A Presidential Attack On Our Freedom

Gotcha! You thought this was going to be a political rant. Assume nothing.

The Presidential yacht Honey Fitz, commissioned in 1918 and in use by all presidents from that time through Nixon, is berthed in the marina where we're staying.

It has been fully restored and looks beautiful.

The current at this facility runs VERY strong. The captain was trying to get back into his slip. The cross current pushed him very close to the stern of s/v Freedom. (hence, The Attack) He backed off just in time and got pinned against the pilings by the 4 knot current.

After a LOT of wrestling, they managed to swing the bow around and bring it into the slip next to us. At slack tide, they'll move it back to their regular assigned slip. Some teak trim got scuffed up but otherwise no harm. 

You can see how much bigger she is compared to our Freedom. No way we could have fended off. We successfully dodged a Presidential incident. Someday I'll tell the story of my "run in" with the FBI.

We'll Never Surrender!

Here's one of the many big guns at Ft. Sumpter in Charleston, SC; site of the first shots of the Civil War.

What is out there threatening the fort these days?

Yea buddy, bring it on! We're ready!

We anchored off the SW side of the fort and dinghied in for a visit. Interesting history before, during and after the Civil War. During a 2 year siege there were as many as 600 cannon balls per day shot at the fort! We decided to hold our fire for now.

Rolling Up The Miles

Here is our trip odometer May 21st offshore of Georgia. Total nautical miles since leaving Michigan in September of 2011.

Halen

"Money can't buy you happiness. But it can buy you a yacht big enough to pull up right alongside it"

David Lee Roth
Musician

We bought a new "car"

Three months in the Bahamas really brought home the need for a first rate dinghy.   The dinghy acts as transportation from the boat at anchor to everywhere we want and need to go.  The new dinghy is a little longer, much wider, and has a higher bow to deflect spray. We had it shipped to Titusville for pick-up on our return from the Bahamas.  There were  concerns with how it would hang on the old davits, but it fits just fine.  We have had it out a few times and we love it.....it is a big improvement.  We put the old one on Craigs List and the first person interested happened to be berthed in the slip right next to us in Titusville.   So long Avon dinghy, thanks for your years of service!

Appalling Literacy Rate!

The rate of litaracy amoung the manatee population must be extremely low.  Posted signs state that boats are allowed a speed of 30 mph inside the channel and only about 5 mph outside the channel in the "manatee zone".   Yet, time and time again we found manatee right in the channels.  Maybe they need reading glasses?

Manatees

We are in Titusville, Florida home to many manatee.  The locals tell us that there used to be a fresh water spring in the area that dried up.  The manatee need fresh water to live.  We were washing the boat and the manatee came flocking to drink the fresh water run off.  Got some great pictures of the " so ugly they are cute" manatee.  It seems that they get as much fresh water as they need from the boating community.

Crossing Over

We had a great time in the Bahamas. We'll truly miss much about the place, especially the crystal clear waters. But it's time to get back to the land of cheap beer and cheap fuel!
Green Turtle Cay is the last major outpost in the Abacos heading north. It takes us 3 days to go around the north end of the Abacos and across the Gulf Stream to Florida. First stop was Foxtown, a small village with decent protection from most winds. Of course, the winds blew from the worst direction possible, but it was mild and acceptable. The second day we had the choice of going NE or SE around Great Sale Cay. Going north was longer but meant we could sail longer, so that's what we did, saving our limited fuel for the long Gulf Stream crossing. 10 other boats chose the SE route and motored all the way into wind and seas and only beat us to Mangrove Cay by one hour.
Mangrove is about 50 miles from anything in the Abacos so we were well away from city lights. We had a beautiful calm night, perfect for watching a lightening show 150 miles away just on the horizon. When we looked up, we could easily see the Milky Way among the "billions and billions" of stars. Chris saw at least a half dozen very bright shooting stars.

In order to make Fort Pierce Florida before dark, we needed to leave Mangrove Cay at midnight. So a dozen boats all upped anchor and headed west. The first pack took a more northwesterly route, I chose a due west route so that when I reached the Gulf Stream I would run northwest in the north flowing stream instead of crossing directly west and perpendicular to the 3 knot current. Once we were in the stream our speed went from 6 knots to over 8 knots. More fuel saving, and we reached Fort Pierce about the same time as the first group.
We phoned in to US Customs and amazingly, our pre-registration before leaving actually paid off. No need to go see 'the man', they cleared in us over the phone. So we headed to a good anchorage, dropped the hook around 6PM and zonked out. The plan was to get going the next day but we layed around to recuperate from the long, tiring & tedious crossing day.
So we've had 2 good, uneventful, relatively painless crossings!! I hope there isn't some Karma that will balance us out by giving us the crossing from hell someday in the future! With all the access to internet & short wave radio, we can get pretty good weather reporting.
So we're back in the USA and headed north...

As good as anything

"If a man must be obsessed by something, I suppose a boat is as good as anything, perhaps a bit better than most. A small sailing craft is not only beautiful, it is seductive and full of strange promise and the hint of trouble. If it happens to be an auxiliary cruising boat, it is without question the most compact and ingenious arrangement for living ever devised by the restless mind of man--a home that is stable without being stationary, shaped less like a box than like a fish or a girl, and in which the homeowner can remove his daily affairs as far from shore as he has the nerve to take them, close hauled or running free--parlor, bedroom, and bath, suspended and alive."

~E. B. White
Writer, Stuart Little, Charlotte's Web, etc; contributor to New Yorker and Harpers

Lovely Cruise

We had a lovely time in the Abacos.  Here is the sunset from last night at Mangrove Cay.  We learned to salute the sunset using the conch horn.

Creativity along the Way

There are some very creative Bahamians.  Take a look at some of the examples.

"Lookin Mighty Fine"

We've spent a fair amount of time with good friends Jane & Ben on Old Rosie. Old Rosie is a 'character' in the tune Fire Down Below by our ex boat neighbor Bob Seger. So I produced this short clip of Old Rosie for Jane & Ben.

Junkanoo and more!

Here are some pictures from the Island Roots Heritage Festival. Royal Bahamian Defense Force Marching Band, Junkanoo and Maypole Plaiting.  not pictured here is good food, good music and good friends. This was a wonderful way to finish our time here in the Abacos.  USA here we come!

Spouting Off

We are at Green Turtle Cay for the Island Roots Heritage Festival.  Two days of bands, contests, parades, Bahamian cooking, and arts and crafts of the Bahamas. The weather has brought wind and rain with enough clear skies to still enjoy the events.  Early Friday evening as we awaited the next musical act, we spotted a water spout forming and heading right for Black Sound where our boat was moored. We watched as it grew and hit land and turned into a tornado with swirling debris.  We headed to the local church to take cover.  When it was over we headed to the boat.   No damage!  The deck was covered in small bits of debris but the tornado never reached the sound.   Three homes were damaged on shore about 1/4 mile from us and a tree fell on a car.  We are told that tornados are VERY rare here.

Trails, hiking and beaches

Most of the islands here have protected anchorages away from the Atlantic.  You can dinghy ashore and hike to the ocean beach.  We have hiked many miles and seen some incredible beaches.  Below are just a few of the incredible pictures. 

By the time we get back to the dinghy the tide has gone out!  Yikes, below with the low tide our choice was to wait a couple hours or draaaag the heavy dinghy to the water.

She Sells Sea Shells by the Sea Shore

Here is a sampling of the many shells we have collected here in the Bahamas.

Which came first? The chicken or the leg?

Do you think this guy:

Knows about this guy?

Yea, that's a blue crab hauling a chicken leg off to dinner. He'll feed his family for a month! Meanwhile, the rooster is looking for a cane.

Under the Sea

My new camera works under water.  I tested it in shallow water for it's first trial.  We had panned on snorkeling the reef out in the Atlantic but just did not find a day that was calm enough.....something for us to look forward to for next year.  Love the white and clear fishies...look closely in the last two pictures.  Really...there are fish in the last two pics.

No Name Cay, Home of the Swimming Swine

This small island is uninhibited by humans but it does have a small population of wild pigs.  We saw four of them, one male and three female.   The locals leave buckets to collect rain water so that they have fresh water to drink, one of the pigs biggest concerns.  Food for the pigs is not as big a problem as they are fed by tourists and locals.  Do you think someone is training the big male to sit?  The picture below shows another cruiser feeding the male....he looks like a cute little pet in the picture.  In reality he is a little scary.  BIG teeth and he is very pushy and makes some scary sounding grunts.  The females all look skinny compared to him.  We fed them apples and lettuce scraps.  They liked the apples and would eat right out of my hand. 

Still Crazy

We enjoyed dining out with other cruisers at the Crazy Love Cafe, taking up 3 of the 5 tables. Prime rib night! We're singing "Crazy Love" by Van Morrison in the first pictures below.

The Wrecking Tree is a restaurant built around the original New Plymouth wrecking tree.  The wrecking crews, people going out to wrecks to salvage treasure and other goodies, would bring their bounty to this tree to divvy up the proceeds. We had the BEST cracked conch so far at the Wrecking Tree. Chatted with the cook after dinner. She said she gets smaller conch from the shallow Sea of Abaco instead of larger conch from the deeper Atlantic ocean and it makes a difference. Big difference, dinner was excellent.