Sea Dreaming

Hi everyone: We've only been back for a month and I'm not even sure if the Baynham's are back as yet and I'm all ready thinking about next year and how it can be made even better and stress free. Example, our daughter, like her mother, gets extreme motion sickness at even a thought of sailing, although, I haven't given her mother much of a choice and she has gotten much better. She went and layed down outside numerous times but never hugged a bucket once this trip. What we're thinking is that for around $100. or so we could fly our daughter from Nassau on a charter to Norman's Cay or Staniel Cay and reduce the bucket hugging for her by a day, IF her and her beau even get holidays and IF we return to the Bahamas which seems likely. Everything that goes on the boat new or gets upgraded is going to be tested with weekend ventures out to Panther Key so we know everything works before we get to the super expensive shopping grounds and if the motion sickness isn't an issue then maybe next year may be the year we carry on farther to Rum Cay and perhaps on to the Turks for a visit.

Last week we watched some folks fishing at one of the condo's here and he tossed a few fish on the lawn and within a few minutes you could hear a Bald Eagle scream and see it approaching so the guy picks up one of the fish and throws it in the water, the eagle swoops down and grabs it and disappears. This happened several times and then on one trip the eagle takes the fish and drops into a yard on the opposite bank and eats the fish himself. The guy later hooked into some giant fish and he another guy jumped into a boat and travelled around and round for a couple hours until he finally lost it.

Pictures are the eagle enjoying his lunch on the opposite bank, the guy who was feeding him, a shot of the live-aboard dock with a big space available for Baynham's boat :) and a shot of more of the docks which are mostly empty with the roof of the motel in the backround where the gym and pool are located. The last one is a giant ssb antenna that I have to find a place to install, a new mixing elbow, some zincs for the raw water only engine and the much coveted kit needed to hook the hot water tank to the engine heat exchanger so we can have hot water while anchored out for extended periods. Just need someone to get it all installed!

Work on Daruma continues

Back for 3 weeks and it seems as though we never left except for the memories and the new round of pictures.

I've been driving 20 hours a week to work in the panhandle since we returned and next week is another fair drive to Jacksonville to be onsite for 3 days, it'll give us a chance to look around at the marinas on the St John River as we seem to be up there all the time anyways and on the way home we can stop in Stuart to see if the Baynham's made it back yet.

Last weekend was spent hooking up the engines to and running them on fresh water until hot to flush out the salt water and this weekend I'll take a look at the engine zincs or anodes and probably have to replace them. I also went in West Marine and saw a Xantrec multi stage "smart" alternator regulator in the clearance bin. That night I checked it out online and saw it at another marine store, Jamestown Distributors, for somewhere around $260.00 so I went back and bought it for less than $200.00. I'm going to hook that to the new 80 amp alternator that we bought before our trip but found it didn't work and I've sent back for repair. The fake owl we put on the mast to scare dirty birds off only seemed to attract another owl and a hawk along with the dozens of birds so tomorrow I'm going to install some spike like things and red reflective tape on the top of the mast and on the top 2 spreaders to see if it works or not. They (the birds) are so messy and the boat has to be cleaned off daily so anything to deter them will be a blessing.

All I have for now. Pictures are Traci and I on the front deck, the proceedure to flush the engines and the new regulator.

This years Bahamas adventure is over but I have a feeling that other adventures are in store for this year, we'll see how it plays out.....

Back In Florida

We had a pretty good crossing of the Florida Straits and the Gulf Stream on Wednesday, not too rough, fair wind and dropped anchor at 4:30 p.m. in Biscayne Bay just outside No Name Harbor as it was full. Thursday we moved into the harbor then walked out of the park to the bus stop and rode the bus to the very last stop where we jumped on the Metromover to the Freedom Tower exit then walked across the Intracoastal bridge to Customs and Immigration. Friday we left and sailed the Hawk Channel to Long Key and and crossed under the Channel 5 bridge to Gulf side of the Keys and anchored for the night. Saturday we strictly sailed north till about 5 p.m when we pulled into a little bay we've anchored in a couple times at Cape Sable when I thought I had better listen to the weather again. It wasn't good. They were saying that the wind was going to increase to 15 to 25 knots from the SSE then switch to NE and increase to over 30 knots with seas 5 to 7 feet and rough with deteriorating conditions through Monday as a cold front passes through southern Florida. We decided to keep going and carried on until about 2 a.m. in continually worsening conditions and dropped the anchor on the north side of Panther Key as we couldn't see the channel markers to enter the marina and we have to wait for high tide anyway. As the wind swung through to NW and gusted to 36 knots plus, it got a little rough and you had to wonder what with the wind strength and change of direction along with the pounding waves if the little anchor that could was really going to and it did indeed. After daylight I turned the radio on again and heard some lady begging for help saying that they were in trouble and had 2 children on board just a few miles north of us. Later I heard the guy from the same boat tell the Coast Guard that he could smell gasoline and ask if they should jump in the water! Boat US responded and I heard him tell the CG that the boat was grounded and taking a beating and would have to stay in that position until better weather but the 4 occupants were safe. At the height of it, after the wind switched to NW, we pulled anchor and headed around the island and into the channel for the Marina and once inside the Mangroves it was a different world. A couple of fellows were camping on Panther Key and we could see their fire when we pulled in at 2 a.m. in the middle of the tempest. Come daylight we could see that they had no boat and we watched them pack everything up and stand in the wind and rain for a couple hours as the boat trying to pick them up abandoned them twice due to the weather. They didn't seem too distressed or ask us for help in any way and later as we were making our way up the canal to the marina they went past us finally in the boat but less all their gear. When we finally made it to the dock I could've got out and kissed this boat for being so tough and safe and not failing us when we needed her the most. I also gained a new-found respect for the expensive radar we installed in Grenada as during the night I noticed a few unmarked derilect steel posts in the Gulf which worried me till I found I was able to tune the radar and these and other markers showed up brilliantly as well as oncoming squalls from 12 miles which gave us time to avoid the worst of them. We're tied up and back in the real world with a few new items on the "wish list" for next year and work is calling..........

Cut and paste update

Monday, Feb. 27, 2012

I'm writing this in notepad so I can cut and paste first time we get internet.Traci and I are heading across the banks with a following wind and waves so the ride is pretty smooth, boring and way too quiet since the kids have all gone home. We said good-bye to them on Saturday :( and did the same with Paul and Shannon yesterday and then made our way to Chub Cay in some very rough water. Good thing about that is there is no other boat traffic. I'm going to try and touch on the cool stuff and then let some pictures tell the rest. When we get some decent internet, I'll throw a few videos on as well. It was a bad camera year as Brock bought this fancy underwater camera that could shoot in 3D and stuff like that and it took great pictures for about an hour then it conked out full of water. A couple years ago we gave Brandi a little camera in a housing and it also leaked water this year and went bust but I will post some underwater pics that turned out prior to the meltdowns. To summarize, Traci and I headed to Nassau and put in a month or so until Paul and Shannon arrived. We didn't get to spend much time with them due to some scheduling. Brandi and Brock arrived on the 9th of Feb. and we spend the night at the marina and took off the next day for Rose Island, Allens Cay then Norman's Cay followed over the next week then back to the marina to pick up Matt and Kara on the 16th. They jumped on the boat around 1:00 p.m. and we headed right to Norman's Cay, arriving in the dark. We spent a few days there so Kara could recover from motion sickness then carried on down to Staniel Cay and anchored beside the island that the wild pigs are on and they swim right out to meet your boat looking for scraps to eat. The next day we moved around to Staniel and saw Paul, Shannon and crew again and we anchored and went snorkelling in Thunderball Grotto which was in a James Bond movie some years ago. As soon as you enter the water you are surrounded by fish of all kinds, I assume they're fed regularily and they're not at all shy. The grotto itself is huge porous rock that is completely hollow and has entrances on all sides, some of them submerged, and is full of coral, fish of all kinds, thousands of colours and shafts of light that enter the chamber from different angles and is the most cool thing I've seen underwater that can't be plundered or pillaged. We anchored that night on the north side of Major Cay (one with the pigs) next to an opening to the deep water on the east side of the Banks and planned to take the deep route back to Norman's as Matt wanted to show us once again what a poor fisherman he is. Next morning brought a perfect wind and calm seas and for a couple hours we were thinking that we'd be back to Norman's in record time but Mother Nature noticed her error when we were just north of the land and sea park on Warderick wells and a little squall switched the wind around to the north, right on the nose, and kicked it up to 26 knots or so and there it remained. This took Kara from having an enjoyable day sailing to being sick and feeling rotten again so we headed back on the banks and sought shelter on the south side of Elbow Cay. That night after the kids had said goodnight I thought I'd just go down to the bottom step at the back and relieve myself and as stood there, in the light from the solar lights we have on each corner, I watched as a large fish came from under the boat tight to the hull I was on and turned around the step and went up the port side. I decided to go to the head instead and use the toilet. I called the kids to come out and watch as lots of 1 and 2 foot fish did this until we went to bed. I think the larger fish came in from the deep water to feed at night. The next few days were spent at Norman's and one evening I asked Matt and Brock if they wanted to try a night time snorkel to which they agreed. In the water were millions of little shrimp looking creatures and when you shut off the light and kicked your fins there was a column of light in front of you, also cool. Friday, the last day before the kids went home, we went to Atlantis, which is also cool, then that evening we headed to Domino's for pizza and since Dairy Queen is in the same building, well you know....That's about all I have for now until we get back to civilization and back to work.

Dave and Traci