2024 April: Return to Florida

10 April 2024

Depart: Alice Town, Bimini, Bahamas anchorage 8:20

Arrive: Private Dock, Pompano Beach, FL 3:00

Distance: ~ 55 nm

Conditions: Choppy / Waves

Before we left the coast of Bimini, I took out my cell phone and took a few pictures. 

Sunrise over Bimini

Cruise Ship: "MSC Magnifica"
anchored off Bimini

As we prepared to leave, the waves were rolling in and we were seriously rocking. Clark reminded me that as soon as we got underway, we would have stabilization, so we got going! The sailboat in the picture below was rocking wildly from side to side. I thought maybe I could capture a picture of it tipped way over, but we were rocking too much ourselves for me to hang around to get the right picture.

Every day, except Sundays when no reports were given, Clark rose at 6:30 for the Chris Parker weather report. This was particularly of interest when determining when to cross open water to return to the states. He took copious notes on the conditions throughout each day.

Crossing options: Monday - Wednesday

Details for crossing on 10th April

Any day the wind has a northerly component is a bad day to cross as the wind fights the Gulf Stream and the waves become short and steep. Although it showed waves and strong winds for Wednesday, we had SE winds pushing us, so not so bad as it may sound.

To make the voyage back to the states, we had to take the flow of the Gulf Stream into consideration. Crossing the Gulf Stream adds several knots of speed in a northerly direction. Crossing at the wrong heading will land a boat somewhere they had not planned to go. 

The charts below show two lines - a red one and a green one. The red line is the course heading. The green line is the actual direction of the boat (all factors considered).  Before we got well into the Gulf Stream, the two lines were in close proximity to each other. (Chart I) Once we were in the Gulf Stream (Chart II), the way we pointed the boat and the direction we actually traveled differed considerably. The boxed X on the black line marks our destination.

Chart I: 6 hours of travel time remaining

Chart II: a little less than 
5 hours of travel time remaining

The boxed X on the chart marks our "waypoint". Typically, for a straight run such as this, we would set the chart plotter to "track" a course to the waypoint. Today, however, we set the autopilot to maintain our more easterly course and let the Gulf Stream carry us to our destination.

After more than 6 hours crossing the Atlantic Ocean, we arrived at the Hillsboro Inlet near Pompano Beach exactly where we wanted to be. The ride into the inlet was a little wild as we rode the waves.

Hillsboro Inlet up ahead

Lighthouse in view

The waves crashed on the rocks of the jetty as we came in.

As we fought our way in the inlet, we saw a lot of people taking advantage of the windy conditions.

Wind surfing

Once we got in the inlet, the water settled down. Phew!

Looking back at the wind surfers

Sea Tow ready for anyone in trouble

As we looked out at the ocean, we saw a sailboat coming in the inlet. First the boat was heading towards us, then sideways, and finally pointing back out to sea. Clark thought perhaps they were in trouble, but it turned out that they decided to stop there (in the wild waves) to take their sail in.

Taking down the sail in rough waters

As we went through the inlet bridge, they were close on our tail  -- perhaps a bit too close for comfort. Once we turned onto the ICW, Clark waved them by us to get them off our stern. The port of call showed as London (I assume England).  They were clearly seasoned sailors in a hurry to get somewhere.

Hillsboro Inlet Lighthouse

Our friend's dock is close to the inlet. We transited the bridge at 2:30 and were tied up at our friend's dock at 3:00. 

View at our friend's house

With a sigh of relief we greeted our friends. The places we saw in the Bahamas were interesting but the trip was exhausting. Every day we had to think about where we could be or needed to be due to the weather. A couple of times, even when we did not move to a new town / island, we picked up and moved to a new anchoring spot because of a wind change or expected wind change that would be less protected or would put us in the shallows. We dragged anchor once when the anchorage was crowded and we were anchored on a down slope.

This is our second voyage to the Bahamas, and I kept asking myself (and Clark), while we were there, "Why do we keep picking years with "el Niño" to go over there!?

April 11, 12, 13, 14

Since we arrived in Pompano Beach on Wednesday, the 10th, we have not gotten up at 6:30.  We have not moved the boat. We have been chillin', and it's felt so very good to relax! Our most important decision each day has been what to have for dinner. 

I got caught up on laundry, added some groceries to the ship's stores, and even managed to run the vacuum cleaner through the boat. Clark and his friend Steve have been working on boat projects together. Steve had a boat the same model as ours in the past. A couple of times he has given Clark boat parts that he took from his boat as spares. 

This trip he gave us two old VHF radios the same model as our broken one at the lower helm. Our lower-helm VHF radio lost its ability to display the channel number. We only knew when we were on Ch 16 and could not in reality change to any other channel and know for sure that we were on the correct channel based on counting detents. 

A very good friend gave us his old VHF radio that had stopped working for him. Clark fixed that up and left it sitting on the lower-helm station, i.e. did not mount it for permanent use. We used that radio throughout our trip in the Bahamas as we could tune in the the Cruisers' Net when offered without having to go up to the upper helm. It also allowed us to have one radio on 68 or 72 for the net while the other was on 16.

The night Clark got the 2 radios from Steve, he was up until almost 2:30 in the morning cannibalizing the three VHF radios (Ours plus the two from Steve) and building himself one good, working radio. Clark said it was not an easy job to do. One might wonder why he bothered rebuilding a VHF radio from parts when a new one can readily be bought from West Marina. The answer is that the VHF is mounted in the wall. No other radio nicely fits in the same footprint of the wood panel and is also electrically plug and play for the power and NMEA networking connections for the GPS data.

(re)Mounted VHF Radio

Whenever we visit Steve, Clark and Steve alternate boat projects to work on. This trip Clark helped Steve set up his laptop with a GPS capability so that he can know where his boat is on the chart displayed on the computer. After a lot of thought and research, Clark came up with a simple solution that gives the computer GPS capability. They tested it by walking around the house, and the computer knew where they were. Eureka!

While here we visited a couple of stores that are not our "norm". Steve took us to Costco one day for food shopping. We do not have a membership and have not been in a Costco in over 20 years. It was a novel experience. 

He also took us to visit the Boat Owner's Warehouse (www.bow.com), which we were unfamiliar with. It is a nice alternative to West Marine. Clark wants one in central NJ now. We also visited a huge Ace Hardware while here, and Clark found the metric cap screw he needed to fix the windlass that broke. All told it has been a very productive few days.

I rate this "marina" 5 *s. The dock comes with rides to whatever stores we need to visit (and some we did not even know about), includes a courtesy car if needed, and best of all, it allows us to spend time with great friends.

We leave here tomorrow to start our trek north up the ICW.

2024 April: Back to Bimini

 9 April 2024

Depart: Great Harbour Cay Marina 7:30

Arrive: Alice Town, Bimini, Bahamas anchorage 5:50

Distance: ~ 60 nm

Conditions: Sunny, cool breeze, following seas

We targeted our departure to be some time between 7:30 and 8:00. Happily, we hit the 7:30 mark. It takes longer to get out of a marina than to pull up an anchor. Multiple lines, fenders and fender boards, and the power cord all need to be pulled in and stowed. The marina staff saw us getting ready to depart, so they took a final reading from the electric meter and gave us the bill for our stay. While I positioned our lines for quick release at departure, Clark went in and settled the bill. 

As we pulled away from the marina, I admired the interesting sky from the stern of the boat while stowing lines and fender boards.

Meanwhile, Clark took progressive pictures, from the upper helm, of the cut he needed to navigate to start our trip towards Bimini today.

Well hidden; black dent in the landscape

Opening up some

Starting to look like it might go somewhere

at last a visible opening

wide enough to traverse

Once through the cut, Clark took a picture looking back at the elusive waterway.

Looking back at the vanishing cut to the marina

Today, we traveled the Great Bahamas Bank. Clark pointed out that we had no 3 or 4-digit depth readings here. We also had the waterway to ourselves for the majority of the day. We neither saw nor heard any other boats for most of the day. 

With the chart plotter showing we had 7 + hours of travel with nothing but water to look at, Clark pulled out some CDs so we had music to listen to. As we got closer to the U.S., he found a couple of radio stations. One was in Spanish. The beat of the music was okay, but we did not understand any of the words! I spent most of the trip working on my Penny Press puzzle book. 

Eventually, a couple of boats showed up on AIS. Clark, of course, had to check them out to get the details. One was a freighter that created a great spray of water off the bow as it traveled.

"Emerald Express"

The other was a Carnival cruise ship leaving Bimini and heading for Jacksonville, Florida.

Carnival Elation Cruise Ship
856' long x 112' wide x 26.6' depth

When we started our trip on the Great Bahama Bank, Clark set a target "waypoint" at North Rock. The chart plotter said it would be more than 7 hours to our waypoint. We finally arrived here at 5:00 p.m.

North Rock

We still had about 45 minutes of travel, another 6 nm, to go before we could drop anchor for the night. Coming into the anchorage, we could see several sailboats already anchored here close to shore. Even close to shore we have rocking going on. We are not getting quite the protection from waves that Clark had hoped for.

Our view from the bow as we dropped anchor was of Alice Town, Bimini.

As we sat down to dinner, the sky decided to give us a show for sunset tonight.  A cloudy night generally makes for better sunset pictures.

2024 April: Bike tour Great Harbour Bahamas

 7 April 2024

Depart: Royal Island anchorage 8:05

Arrive: Great Harbour Marina, Berry Islands, Bahamas 4:45

Distance: ~ 75 nm

Conditions: Calm seas, sunny, cool breeze

Most of our travel today was over open water in the Northeast Providence and Northwest Providence Channels. The chart shows depths of 4 digits - as much as 9000 feet deep.

I took a couple of pictures of the anchorage before we left in the morning.

Exit from anchorage - between the islands

Marker on one side of entry

Marker on the other side of the entry to the 
anchorage

After that we had nothing worthy of picture-taking until around 3:30 when we approached Little Stirrup Cay, which appears to have taken over by a cruise ship company as their own playground in the Bahamas.

"Liberty of the Seas" (On left)
"Allure of the Seas" (On right)
Royal Caribbean Line

Perfect Day Amusements

"Allure of the Seas" cruise ship
Little Stirrup Cay

Our destination today was the Great Harbour Marina. We watched the clock as we traveled. The staff goes home at 5:00, and we were cutting it close to getting there beforehand. We arrived around 4:40! Tying to the fixed dock with a wide tide change proved challenging. While Clark was checking in at the front desk, the dockhand was trying to give me directions on how to tie up. I told him to wait and talk to the Captain as I knew Clark would just rearrange things afterwards anyway. By the time Clark was ready to deal with placing lines and fender boards, the staff had gone home, so we dealt with it ourselves to our liking.

Entry to access marina

Sign says 
"Great Harbour"

Looking back at narrow passage into marina
well-protected here

Dock at the marina

Clouds over the marina as we settle in for the night

8 April 2024

While on this trip, we have done walking tours and dinghy tours in the Bahamas. Today we did a bike tour of Great Harbour Cay. Clark had a small map of the island noting places to visit like the grocery market which he used to guide us on our tour. The island has rolling hills which were great on the way down! I had to walk small portions of some to get to the tops. 

Great Harbour Cay is part of
The Berry Islands

We saw lots of great views on the ride.

Bay of the Five Pirates

Power Plant, fuel dock and BTC cell Tower

Pretty blue homes in distance.
Sketchy-looking guard rail up close

Biking in the Bahamas

Anchorage just outside the bay

Clark had the map. I did not. I did not even have cell service to get a map online. Had Clark lost me along the way, I would still be trying to find my way back to the marina. For such a small island, I got very confused as we rode. It felt like we went in circles, and we probably did!

Ev with the Flag of The Bahamas

Small rock island

As I crested a hill and saw roosters and chickens ahead of me, all I could think was ...

"Why did the chicken cross the road?"

After a bit of looking around, we finally found an open food market. I decided to see if I could get some bread here. 

A&L General Store

Shopping here is a little different. Walking in the front door, we had to step around the pile of dirt and broom that sat ready to be sweep it out the door. The shelves have an interesting mix of items. I saw, among other things, Fruit Loops in mega size, packages of Canadian flour, and Irish chocolate chip cookies. You take what you can get and make do with what you find.

The store is tiny; the aisles compact; the choices few.

A local family was in line to pay in front of us. The 2-year old girl was an imp and adorable.

I bought a loaf of bread, some crackers, and chocolate chip cookies. It totaled $17. I have become used to the cost of things being high compared to what I would pay in the states. We stuffed the food into Clark's backpack and continued our trip.

We skipped the part of the tour that would take us out to the airport. The restaurant out there said it was temporarily closed. We watched several cars go down that road and clouds of dust came up from the tires or even from a breeze that blew. Not wanting to choke on dust, we opted to travel elsewhere on our bikes.

We took a dead end that led us to a path down to the water. We dropped the bikes and walked over to take a look.

Nice views at the end of this road.

This was the cut we used to enter the bay

Looking out towards Bullocks Harbour

Looking in towards the marina and
the Bay of 5 Pirates

Finally, Clark decided we had seen all we could hope to see and headed back to the marina.  We got back around 11:00 and stowed the bicycles. I declared myself hungry at 11:30, so we went looking for lunch at the restaurant at the marina. Inside the restaurant is very small with only one table. We asked for menus, but instead of giving us a menu, she told us what she had to offer. 

Da Wharf

Outdoor Seating under Canopy

From the choices given, I opted for Grouper Fingers with Fries, and Clark chose the Grouper Burger.

The Grouper Burger turned out to be Grouper Fingers on a bun.  We took a seat at the outdoor tables where we had a lovely breeze while we waited for our food.  When it came, it was delicious!

Bahamas Placement showing 
the Islands of the Bahamas

I don't usually take pictures of my food, but I did today.

Grouper fingers and fries

After a very filling lunch, I came back to the boat to work on blog updates making use of the WIFI here at the marina. Clark added potable water to the water tank. 

The marina has two types of water -- one for washing down the boat which is free, brackish water and the other is metered, potable water. Clark borrowed a hose to wash the dinghy as he did not want to 

put that water down our drinking hose.

Later, while I continued to work on the blog, Clark talked with some folks on sailboats that he met over the VHF radio yesterday. We were able to observe the partial eclipse. Clark showed me the picture he had taken. He placed two polarized lenses over each other to protect his eyes.

Sun looks like a moon in center of picture.

We were told that we could sign up for a pot-luck dinner for 5:00 if we wished to participate. Having had a very filling lunch, we declined the offer.

Folks in far tent enjoying the pot-luck dinner.
Complimentary bicycles shown in foreground.