

We've enjoyed our time in the Bahamas.  Weather has been mostly great although constantly windy.  Last night we were dancing at the Taino Beach fish fry.

And there's the pool for Kathleen and the Tipsy Turtle for me.

Life is just so much easier in the States though.  So we're ready.  Our absentee ballots for Town Meeting/Primary will be at Riviera Beach for us.  And some new credit cards cuz ours were hacked.
And we'll start back-tracking familiar ground with planned R&R stops at Cumberland Island, Savannah and other cool places.  Stay tuned.  Much more to follow.

Dolphins

I don't like zoos or any animals held in captivity so people can make money.
There is a tourist attraction here called the Dolphin Experience.  For $85 you can watch the dolphins to tricks and then get in the water with them and scratch their backs or something.  We weren't going to do that.

But we discovered a "back door" to the place we could reach by dinghy.  Of course they are very friendly and curious.

I spent a lot of time with this guy.  He proved to be a very good listener.

I told him I would set them all free if I could.  When I stood up and said good-bye he raised out of the water and "squeeked" good-bye to me!

Today I learned that they're not really captives at all.  Their handlers/trainers lead them into the ocean all the time and they just follow the boat.  They parade them down the channel and they go back to their "home."  I guess three squares a day is worth a lot to a dolphin.

I love them.  They are so smart and so gentle.

Pump!

The seawater pump is installed!  I got my hands on it yesterday after 4 hours of Bahamian brokers, Customs and UPS agents.  Oh and $130 in fees.
Put it in this morning.

I decided to get the new pump because I had a consistent leak.  Could have ignored it but on examining the old pump I'm glad I didn't.  One aft seal was completely gone, exposing the bearings.  Losing the seawater pump in the gulf stream would not have been good.

We are good to go and getting anxious to get back on the...water.

Dorian

One doesn't get the magnitude of Dorian, the hurricane, where we are on Grand Bahama Island.  Yes, everyone's house was flooded and roofs were ripped off.  I hoped to help someone gut their house or hang some sheetrock. But yesterday I rode out to East End right next to Abaco with 3 young people who have a 501c3 doing relief work here called Hope Fleet.  They work with a local church.

The devastation was mind-boggling.

Recovery efforts now, after 6 months, are still focused on cleaning up the mess and leveling homes.  The busiest reconstruction sites were at 2 Baptist chuches with crews that were obviously American.  After some musing I realized that rebuilding a community had to start with restoring the gathering places.  Down here that's a church.

We stopped at the ferry dock connecting Abaco to GBI and talked to some folks. 

One woman had opened a little store/bar in the trunk of her car.  Potato chips and rum.

Most of the population of Abaco has been absorbed into the other islands by family or churches.  Those that are hanging on do not want to go on social services.  They have two big needs.  The first is roofing materials.  The second is to get their livelihood back which is fishing.  They need small boats/runabouts and outboards.

That's when I realized that we can be so much more helpful by raising money to get those fishermen back to work.  So I am developing a plan to raise money to buy one or two boats with motors.  In Maye will appeal to the Lake Champlain boating community and work through Hope Fleet.  Much better than hanging sheet rock, although that would make me feel good.

Seems that Grand Bahama houses were built with concrete while Marsh Harbor and Hope Town were mostly wood structures.

So life goes on here.  Seawater pump hasn't arrived and that's not surprising.  Still lots of work to do on the boat.  Kathleen got sick of this old tub and decided to buy a new one.