We don't get out much

Junkanoo parade

We're usually back on the boat before dark for dinner and bedtime. Cruising in remote areas where not much is going on helps promote that kind of behavior.

But here in the Abacos, there is a lot going on. Last Wednesday night, we went to rib night at the Jib Room in Marsh Harbour. The ribs were falling off the bone delicious and there was live music and limbo.

 

Then last Friday night we went to the Goombay Festival at the Sea Spray Marina. The full moon was big and orange while rising and then amazingly clear and bright. While the festival was going on, we got to see the Delta IV launch from Cape Canaveral in the distance. It was quite a sight and the live music and crowd made it even more memorable. The festival ended with a Junkanoo parade which features colorful costumes and a whole lot of noise/music.  The kids loved the parade but were certainly tired after a long day of snorkeling and the late night.

Desmond, who apparently has no bones to worry about. Only
his feet and ankles are touching the ground here.


Putting the kids to work

Now that they're 5 and 6, it's about time the kids started to pull their own weight around here. To that end, we are starting to give them some jobs on the boat.

Conrad helps lower the dinghy, puts in/pulls out the dingy plug when it rains, and bails out the water. Conrad has helped scrape growth off the bottom of the boat. Mark and Conrad take turns pushing the button to reset the location on the anchor alarm when we anchor (if they can pull themselves away from whatever argument they are having during the anchoring process itself when we are too busy to deal with them).

Mark and Conrad love cleaning the boat. They both set and help clear the table. Conrad also helps to sweep the boat and wash clothes. It's amazing what kids think is fun when you stick them on a boat all day.

Conrad caught this snapper. Dad helped reel it in.

Birthdays and bottoming out

Hope Town Lighthouse before the rains came.

On my (Jen's) birthday, we had an eventful day. They say bad things come in threes.

In the morning, we headed over the Sandy Cay to see whether the conditions were good for diving. It was too choppy and chilly so we anchored near a beach to have some lunch. As we were anchoring Matt said in his calm way, "We have a problem." The port engine was running but not doing anything to move the boat.  Luckily the anchor went down without issue and we went to investigate.  We had read stories about boats who's props had fallen off and had just gotten through resolving issues with the starboard side transmission, so we were fearing the worst as we opened the engine room hatch.  We quickly saw that the propeller shaft had decoupled from the port engine transmission.  Not good, but (relatively) easily fixable.  Matt spent the next hour or so re-bolting the shaft to the transmission- using locktite on the bolts to insure it didn't happen again. After that, we were good to go.

We headed back towards Hope Town and were having a great time with the brisk winds. A couple of times we saw 9 knots, which for us is pretty fast. We had a little friendly competition with Halcyon. This is Matt "winning".

Unfortunately, as we got closer to Hope Town we heard one noise (there are several of course) you don't ever want to hear on a boat. We had gotten too shallow and the boat momentarily scraped and bounced along the bottom. In hindsight, we realized that we had mistaken a poorly marked safe water buoy for a harbor channel marker. The shoal wasn't shown on the charts, though. 

Five minutes after finding the bottom we thought things were back to normal but then the jib started flapping wildly.  What now?  Spinning the winch offered no resistance and we saw the sheet had simply parted about 5 inches from where it was tied to the sail.  Fortunately, we were ready to bring the jib in anyway and we quickly furled it.  We're not certain why the sheet failed, but for now we reversed the line and retied it to the jib.  It came with the boat so we're not certain how old it is. We will probably have to replace it at some point.

 

After we anchored, Matt dove to assess the damage and found a chunk of missing resin from our keel that told us we must have hit some rock as well as sand. With it's shallow waters, this kind of thing is one of the main dangers you face in the clear waters in the Bahamas. Sigh. Hopefully this is a lesson learned that we will not repeat. Matt will be diving later to put in a temporary repair with epoxy until our next haul out. Fortunately, it is solid fiberglass down there, so no structural damage was done..

That evening we anchored near Hope Town and took a quick climb up the Hope Town lighthouse. It is a working lighthouse that is powered by kerosene.

 

 

That evening, as the rain started, we had a great dinner with Halcyon and dessert was a delicious chocolate birthday cake that Matt threw together in between repairs. Thanks Brit and Sandy!

 

Elbow Cay

Hope Town Fire and Rescue (volunteer)

Here are some shots near Elbow Cay (the island where scenic Hope Town resides), where we anchored for a couple nights. There seems to be no end to how much the boys can entertain themselves by digging at the beach. We plan to return to Elbow Cay Thursday for the Goombay festival.



If I can just ride far enough, I know there will be
ice cream at the end...

Brit kite boarding

 

Remoras like moldy pita bread

We worked our way towards Marsh Harbour with easy day sails. We bought some produce, met up with our friends Brit and Sandy on Halcyon, and have been having a great time hanging out with them. We did some diving at Man-O-War Cay and biked to Hope Town (they allow only a few cars on the island). There is a great sand bar at Baker's Rock near Hope Town where Brit has been having a great time kite boarding. I know Matt is itching to try it.

Here's a video of the kids feeding remoras off the back of the boat back in Little Harbour. We have had limited internet and expect that to continue.

 

Little Harbour

We moved up to the middle of Abaco island, which is the start of the 'real' cruising grounds. Behind the outer islands the Sea of Abaco is usually calm and serene, and packed full of anchorages to explore.  The trip up from Sandy Point took the full day. Again, our wind died so it took a couple (ermm, maybe 4) hours longer than we thought it would be, but we resisted the urge to crank up the engines and instead put up the spinnaker for the first time. At least it was all downwind and no one got sick, so we had that going for us.



All alone off Lynyard Cay. Everyone left when it got windy.

After a day off of Lynyard Cay getting swarmed by biblical amounts of flies after a brief rain, we are in Little Harbour now. At it's heart is Pete's Pub, a very charming art gallery and beach bar that serves fresh fish caught daily by one of the owners. The owners (now the third generation) also run Johnston Studios which produces some beautiful bronzes.  We saw them perform a bronze casting today, which seemed very old-timey and somewhat dangerous. 

Playing the ring hook game, the island version of bags.

We also went to one of the caves next to the anchorage. The Johnston family (of Pete's Pub and Gallery fame) apparently lived in the caves while Randolph (Pete's dad) was building their original home back in the 60's. The boys were disappointed that they didn't see any bats but liked being in their first cave.

Fix, fix, fix your boat...

The local club scene.  No cover charge.

Many of our mornings are spent doing school with the boys (Jen) and fixing the boat (Matt). Good thing we didn't buy a fixer upper. Here's Matt fixing those escape hatch corners that broke on the way over. He's sitting in the dinghy underneath the boat.

 

 

Before we left Ft. Lauderdale, Matt redid the trampolines at the front of the boat. This was a project that had been identified before we bought the boat. It was not a high priority but prevented anyone from safely hanging out in front. It required Matt to replace/reseat a number of eyebolts and then restring the trampolines using high-strength line. Jen had to be called in to get in to some of the small lockers and compartments to tighten the bolts. Nothing like getting stuffed into a closed, dark, gasoline smelling compartment in the hot Florida midday sun!  But now we can lounge in the front of the boat just like the people in the all those glossy chartering ads.  Boat boy! Another drink please!

 



 

Afternoons are reserved for something fun, like fishing, playing on the beach or exploring.