Experiences – Page 4 – Interested in Learning How to Find, Select and Eventually Live On Board Your Own Sailboat? You're in the Right Place….

Nassau / New Providence

After Bimini, we did an overnight to the West End of New Providence where Nassau is located. We anchored in West Bay and took a cab into Nassau to visit downtown. While we were there we moved to Palm Cay Marina on the east end of New Providence. While we were in the marina, we attended Junkanoo. Junkanoo is an annual festival that includes parades and other festivities around Boxing Day and New Year.

The origins of Junkanoo are shrouded in history. Some say the origin of Junkanoo is unknown. However, it can be traced back to West Africa. The most popular legend states that the name originated from John Canoe, an African tribal chief who demanded the right to celebrate with his people even after being brought to the West Indies in slavery, During pre -and post -slavery days, Christmas was the greatest time for celebration in the Bahamas, and Junkanoo was the highlight. This remains true today.

The Junkanoo floats are built and maintained by volunteer community groups in large warehouse style structures. The groups engender tremendous loyalty and have names like Valley Boys, Roots, One Family and Saxons. I’m not sure what the origin of these names are some are based on regions of the island and some are otherwise derived. The Valley Boys lost the Boxing Day Junkanoo parade contest but won the New Year Junkanoo contest. Junkanoo starts at midnight and goes until about 5am…..the contestants then take a break and come back around 7am and do the whole parade circuit again.

All the floats and costumes are hand made. Mostly they are made from cardboard and paper.

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Bimini, Bahamas…..aka The First Stop in Neverland

After we arrived in Bimini, we had enough time to enjoy the sights and people of this small and friendly island. There was a bit of a cold front pushing down so the winds kept us there for around a week…..

Kim managed to finish off a bottle of Four Roses that she had started about three or four weeks prior, just in time to donate it to the “Dolphin House”. This is a very unique structure run by a nice gentleman named Ashley Saunders. He has been building this (now three story) structure for about 24 years. He finds most of his building materials on the beaches and he also uses shells and other natural substances in his building process. And now he has a Four Roses bottle to add to the mix !!!

Here’s a link to his Facebook page …..

https://www.facebook.com/Dolphin-House-Bimini-132740360135441/

Ashley was kind enough to let us add our boat card to his wall !!!

We met some great cruisers while we were in Bimini too and shared a wonderful potluck Christmas dinner at the Marina !!!

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Bimini ….I was starting to call it Neverland

Because I thought we were never going to make it………

Kim, buying $2 conch…because you can’t get them that cheap counting your fuel and time if you go get them yourself !!!

She’s one shiny gal…..in the slip at Brown’s Marina, Bimini

The entrance to the “Compleat Angler Bar” formerly Hemingway’s home in Bimini Oct 1995

Same spot 22.3 years later…..and 15 years after the bar burned down….

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A guest writer for our blog

As many of you know, we are often graced with the company of our good friend Mike. In addition to being a good sailor, generally handy and a lot of fun, he likes to write. So, I proposed that Mike write a few articles for the blog and I told him they could be about anything he found interesting……so, from time to time we will be posting entries from Mike….some will be technical, some anecdotal and some with his own unique blend of views of the sailing life, philosophy, plus some comedy along the way……there may even be some illustrations to go along with some of these entries…….the names will be changed to protect the (innocent/unaware/clueless….haha)

So, without further ado, the first installment of what I guess we will call the “Life of Crewman Stoopid”….Or “Stoopid Crew Quarterly” or something like that…….maybe we should have a contest to name this storyline……???

—————————————————————————————————————————–

“Something’s wrong” the Admiral said to the captain. “Stoopid crew has been sitting on the deck for an hour looking at nothing.”

The captain looked up from his coffee, looked toward the bow at Stoopid crew, then back toward the Admiral. ” Looks normal to me” he said. ” No, it’s not” she said. “Go talk to him!”

Knowing that arguing with the Admiral when she had THAT tone in her voice was not only unlikely to be successful, but also potentially dangerous, the captain sighed, got up, and went forward to where Stoopid crew was sitting, staring out to sea.

“Everything ok?” the captain said, hoping against hope for a short affirmative reply. ” Well…”said Stoopid crew, and the captain’s heart sank- not from anything he was about to hear from Stoopid crew-but from the sure and certain knowledge of the smug look that would appear on the Admiral’s face as she was once again proven correct in her judgement and intuition. Well, he thought, she was The Admiral for a reason after all. ” Go on” he said to Stoopid crew,” what is it?”

Stoopid crew looked for a moment at the captain, and then resumed his stare seaward. “You know how we’ve been trying to get to the Bahamas for almost a month now, but every time we think we are ready, we break something else, or the weather turns bad?” ” Yeah” said the captain, who had silently been referring to the Bahamas as “never land” because he was beginning to think they would never actually land there, as it was usually the bad weather AND breaking something that actually was preventing them from leaving.

“Well” said Stoopid crew,” while we’ve been here, we had great times with good friends, fantastic meals and great music from bands. We’ve seen whole pods of dolphins, a huge manatee and sea turtles. Osprey and pelicans hunt for dinner right off the bow of the boat. We find crabs in our traps and fish in our nets and there is always cold beer”

The captain looked at Stoopid crew for a moment, reflecting that this was all true, but that he had never before heard this type of coherent thought from Stoopid crew, and said “so?”

And then it happened. Stoopid crew turned from his seaward gaze, looked directly at the captain with bright intelligent eyes, and said ” It really IS about the journey and not the destination isn’t it?” With that, Stoopid crew got up and began washing the deck, whistling a happy tune with what could only be called a contented smile on his face.

The captain looked at him for a moment, and then got up and made his way back to where the Admiral was anxiously awaiting his return . “Well ? Is he all right ?” she said. The captain looked at her for a moment, and then at Stoopid crew happily working away, and then back at her. “Yeah…yeah he is” the captain said. And then he picked up his coffee, and slowly turned his eyes to the sea, a small, yet contented smile slowly spreading across his face.

—————————————————————————————————————————–

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Things have been hectic….a glimpse of Matthew damage

Every once in a while Mother Nature comes along and reminds us that it’s her playground. We might be allowed to use it, but when the streetlights come on you’d better get inside…….

This was one of the “boat victims” of Matthew. The story was that she belonged to a local woman’s father and she inherited the boat. She anchored the boat out for Matthew and it broke loose. It collided with the lower section of one of the nearby bridges and then became grounded on some rocks. It’s a real shame and she is reportedly heartbroken over the loss. The sad irony is that for about $300 she could have had the boat hauled out of the water …..which is where it ended up anyway and will probably cost a LOT more than that in the long run.

On a happier note…here’s Kitty Hawk safe and sound in the yard ready for Matthew……

We were fortunate to have zero damage from the storm…..it was pretty stressful getting her out of the water, secured and evacuating in just 48 hours……that’s one of the big reasons there haven’t been any posts lately…..that put us a few weeks behind and we are prepping for the Bahamas….so stay tuned !!!!

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How do you know where you’re going? Or…..Guess what? You’re a Navigator too

We get this question ….A LOT….

“How do you know where you are or how to get where you want to go?”

The question makes complete sense. After all, most people are, at a minimum, accustomed to having at least a road map, road signs and street name signs. Add to that a Tom-Tom, Garmin or other turn by turn GPS, either hanging on their dash or in their phone. On top of that, whether they know it or not, they have had a subliminal geography course going on their entire life. Some people may not be able to find New Jersey on a map, but they can navigate their local area pretty reliably.

What most people don’t realize is that they use a form of marine navigation in their every day life….it’s commonly called Dead Reckoning or D/R for short. D/R is essentially estimating your position based upon your known direction of travel, your speed, the elapsed time and use that to determine a point between where you started and where you are headed. You didn’t know you were a Navigator, did you? Just imagine if someone put you in a car on I-75 (that runs North and South between Detroit and Miami). Pick any spot…assume a speed of 70mph and an lapsed time of 5 hours….where are you ? Ta-da !!! A D/R “fix” or estimated position (EP).

Many people, when they imagine marine navigation envision the use of a Sextant and some pretty complicated calculations based on the angles of the sun, moon or stars coupled with other fancy techniques. Frankly, the sun and stars aren’t always visible, so navigators need a method they can use reliably when they can’t see either, that’s where D/R comes in.

Take a look at the snapshot of the chart below. That’s an image of a “rhumbline” or direct course from an area South of Miami called Angel cut to Cat Cay (Cay is pronounced like “key”) in the Bahamas. That rhumbline is 48 miles long.

For the purpose of the example, let’s use our boat. Kitty Hawk averages about five knots per hour under power. If you average out the sailing speed, 5kts is also a safe number unless the wind really dies, at which point for this example we would fire up the diesel and still maintain 5kts. A knot is 1.152 miles per hour, much in the same way a nautical mile is equal to 1.1 statutory miles.

We will also assume, just to make things simpler and avoid calculating “tacking” (which is changing the course of the boat to take advantage of the direction of the wind) the boat, that the wind is coming out of the South at 10 knots. That means we could sail straight across our rhumbline course on a coinciding magnetic course, using our helm compass and autopilot to be sure we stay on that heading. A course is an intended route….a heading is the actual direction the boat ends up going based on current (like the Gulfstream), wind or other factors. In this scenario we would need to make a slight course adjustment to the south to stay on our rhumbline course due to the Gulf Stream that flows to the North in this area at about 1.5 to 3 knots. (That would be a dream crossing to the Bahamas by the way.) If we left Angel’s Cut at 7pm we could estimate our position on the rhumbline at any given time by multiplying the number of hours passed by our speed of 5kts and our ETA at Cat Cay would be ????

Drumroll please………….

If you said anything close to 9.5 hours later or around 4:30am….you’d be exactly right!!! Congrats !!! You’re a navigator !!!

Generally speaking, there are “road signs” out in the water as well. That way you have a visual confirmation of when you’ve arrived at your intended destination. While the U.S. has the best marked and best maintained system of waterway navigational aids, (called ATONs, as in Aid To Navigation, in the boating world) the Bahamas don’t do as bad a job as some countries. Most of these markers are colored (red or green) and numbered so you know when you are approaching the first or last in a line at an inlet, channel, or where you might be in a waterway. While Cat Cay doesn’t have any channel markers, you have to navigate this inlet by sight. In contrast, Bimini to the North, is marked by lighted red and green buoys numbered 1 for the green and 2 for the red. When numbered, Greens are odd and reds are even.

In this day and age, GPS and chart plotters have made navigation even simpler. Our chartplotter is capable of displaying our course, our speed though the water, speed over ground, heading and our position on a chart simultaneously. It’s always a good idea to have a non electronic backup method, and use it underway, in the event of a catastrophic failure though. That’s where D/R comes in to save the day.

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Random pics from along the way….

Here’s a cargo ship that passed us on the way into Cape Canaveral inlet…..

Me….either before or after removing something from the prop …..or before or after cleaning the bottom…..or before or after diving the anchor……sensing a theme anywhere ??

Mike and I checking depths around our potential route out of an anchorage in NC that turned out to be pretty shallow…..

Kim learns to surf…..well….sort of

Some shots of the bridge near Boot Key (Marathon)…..

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Key West Part Two….

Well, here’s part two…..as promised….sort of…haha. As I began to assemble the remaining photos of our weeks in Key West, I realized we didn’t have as many shots of us “partying” as I thought. Perhaps it’s a sign of our age, our recent change in lifestyle or maybe we just forget to be camera happy once we hit the happy hours ? Either way….I need to remember to get a few more shots once happy hour starts !! This post, while shorter on “party” than expected, still has a lot of new, never before seen stuff !!! ENJOY !!!

This scene above seemed a tad bit like overkill. We had an issue with our outboard engine “deadman” switch/ kill switch. We had contacted the Garrison Bight Marina to check on the availability of the parts to repair it. Since our outboard was originally purchased overseas, they couldn’t guarantee the part number they had in stock would fit. They offered to have their mechanic test fit both versions to make sure it was right. Since it was only a few more dollars to have them replace it and get a full warranty for labor, we decided to let them do the work while we had lunch at the Thai restaurant next door. I thought the mechanic would just walk down to the dock, but they opted for a full blown haulout of our 9′ dinghy, for which we also weren’t charged, but was fun to watch.

Me giving the fishhook to the guy that was hitting on Kim !!! (See a few photos down!)

A shot from Mallory Square at sunset….that might be the America 2.0 out there …..

Bar hopping !!!!

Me as....well....me in front of the Bimini Barrelhead Bar — Me as….well….me in front of the Bimini Barrelhead Bar….(a repeat but I like this one !!)

Happy Hour at Alonzo’s Oyster Bar ….our favorite

This guy is part of a semi permanent outdoor exhibit at the Key West Museum of Art and History on Front Street at the Old Customs House.

The Old Customs House, as it is known historically, opened in 1891. It currently houses the Key West Museum and History Center. It has been, and continues to be, one of the most striking structures in Key West. It somewhat reminds me of Music Hall in Cincinnati design-wise, despite their technically different styles and size difference. The photo above is the “Lunchbreak” a bronze statue by John Seward Johnson II. Johnson, an heir of the Johnson & Johnson talcum powder empire was, ironically, fired from J&J in 1962 by his uncle. That didn’t seem to affect him much financially. He is also a first cousin of the actor, Michael Douglas, on his mother’s side. Seward was initially a painter and turned to sculpture around 1968. His work has received a lot of criticism since many were simply sculptures based on impressionist paintings or iconic photographs and have been described as “kitschy”. I seem to recall reading an article somewhere that his larger sculptures were constructed by teams of fabricators under his direction, which may have generated some other criticism. Johnson was a diagnosed dyslexic and attended the Forman School which specializes in the education of people with Dyslexia.

These shots are actually the light house on Loggerhead Key west of Dry Tortugas and a nearby sunset, but I thought there were so nice I’d post them again…..

One of our neighbors in the Garrison Bight Mooring Field was a seaplane that would usually arrive on Monday, tie up to a small floating platform that was tied off to a mooring ball. It was met by a small powerboat that was either picking up or dropping off the passengers for the plane. It was pretty cool to watch him land and take off especially since the prevailing winds were regularly at least 15 from ENE to ESE or so.

This was beautiful moon view in the mooring field …..it only photographed so-so unfortunately…..

The Crew !!! In search of live music and happy hour

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Things we fixed (aka broke) along the way….

Things we fixed…..(the last few things on this list were more like upgrades)

Both heads (toilets)…..rebuilt the pumps, replaced the intake and output lines, replaced the water intake strainers, siphon breaks..rebuilt the forward head pump multiple times before finally replacing the entire housing…

Diesel—adjusted the Valve lash, oil changes, used high dose diesel cleaning solution treatment four times due to contamination of our injector pump…(this wasn’t an issue we caused, it was caused by a boat yards poor work in NC)

Patch the Genoa Sail sunbrella sacrificial cover

Racor filter / housing rebuild and filter change

Galley Faucet….this began to leak and reached a critical point while moored in Key West…..the faucet was so old that the owner of a plumbing supply warehouse, who was in the family business for 50 years said he hadn’t seen one of these in 35 or 40 years!!!

Galley Sink….at some point in our boat’s history….someone (possibly a sadist) used 3M 5200 to seal the sink to the countertop…..for those of you unfamiliar with 5200, it’s a great product for installing things you want to be bulletproof…..it’s not so great for something you might want to remove….ever……even employees at boatyards groan audibly when they learn they have to remove something installed with 5200….it has been nicknamed by some “death paste”. The upside is, since the edge of our sink was so severely damaged during removal, we had a custom single bowl sink fabricated and installed …..if anyone needs such a replacement let us know we have a great source for these sinks !!!

Drinking water inline filters (x3)

Aft head cold water faucet replacement

Power switch for VHF radio….which completely deteriorated and fell apart in my hand when we went to switch on the radio to check the weather in the Dry Tortugas…..

Zinc replacement x2

Remove lines from props ….five times….one with a crab trap on it….no bonus crabs though….

Tune up, recommission the diving air compressor and change the breathing air filter

Replace outboard prop and kill switch

Refrigerator coolant line unclogging

Replace Aft cabin fan….then replace defective blade….then fan died…again…ugh

Unclog Lazarette drains

Unclog sink drain x2

Fix aft head intake leaking seacock

Replace steering sheave and pins

Replace Hatch solar fans

Replace / upgrade anchor to a Mantus 85lb galvanized anchor

Upgrade Battery cables, install battery bank monitors, replace underrated/melted battery selector switch and install a main fuse for battery banks

Install new Wind instruments and displays

Painted the salon and V-berth interior

Repair salon sole soft spots

Shower stall refinish……

This all added up to about $12k for the year in boat upkeep….they say to anticipate 10% per year of your boat’s value for upkeep so we are a little high but fingers crossed that goes down next year……

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Key West…..Part One

When we arrived in Key West, after our overnight stay at Looe Key Reef,… (See that post here …. https://learntoliveaboard.com/2016/07/scenes-from-along-the-way-to-dry-tortugas-via-key-west/ ) we spent about 90 minutes navigating the entrance to Key West from the South. There was no shortage of small and large traffic including a departing cruise ship. We had called ahead and arranged for a mooring ball in the Garrison Bight Mooring Field.

We made our way around Fleming Key, which is the home of the U.S. Army Special Forces Undwerwater Training Center which is located at it’s north tip. The island also has a waste water treatment system and a Dolphin Training Center !! You do see a conspicuous number of dolphins cruising between the boats anchored on the west side of the island. There are A LOT of boats anchored on either side of the channel in the area between Key West proper and the channel on the west side. There are a great many people who find it cheaper to buy a boat and live at anchor than to rent an apartment or commute from the upper keys when working in Key West.

This was the first time we tried our tactic of picking up a mooring ball from the stern swim platform (Kim’s idea). I have to say, it worked really well and avoided all the extra stress and strain of leaning over the bow to snag the pennant. The bow of Kitty Hawk is about 5′ above the water line. Our initial concern was that the weight of the boat would make getting the pennant from the stern to the bow impractical. We used our “Grab-n-Go” (a special spring loaded, gated, stainless steel hook that attaches to an extendable boat hook) to grab the pennant and lead it forward to our lines. Here’s a diagram for anyone unfamiliar with a mooring ball….

The 2′ to 3′ white, floating ball, usually has a blue line running horizontally around it, is attached to the bottom by a piece of heavy chain. A steel rod or chain runs through the ball to the chain that leads to the bottom. At the top, is a steel loop or large eyebolt that attaches to the pennant. On the bottom of the body of water there might be a large concrete anchor or really anything heavy, sometimes there is a helix style pin screwed directly into the sea or lake bottom. The pennant is the (normally) yellow tether, usually a heavy nylon rope with a loop covered by chafe guard on the free end.

The mooring ball was about $300 for a month, as opposed to $1700 a month for a dock in Key West. If you plan to stay on a ball more than 17 days it is actually more affordable to just pay for a month on the ball. The downside is that the mooring field is a 15-20 minute (sometimes pretty wet) dinghy ride in to the city dock and about a mile walk to downtown. We didn’t find that too bad most days since we counted the walking as our exercise for the day.

We spent just over three weeks in Key West not counting our small break for our trip to Dry Tortugas.

Here’s some shots from Key West…..I took these with my iPhone 4S….I either need a new phone or a dedicated camera…..

Kim in front of the Kapok tree aka Ceiba Tree considered sacred by the Mayans

I would have liked to enlarge these remaining photos but the software for the blog seems to be wiping out the rest of the post every time I try to do so. Sorry…I’m afraid you’ll have to click on them to see greater detail…..

While we were in Key West the “America 2.0” was in port making daily sunset cruises and short local charters. She’s a model of the original Schooner America that won the first America’s Cup in 1851. She’s 105′ overall with 3600’sq of sail. She also has freestanding carbon fiber masts.

Kim with “shot cannon” at the entrance to Fort Zachary Taylor.

A cannon restored and mounted inside the fort.

There’s a pretty cool story about the restoration of the fort in Key West. Construction for the fort was begun in 1845. It was originally constructed by the army and used heavily in 1898 in the Spanish American War. In 1947 the fort was turned over to the U.S. Navy and was used for storage. It was basically a dumping ground and most of the historical parts of the fort were buried. In 1968 a local named Howard England recruited volunteers to excavate the fort walls and restore the cannons. It was discovered that the fort contained the largest number of Civil War Cannons anywhere. England invested ten years restoring the fort. Thanks to his efforts and his volunteers nicknamed “sandhogs” the fort went from abandoned dumping ground to tourist attraction with a beach covering 87 acres.

Some photos from around the fort ……