Guana Cay and The Barefoot Man

For the St Patricks day weekend we HAD to go to The Barefoot Man concert.  He played at a restaurant on the beach on Guana Cay called Nippers.  You could sit at tables on the many outside decks, relax by the pool or enjoy the beach.....but pay attention to the lyrics.  You don't want to miss his classics, like "who the f#@k is Alice".

Hope Town Architecture

We love this quaint town and thought you might enjoy some more pictures.  The yellow shuttered building is the church.

Hope Town Beaches

Love the sugar beaches of the Bahamas.  Look at the sea foam washing the shore. Freedom looks good moored here.

Hope Town

The approach to Hope Town Harbor can be tricky at low tide.  They have range markers, lit with led rope lights on shore.  You find them at daylight next to the pink house and the white bench.  Hope Town is a charming town with a red and white striped lighthouse.  The lighthouse is lit with a kerosene lamp and Fresnel lens.  Very narrow streets, charming cottages, great shops and lots of cruisers. 

The Ocean is Swell

Tahiti beach faces out on the Sea of Abaco where it is nice and calm.   If you walk across the island to the Atlantic Ocean you can see the huge swells beginning to come in from a storm way out towards Bermuda.  The landscape changes as well.  The shore is rocky and at times looks like you are walking on the surface of the moon.  Filled with craggy rocks and craters.   The crashing sea was really something to see.  The sea spray climbed the cliff and the picture below gives a bit of an idea of the power of the mighty Atlantic.  We saw areas where the spray climbed 75 feet.

A Day in Tahiti.

The wind has been blowing for days and days.  We took a quick sail this morning through a narrow channel.  This area is too shallow to get to at low tide and we will have a super low tide today.  Most charts are marked with depths at mean low tide.  Today the depths will be lower than charted depths!  No problem, we will just need to transit the area at near high tide.  The prized anchorage is a place called Tahiti Beach.  It is prized because of it's beauty and because it is so well protected from the ocean.  We arrived and got anchor down and headed out on our dingy with friends Ben and Jane. We landed on TahitI Beach and explored the beautiful beach and sand bar (remember the extra low tide).  Lots of cool critters.  Royal Terns stood sentry along the sand bar.  A starfish and a conch were caught in a little tidal pool.  And we found a sea cucumber.

A Broad Reach.

We sailed, a broad reach, to Boat Harbor.  Nice day with 6-12 knots of  wind on the Sea of Abaco!

Hanging with the Canadians!

We have been hanging with a great group of people here at Treasure Cay Marina.  You heard about our lobster hunt, well Ben from Owen Sound was the only one to capture a prized "bug" and was gracious enough to share his prize......he felt it was a group effort.  Jane whipped up a fabulous lobster appetizer, pictured below........really yummy.   You can see us all on the Motor Sailer Old Rosie after our delicious repast.  We also spent pizza night with a crew of Canadians, see us below waiting for our pizzas to arrive at the Tipsy Seagull.  A fun time was had by all!

No bugs

We finally had a beautiful, clear, warm day to go lobster hunting.  The guys headed out in their wetsuits and the girls went looking for shells.  In total we got one bug (lobster) and lots of great shells.  We had a great time with good people and enjoyed the beautiful Bahamian waters.

Moon over Marsh Harbor

We enjoyed our stay in Marsh Harbor.  The full moon was spectacular,  even at sunrise, as you can see in the photo.  We finally got a chance to try the famous Bahamian coconut bread from Da Bes Yet  bakery....yum.  Also, a first for us, Rake n Scrape band with Brown Tip.  He cleans boat bottoms by day and entertains by night. Rake n Scrape is music with a saw and a grater. Wish I had his energy!  This little lizard joined us at the bar for happy hour.  We are now at Treasure Cay awaiting the Bahamian sunshine....its cold (61 degrees) and cloudy.

By the way, an update,  the Captain has fixed our generator and outboard dinghy engine (knock on wood). Great job, Bud jr.!

Holy Mackeral!

The weather has been unusual for Bahamas...lots of west winds.  On Monday we decided to head out the Whale passage to go south, an area with more choices for protection from west winds.  The passage can "rage" if the wind and sea conditions are just right (or just wrong).  Conditions were good so we headed out to sea and put out a lure...hopefully catch some dinner.  No luck outside but when we came in to the Sea of Abaco we switched to a smaller lure and......holy mackerel Ed caught a Spanish Mackeral!  Too small, we sent him back, but it was nice to finally catch one.   We are in Marsh Harbor...big town but only have internet at the restaurants and cafes.   TAke a look at the beautiful Marsh Harbor sunset.

Walking the beach.

We anchored off Manjack Cay Abacos and took the dinghy to a beautiful secluded beach. We were all alone...or where we?  This Eagle Ray joined us for our stroll.

Thar She Blows

We survived the storm of the Millennium, er Century, er Decade, er Year, er Month. Well, around here it was the storm of the week anyway. Strong fronts blow through here about every 10 days to 2 weeks during the winter. This one came through Sunday night. Why always in the black of night?
The wind was steady in the upper 30's with plenty of gusts over 40. nearby boats with instrument recorders reported gusts to 50. That's about what we saw when hiding from hurricane Sandy.
I cat napped maybe an hour overnight. The boat was swinging quite severely back and forth on the mooring pendents. Each time we reached the limit of swing to one side we'd heel over quite a bit and then snap back and swing the other way, repeating the process all night. It is amazing how loud the wind can be, add in all the creaking of the boat, the rigging and the groaning of the 2 mooring lines and it's amazing SOMEBODY was able to sleep through it all! Our mooring block is a 4' concrete cube tethered to a 1.5" piece of rope. Reportedly it held fine during hurricane Sandy this last fall which was quite severe here. But I couldn't be sure if there was any wear on the line or on any other lines of other moored boats. Doesn't appear there were any issues here. Radio chatter in the morning did have a few reports of anchored boats dragging.
We should get about 2 weeks before the next big front comes in from the north.
Today we'll drop the mooring and say goodby for now to Black Sound and Green Turtle Cay. It's a great place to stop and visit but we want to get going to something else. We'll head north a few miles to Manjack Cay and anchor there. Weather should be mild the next few days which will make for good fishing conditions close by.

V D 2013

It's Valentines Day here in New Plymouth Green Turtle Cay.

Time to don my traditional Valentines Day garb. A tradition started 26 years ago...

We spent the morning recuperating from a visit last evening to Miss Emily's Blue Bee bar, home of the Goombay Smash. Shared a few with new boat neighbors Bill & Linda from Annapolis. They were delish! (The drinks)

Chris made Blueberry Pecan Whole Wheat pancakes for breakfast. They were delish!

Sorry, no pix, too busy eating them up.

Later in the afternoon, we dinghied into town and walked around a bit, good exercise. We stopped at the Sundowner to watch the sunset and have a Kalik, the local Bahamian beer. They were delish.

 
Time for dinner at The Crazy Love Cafe...

Lobster & Shrimp Pasta, fried Grouper; delish. And a cocktail with dinner, another Bahamian specialty...

Fire In De Hole Erotic Rum!!! Guess what...............Delish!

Shared a table with Dave, Cathy & Gary from Baltimore; more cruisers. Having a great time in New Plymouth!

Happy Valentines Day!!

The Fix Is In!

We really rely on our dinghy. So getting the engine fixed was very important. We couldn't even raise the recommended outboard repair shop on the radio on Monday morning. We're getting a bit desperate.
Chris insists we try one guy we know is available. I think being readily available is a bad sign. Plus he has no parts inventory and I just do not have any confidence in this guy.
But Chris likes him, thinks he's handsome and charming. So what the heck, lets him give it a try. It's only money, right?

Here he is at work on the dinghy engine on the back deck of S/V Freedom

Here we can see him hard at work on the engine. We can also see why Chris was so enamored with him. Smart, funny, charming and damn good looking, eh?

AND, miracle of miracles, he fixed the dinghy engine!! It runs great! What a guy! Chris is sooo smart.

Maybe he can fix the Honda generator too!

Reality: I posted my problem to a few online forums. Got some good tips to check for fuel line leaks and that the float was level. I pulled the carb and noticed some wetness on the fuel lines. So there was some leaking at the fuel line connections. Pulled out some better hose clamps from my hose clamp inventory (plastic shoe box full of hose clamps) and changed the clamps. The float was sitting just a bit off level so I finessed it into a level position. Cleaned the needle valve again and blew compressed air through the needle seat.
The engine runs very good...for now. The long term prognosis is TBD.

Thankfully were we are, we do have open wifi we can use. It's very sporadic but like most things aboard, we make it work.

Threes

Chris says problems always come in threes. I hope so. Our third problem was easy to fix, the power plug for my laptop went bad. I have spare 12 volt plugs, so that was a quick fix. Problems one & two may be a bit more tricky. The Honda generator quit putting out A/C the day before we left Florida. I decided we can make do without it and maybe find a fix while in the Bahamas. Not great, but manageable. Problem two popped up yesterday. The outboard for our dinghy stalls after a minute of run time. Fouled plugs. I'm concerned about finding parts here. We NEED the dinghy so it has to get fixed. This might get tricky. There are outboard mechanics around here, but they don't specialize in Tohatsu. If they don't have parts for our motor, it could take a week or more to get them in. We think we'll leave Green Turtle and go to the larger town of Marsh Harbor where a bigger supply of parts should be available. I may also take a stab at fixing it myself. I'm soliciting some help on an outboard motor forum to see if I can garner any solid do-it-yourself tips. Internet access is intermittent which compounds the task of digging up information.
One thing we do know...rowing sucks!