Sailing Alchemy

Yesterday Morning we woke to a pleasant day in Nassau, anchored off of a Yoga retreat on the south shore of Pleasure Island. After listening to the Cruisheimer’s Net on the SSB, we found ourselves dragging anchor, rather rapidly. The holding in Nassau is notorious for being poor, so this was not a surprise. We re-anchored, but the set was not so great, so we went across the bay to try the “Main” anchorage. When there, we saw Quadrille, Fred and Bernice, who where weighing anchor to go to Allens Cay, our next stop. We quiclky thought it over, and decided to tag along with them. They are a really nice couple from Montana, on a Westerly Conway. We have a big place in our hearts for Westerlys.

We took a course that was south enough to avoid most of the coaral heads of the Yellow Bank, while not entering the White bank. Sort of threading the needle. Most boats just go over the Yellow banks, and keep a watch for the coaral. This was perhaps a safer route, but longer, adding at least two hours to the trip. We arrived at about 5:30, about 15 minutes from sunset.

Dina and Myron aboard Hold Fast answered our call when Gretchen asked for any boats in the Allens Cay anchorage that could tell us how things looked there. When we arrived, they came over on their dink and gave us some advice on shallow areas, and came aboard for a bit to visit. The anchoring here is great, it set immediately, and now we are going to go see the Iguanas. Yes, I said Iguanas!! There are hundreds of them on Pine Cay here.

We made it to Nassau, arriving a about 700AM, with a bit of a wait for the cruise ships and a cargo vessel to all get in. I think we will be going to Allen’s Cay next, in a few days. We are anchored right off of a Yoga retreat – they were out under their vernada doing poses as the sun set tonight.

We tried over at the “main” anchorage next before the bridge, but the bottom was grass, and it was too shallow, we might have been aground at low tide, it was too close to tell. Much better here, 20 ft depth, and sand – dug right in.

The boats we crossed with were Living Well (hunter 420)with Steve and Mary Ann, and Midori (PDQ 32) with Brian and Lynn. LW had radar, so they could see the light at the NW passage, which was out. We arrived there about 9:30pm. We motored the whole way – the wind even clocked around back to the nose when we got through the channel ;<. It was on the nose almost the entire way.

There was a bit of fun tying up to get fuel before we anchored. We pulled up close to the dock, and Gretchen passed the dock hand a spring line. He tied it off, but with about 15 feet of slack. Then she handed him a bow line, which after a few seconds, he haded back to her??? Twice? In the meantime, the current had caught the boat and the spring was now stretched fully, with no other lines to the boat. We finally sorted it out. The only thing we can figure out is that the dock hand tought when she said that she needed the bow line, he meant that she wanted it back. Very odd!

We are enjoying our most likely short stay here at Bimini. This morning, we walked down the road a bit, and then cut over to the beach. When we got to the point on the beach that faces the inlet we had troubles with, we spotted a medium-sized freighter that was m,aking it’s way to the cut. We stuck arouind long enough to watch her come in, and then walked over to the wharf, where we got to meet the captain and pick his brain about how best to leave the channel. He draws 6.5′, and came in at aq bit past low tide, so we feel confidant that we can make it out unscathed! The trick was that we needed to come MUCH closer to the shore of South Bimini before turning into the cut. This was not what the chartbook showed, and we had no luck getting any local knowlege despite several radio calls before coming in. The marina we are in does not use radios at al – we needed to just make eye contact off of their fuel dock, they saw our “Q” flag, and pointed us to a slip. It was almost comical, but I guess it is just a more laid back way of doing things.

After getting back to the boat, we walked a short way back down the boat and got ourselves a hot loaf a brad from the locak bakery, and a wonderfull fish lunch, take-out, with two small “heads on” fried white fish (IE I don’t know what they were) fried rice, veggies and beets. Yum yum, and the bread was delicious!!!

Alchemy is safe in Bimini. We had a great motor-sail over here, only to run aground repeatedly trying to get into the harbor. It seems that the “new” channel has got a bar across it that shoals to less than six feet. We were saved by a power boat that gave us a tow across (bump, dredge, bumb dredge) across the bar. Now, we have to figure out how to get back out!

I am posting this via the ham radio, we are enroute to Bimini. We got off the hook at 5:15 this morning, and are motoring at about 5 knots. We should get in around 3-4pm. Wohooo!!!!! Check out the postion report to see where we are right now.

I am posting this via the ham radio, we are enroute to Bimini. We got off the hook at 5:15 this morning, and are motoring at about 5 knots. We should get in around 3-4pm. Wohooo!!!!!

I am sitting in the Suds Laudromat in Miami today – and taking advantage of the good wifi here.  Cruisers note – this is at the 1400 block of lto ave – Sobe Suds Coin Laundry. They have a secured netowrk, but just ask for the key. Oh, and the photo of Mark and Julie is from Mantee Pocket, but I just had to include it!

Here are some photos from the last few days taken with the phone:

We went out for the morning to wander around South Beach with Mark and Julie from Rachael. We could not resist having or picture taken here ;>