December 2020
The first of December found us in
Ft. Pierce Florida. This is usually a
really fun spot, particularly when our good friends Pete & Jane lived in
the area. In these days of Covid we
stayed a day but never even launched the dink.
We had made a nice run to Publix
while in Coco Village and decided to use the lay day for a great meal. The Prime Rib had been on sale so we had
decided to splurge on a small one. We
have not been going to restaurants since last March & my Rob has been
perfecting his pastry skills. When we
were at Cobb’s Marina, we had a television aboard and watched far too much of
The Great British Baking Show. Rob
decided to have a go at the pastry recipe from Mary Berry, a former presenter.
They were both wonderful & I
failed to get pictures when cooked.
Trust me, they were fantastic.
We moved on to Stuart where we have
two sets of really close friends & we were finally able to introduce them
to one another. I have known Stew &
Diana longer than I’ve known Rob! I
first met them through the Great Chesapeake Bay Schooner Race and enjoyed their
friendship for 20+ years. Rob & I
had the pleasure of meeting Larry & Annette while helping with cleanup
efforts in Salt Pond/Thompson Bay Long Island after Hurricane Joaquim. Larry & Annette had to stop cruising for
personal reasons and now have their beautiful Island Packet up for sale. Their home is on the water in Stuart &
they keep the boat at the house to make it easier to show. They also have a mooring ball just off the
house and they were kind enough to let us hang out with them for a few
days. Annette & I had the chance to
have some “girl time” and go provisioning for the boat. There were several stops, Trader Joe’s,
Office Max, Bed Bath & Beyond and the list goes on! I like shopping with Annette – I found
everything on the list and then some.
We wanted to see Stew & Diana
& checked with both couples to see how they were with meeting new folks
since we are all of a certain age & tend to be more careful in this time of
Covid. It worked out well. I only regret
not taking any pictures. One-night Annette
made us dinner with some fantastic meatballs (yes, I got the recipe) and the
pizza & appys at Stew & Diana’s was great. Yep, next time the camera.
Our next stop was Hobe Sound just
north of Jupiter Inlet. There are
several more McMansions since our last stop in 2018. Several were for sale so that makes you
wonder a bit. The area is a “minimum
wake” zone & local law enforcement take it seriously. We watched many get ticketed including a 100+
foot mega yacht.
This caught our eye! I think you can rent them.
It’s that time of year again and
every year this guy pops out hangs out with us for a few weeks!
We were starting to get the itch to
get over to the Bahamas and moved on towards West Palm Beach. The Jupiter lighthouse is one of the prettier
in Florida.
Between Hobe Sound/Jupiter and West
Palm Beach we had to go through seven, yes 7 opening bridges. That can make traveling somewhat tedious and
even more so on this trip as one of the bridges was under repair and was not on
a set schedule at all. What lessened the
bother were all of the wonderful Christmas decorations to see from the
waterway.
Of course, the birds were enjoying
the view too.
West Palm Beach is well known for
many festivities along the waterfront.
Sandi Land at Christmas is one we have enjoyed several times and this
year was no different. Well, I guess it
was different as it was very scaled back from years past and social distancing
rules were in effect.
Although the event was scaled back
from previous years the sand sculptures were still loads of fun.
We decided we needed to get very
serious about scheduling our Covid test and watching the weather. To stem the spread of the virus the
Government of the Bahamas has been very proactive since the beginning of the
pandemic. Lockdowns, travel
restrictions, often total travel bans & curfews have been the norm for the
citizens there. The Bahamian Government
has saved countless lives by being involved.
God bless them! It is a shame that we Americans had a President who
played down the severity of this deadly disease and offered ZERO guidance to
the States from the Federal level. Hundreds
of thousands of American lives could have been spared if we had had a leader in
the White House and not a bully full of piss & vinegar who said the deadly
virus was a hoax. What a horse’s ass. I
am so pleased he is going to be gone on January 20th. OK, off my
soapbox.
To travel to the Bahamas in this
time of Covid you must have a negative Covid test that is no more than five
days old. Once you have your test
results you apply for a visa/health certificate online by uploading the test
results along with other info. Once that
is approved by the Bahamian Government you go back online and pay for the
health certificate. The payment covers
the cost of an additional rapid Covid test on day five. Confusing huh?
For us, we looked at the weather and
went online to the lab in the US and applied.
We received a text that someone would contact us via telephone. A very nice lady called and we scheduled a
test for a few days later. The following
morning, we were going to run the engine to cool the refrigerator & charge
the phone. It had been running for 10-15
minutes when an alarm sounded. It was
the battery alarm and the tachometer was sitting at zero. This is not good. Rob thought the alternator must have gone bad
which was aggravating since it was only a year or so old. He empties the lazarette, removes the
alternator & installs the spare.
Again, no tach, no charging. This
is really not good. He calls our favorite MacGyver type, Mike and they discuss
the matter & decide that perhaps we should take the alternator to a shop on
Monday to be bench tested, this was on a Saturday. Mike also said that it would be a good idea
to call Beta Marine in North Carolina on Monday and see if they had any ideas.
Off we go to get a bag of ice
because of course we had fresh seafood & veg onboard. We Googled
“Alternator repair shops near me” and actually found one nearby (5.5 miles)
that per a review had worked on marine alternators. We found the bus route that would get us
within a half mile or so & we were ready to tackle this on Mon. We were ready to leave Monday morning when
Rob called Beta. Thank goodness for
Farron! He thought it odd that two alternators would go out as the same time
(as did we) and gave some tips to Rob on the fix. That did the trick. There was a bit of corrosion and after the
contacts were cleaned (emery paper) and lubricated (Vaseline) we once again had
charging power.
Of course, this was over the weekend
and we found it necessary to cancel our Covid tests due to the five-day
limit. The five days start on the date
of the test. We rescheduled for the 17th.
On a trip to Trader Joe’s, we had
picked up a leg of lamb & cruising friends Brad & Jeannie were nearby
so we invited them for dinner the night before our Covid test. This is the same couple that we spent time
with in Oriental. The weather had turned
a bit cool so we decided to eat below in the salon. About halfway through the meal there was this
sound….. rain! It was pouring. That was ok, the only thing better than the
meal was the company.
We scheduled our Covid test in the
afternoon as this would give us time to do laundry and stuff before the
test. Rental car was set and off we
went. The test itself was not bad &
the results came back via email about 4:30am the following morning. We went online and filled out the forms for
the Health Visa, uploaded copies of our negative Covid test and passport, then
waited to hear back. That only took a
few hours. We received an email saying
we were approved and all we needed to do was pay & we would be good to
go. We did and printed out everything we
thought Customs & Immigration in the Bahamas may need, secured the dinghy
and waited for the 1645 opening at the Flagler Memorial Bridge to start our
crossing.
It was awful. We subscribe to Marine Weather Center on the
SSB – Single Side Band (ham radio) and the forecast was a tad off. Winds were supposed to be from the east at
5-10mph but were closer to 10-15 with gusts to 20 from the north. Waves were forecast to be 2-3ft but were 4-6
with occasional 7-8ft. Very
uncomfortable.
Those of you familiar with the
Gulfstream understand what this means immediately but for you non boaters this
is the cliff note version. Think of the
gulf stream as a northbound river of water within the Atlantic. It can be about 35 miles wide and moves north
at anywhere from 3 to 7+knts. If you
have this water heading towards the north and winds heading from
the north it kicks up nasty confused waves.
Extremely uncomfortable.
At times we were making under 2knts
and our trip that should have been less than 12 hours took about 19. Sleep when off watch was on the settee with
the lee boards up to keep you from rolling off.
The bow of the boat was buried in the waves more times than we kept
count of. Unfortunately, the cover came
off the hawse pipe which left an opening into the anchor locker. Salt water came through the vents in the
anchor locker and our bedding & clean sheets were soaked. The cover was
found midships so at least it wasn’t lost overboard. We talked after our
arrival and agree that this was the worst crossing we have had since we started
cruising in 2002. We wondered if this had happened in ‘02 would we have ever
returned? Happily, it did not and we
have spent much time enjoying the beautiful islands & wonderful people of
the Bahamas.
We cleared Customs & Immigration
about 1015 Sunday morning, purchased some Conch Salad from a local and set off
to Great Sale Cay for the night.
We had a stowaway who joined us at
some point during the crossing. It was
so rough that even the fish were looking for a ride.
We were very tired but looking at
the beautiful waters made us happy. We
had Conch Salad & fresh bread for dinner and over a glass of wine toasted
“Welcome Home” to one another.
Then it was on to Green Turtle Cay. We have always enjoyed Green Turtle and this
visit was not bad. There is a lot of
damage but the locals are working hard to bring things back. We dropped the hook in White Sound between
the Green Turtle Club & the Bluff House, or rather what is left of the
Bluff House.
Those docks were always filled with visiting boats. The building at the top of the hill is gone, bulldozed.
These are some of the houses as you
enter White Sound.
The spirit of the folks in that area
is unbelievable! They do not let this
get them down. There were a few
restaurant/businesses that will not be returning. The Wrecking Tree where we always had our
first conch burger in the Bahamas for the season has been replaced with a home
but the tree is still there. The Blue
Bee, famous for their Goombay Smash no longer has a roof and some of the
concrete walls are down but you can see the Boat Cards on the remaining walls. Lowes Grocery was demolished but Sid’s &
Curry’s groceries are doing well.
The winds were still up but we made
the trek through Whale Cay Cut. This
involves leaving the protected Sea of Abaco into the Atlantic, around Whale Cay
and back into the Sea of Abaco. You
cannot go thru as it shoals to 3ft in areas,
We always stop in Fishers Bay and
head into the settlement at Great Guana Cay and this was no exception. We dropped the hook on a Saturday afternoon
and decided to wait till the next day to go to shore. We saw the lights & heard the music at
Grabbers and were looking forward to getting a “Grabber” cocktail. We went to shore about 11:30am and noticed
they were not open so into town we walked.
This was the old Dive Guana
He moved into the settlement proper a few years ago as he was renting the place in the picture & now, he owns the current spot.
We decided to walk over to Nippers
to see how the repairs were going.
It’s amazing, but some things survived. Nippers hopes to be open in February or March
2021. Love the positive Bahamian spirit.
The harbour is known as Orchid Bay
& there is, was, a marina by that name there along with public &
private docks. None were spared but new
ones are in the works.
We discovered that Grabbers is no
longer open on Sunday.
On to Marsh Harbour. This was truly heartbreaking. It has been over a year and there is still so
much destruction but as the locals have told us, we just keep working on it.
What was known as “Restaurant Row”
along the harbour is gone. Just gone.
The Marsh Harbour Marina & Jib Room,
gone
But new docks are being built.
Conch Inn, gone
Mangoes, Snappas, Harbour View,
destroyed. The walkway where George the
Conch Salad man was is gone but George is still there & his conch salad is
still wonderful.
This boat is about a half mile from
the water on Don McKay Blvd.
Bristol Liquors was is a huge metal
building that is gone. All that remains
is the concrete pad & ramp. This was
Abaco Asian where we would get real Thai food & movies. We know the husband & wife are fine as we
saw them in a drone video shortly after the storm.
Hardware stores, gift shops, mom
& pop shops are just gone. The
consensus is that it will take about 10 years to recover.
There was a restaurant called
Colours By the Sea that we really enjoyed.
It sat in a building over the water that was a marina before Floyd. The building & the docks were destroyed
but we saw this building & thought, could it be??
It is the new Colours and it has
only been open for 2 weeks today (Dec.31, 2020) The food is just as good and
the staff just as wonderful.
If you notice the building across the
street with the orange stairs, that was Longs Seafood in years past. The Long’s sold it & moved but the point
is that it was a two-story concrete structure.
That was a lot of force.
As 2020 comes to a close with all
its trials & Covid, it seems the Bahamian spirit is as strong as ever. This was what we all saw here in Marsh
Harbour this morning.
Happy New Year to all and may it be better in every way than 2020.
