Stolen Moments

Our friends from Siskiwit Bay Marina (Corny) came in on Sunday. Craig and Sue have the sailboat Stolen Moments and have another friends, Dennis and his girlfriend Barb aboard.

It was really great to see them again. They have been cruising the southern Bahamas this winter and are kind of on their way back to the US. They plan on staying in Abaco for a month or so. Dennis's boat, Landfall, is in Newfoundland waiting for spring so he can continue his circumnavigation adventure. Barb's home is in Newfoundland and they flew back to St. Johns Newfoundland on Wednesday.

In the table picture Dennis and Barb are on the left, Craig has the Blue shirt, Sue is the gal with the wonderful tan in the foreground, and William and Francis are between Sue and Craig (cruising friends of Craig and Sue who just happen to be in the same area).

We had a great time together and on Tuesday we took a rental sport boat to Hope Town, Man-O-War, and snorkeling on Fowl Cay Reef Preserve. The person snorkeling in the photo is Sue.

Craig and Sue plan on sailing Stolen Moments over to Hope Town so they can hang on a mooring for a week or so. Then who knows, they are very adventuresome cruisers.

Hot Dogs and B Ball

My friend Dennis invited me over to his boat to watch the NCAA basketball games. He has satellite TV and a flat screen TV and I have included some pictures of Dennis on his boat and of the interior of his 47 + ft Beneteau sailboat. It is very nice in a kind of Winnebago way with all the amenities of home.

We watched the games on Wednesday night and then again on Thursday night although on Thursday the games we kind of blow outs so I cut out early.

Dennis is from Detroit and will be sailing his boat back home in a few weeks. He plans on shooting from here in the Bahamas right to New York City. Then will take the same route I'm planning on up the Hudson to the Erie Canal. His boat is capable of sailing anywhere so with a couple of guys to stand watches he should make the trip to New York in less than a week. Not a passage I would be interested in but I'm sure he will have a great time.

A Thought For Today

From a sign at an anchorage on the Baja Peninsula

Now is all the time you own
And no man knows the hour
Just when the clock of life will stop
At late or early hour
The future's just a dream of hope
The past a distant link
Go cruising now my brother
It's later than you think

Author Unknown

Aboard Summer Snow

How can you run out of time when you are living "on the hook"? When I say "on the hook" I mean anchored out or on a mooring ball. It can be done, in fact having time melt away seems to be the rule here on Summer Snow. The reason for this is that my cruising lifestyle is similar in ways to a subsistence type lifestyle. I'm not a fisherman (if I subsisted on fish that I caught I would starve) but I do "hunt and gather" at the little stores that are typical on these cays and that takes time. You might get a potato here and maybe a carrot in another store which you reach by dinghy. And I often prepare my food from scratch such as the corn muffins pictured here. When you bake your own breads and cook everything else by yourself and then clean up after each meal (boiling water each time to wash stuff) you burn up a lot of time.

Taking a shower at home takes a few minutes but on Summer Snow you have to heat water, remove stuff from the head, shower, and then clean, dry, and put everything back in the head and more time is burned up.

I'm not complaining because I relish this lifestyle and I think I will appreciate sharing the work load with Bev and the comforts of home more when I get back to Hayward. When someone says "what do you do all day on that little boat?" I just want to say, follow me around for a day and you'll find out what it takes to live "on the hook". And you know - the rewards may be simple but they are truly spectacular like the full moon the other night rising over Man-O-War and the fresh coffee and corn muffin in the morning.

Hard Aground

Two chartered Moorings sailboats came into the harbor. They are identical boats so the one that is tipping is just like the one in the foreground. I should be the last one to yuk it up when a boat goes aground. I've been on the bottom so many times I've thought about putting a wheel on the bottom of my keel. Never the less, it's encouraging to know that it will happen to everyone if they sail enough. In defense of the unfortunate captain I chatted with another Moorings charterer and asked him how deep his keel was and he said, "Mooring told me at first it drew 5.5 ft, then when I picked up the boat they said it was 6.5 ft. But when I asked another employee he said they all are 4.5 ft so I have no idea how deep it is."

It was interesting that after trying a few things like, attempting to kedge themselves off using their anchor (they used their anchor windlass as a winch - bad idea) and they used my method which is standing on the bow and scratching your head, they all (four couples including the crew from boat that is still floating) got in a 10 ft dinghy and went to shore as happy as larks. It's 3 PM and high tide is at 10:45 PM today and what the heck, the tide raises all boats. There is a lot to be said for chartering isn't there?

Man-O-War Sailing Dinghies

Joe Albury's father began making boats as Albury Boat Builders in 1927. Joe grew up helping his father and made his first boat when he was 12. Joe and his father worked together making boats for many years and now Joe is the only one making traditional Abaco sailing dinghies. He uses his father's designs and each boat is hand made out of local lumber. He searches the local islands for trees with just the right bend in them to cut the ribs and bow. These pieces are usually from near the root of the tree. The wood is local Madera (Mahogany) for the ribs and bow. Madera is very hard and strong and the rather large keel appears to be of oak. He uses Dogwood for the bottom braces on the ribs and then cedar planks are attached to the sides and again for the small deck . If the wood is "green" it is cured "in the sea" before it is used.

Joe explain to me the differences in the designs of the boats under construction now. The 11 ft sailing dinghy has a nice reverse sheer bow for speed while the 14.5 sail boat is a work boat design and has a nearly straight sheer. The straighter sheer makes a more stable work platform for the fishermen as they stand a lot while fishing. Each boat has more keel than I expected and Joe does put some weight in the bottom of each to make them more stable under sail. He said that the 11 ft model was actually designed by his grandfather who made many boats for local fishermen.

He makes several per year for sale. I didn't ask the price as I suspect that if you need to ask you probably can't afford one. Joe and his son also carve halve hulls and make beautiful frame models of Abaco dinghies. The fine workmanship is obvious, even to this inexperienced eye.

Joe's family also owns and his son runs Edwin's Boat Yard which is a full service boat yard with two locations on Man-O-War Cay. They have a sail loft on the premises and have a very complete chandlery.

Man-O-War Cay Photos

Small World

The other day, when still in Hope Town, I wanted to spend a few hours at the Wyannie Malone Historical Museum to read about the history of Elbow Cay and Hope Town. The gal that was at the desk noticed that I was from Lake Superior (from my t-shirt)and she said "say, I know someone here in Hope Town that is from Bayfield on Lake Superior." Of course I said "who would that be? That is where I sail most of the time." She said she would call her friend because she was sure her friend would want to talk to me. Her friend came over to the museum and it was Mary Rice who I had not met before but I have been to two of the three restaurants that Mary owns in Bayfield. The restaurants are Egg Toss, Maggies, and Wild Rice. Mary had been coming to Hope Town for many years to avoid the Northern Wisconsin winters.

As luck would have it, a few days later I was having my usual coffee at the Hope Town Coffee House when Mary walked in to get her supply of custom ground coffee. We chatted over coffee about the similarity between Hope Town and Bayfield and about boating in general. She has a restored Nor'Sea blue water sailboat up in the Apostles that I hope I get to see someday.

As the late Professor Joseph Campbell pointed out years ago, "the true purpose of an adventure is to learn about yourself". For me this cruising adventure has taught me that meeting and interacting with interesting people is very necessary and important to me. With that in mind this has been a very successful adventure so far.

Sailing to Man-O-War

Today I sailed to Man-O-War Cay. I needed some tide help to get out of Elbow Cay and to get into the Man-O-War harbor. High tide was at 5:45 PM so I waited until about 2:30 to leave Elbow Cay. That probably was a little early but I was anxious to leave. The day was breezy and the boat next to me in Hope Town Marina left at about 2 PM. It was a Moorings boat that drew about the same as Summer Snow. As he exited his slip the wind caught him and he kind of jocked around until he was broadside to the end of the marina and had no place to go. Aaron, the marina manager, raced to the dock and they lined his bow and held the stern clear of the pilings so he could finally get going in the right direction. I was the next to go after that display of inexperience and bad luck. I planned my exit, got all my lines off except the critical mid-ship spring line and backed out without incident.

I exited the harbor with 6 ft of water and set Summer Snow on a beam reach under foresail alone. I didn't want to make too good of time because I needed more tide help to get into Man-O-War harbor. It was a beautiful sail and Summer Snow made 3.4 nts with her 135 jib.

The entrance to Man-O-War harbor is tricky on a good day and although the depth meter read 5 ft once I did not feel it touch bottom. Once inside the harbor I found many boats hanging on moorings. I slowly zigzaged through them until I spotted an empty mooring ball. I circled around so I could approach it from down wind and slipped Summer Snow into neutral with minimal way on. Then I took the boat hook to the bow and snagged the mooring ball. I slipped the loop over the forward cleat and tried to act like I did this every day. It was late in the afternoon and many of the "salts" were sitting in their cockpits watching. I'm sure they thought that that "single-hander" knows what he's doing ;>)

Dinghy Dodo

Summer Snow's dinghy has been in the water since December. I got the motor running nice now but I noticed that I couldn't get it up on plane like I could a few months ago. Could there be a little growth on it's bottom? Standing at Summer Snow's stern and lifting the front of the dinghy I can see a lot of "stuff" growing on it's bottom.

I need to flip it over to scrub the bottom and so I decide to do it off the stern rather than to go ashore. By cleaning it at the boat I have all the supplies and tools I might need and I can take a break easier too. So everything in the dinghy has to come out, that is, the motor, the anchor, the fuel tank, and the oars. I secure a line to the port side and run it up to the stern of Summer Snow. Then I put the starboard side of the dinghy against the swim ladder and pull the line while standing at the stern of Summer Snow and the dinghy flips over nicely.

In this photo I have been working on it for a while but when I started the whole bottom was like the dark part. Yuk! The stuff is really tough and you have to scrub and scrub some more. After I get the thick stuff off I start to work on the really stuck stuff, I think they are barnacles. They require lots of "elbow grease" with a 3M pad. I suppose there is some goop I could buy to take them off but the closest West Marine is 200 miles away. A fellow sailor stopped by and suggested I use lemon juice to remove them. I thanked him for the tip but thought to myself "if I had some lemon juice I would make lemon aid and drink it, I sure wouldn't give it to the barnacles".



So here is the clean or I should say "cleaner" bottom. There is still a few barnacles but this will do for now. Perhaps when I get back to the US I can get some "gook" or whatever and make it like new again. I ran the port line under the upside down dinghy and put the starboard tube next the the swim ladder and flipped it back over. Put my motor and stuff back in and am ready to go ashore again.

Hope Town Favorites

Hope Town is my favorite place in the Bahamas. Granted, I haven't seen many of the other 700 or so islands (or cays as they call them) but of those I have seen, this is where it's at. The slideshow presented here is about Hope Town and shows some of the places I frequent and have enjoyed.

Dinghy Motor Issues

My new Suzuki dinghy motor started to bog down and die last week. It acted like a fuel problem. I suspected bad fuel because I had just added my spare gallon of gas before the problem hit. I got a tow back to the boat and started to trouble shoot.

I first removed the fuel filter and blew backwards through it and then pulled the plug out of the bottom of the carburetor and saw some water drain out. I had added a gallon from my spare gas tank and I probably had a gallon of fuel left in the big external gas tank so now I have two gallons of bad fuel. Yuk! I replaced the filter and the plug.

I decided to "polish" the fuel by draining it into clean empty water jugs and letting the water settle out to the bottom. Then I pored the fuel through a paper filter leaving the last quarter of fuel + water in the jug.
After polishing the fuel I fired the Suzuki up and ran through the harbor running and feeling good. Then it died again. DARN! A passing dinghy gave me a tow back to Summer Snow.

I took off the cowling again to expose the inner workings of the motor. Hmmmm, should I start dis-assembly? I've never let lack of experience or knowledge stop me before, so why not!

I removed the fuel filter and blew it out again and checked the fuel pump to see that it was pumping OK. Then I took the carburetor off, turned it upside down, and removed the fuel bowl. Wow, these parts are really small! There was some "jelly" like stuff plugging the main jet so I cleaned everything with WD40. Then re-assembled all the parts. Finding no extra parts left over I figured it must be fixed.

I asked my friend Phil to follow me as I went for a test run. Sweet! The little Suzuki hasn't run this sweet for a while so we'll see if this is the end of my dinghy motor problems.

Friends

We have had a great two weeks. First Neil and Linda came to visit and then Dave and Paulette were here for a week. We rented the "Coconut Cottage" which was very nice accommodations for 4 people and was close enough to Hope Town that we could walk to coffee every morning.

The wind blew too hard to snorkel while Dave and Paulette were here but we did get out for a nice sail to Man-Of-War Cay on Wednesday. I used this opportunity to demonstrate the shallowness of the Sea of Abaco by plowing a furrow with Summer Snow's keel. The crew reacted quickly and rolled in the jib as the captain cursed and screamed while dropping the main. We dragged onto the bar but powered off using sweat, tears, and our Yanmar Diesel. A pod of dolphins played around the boat while we were aground. They seemed to enjoy our predicament.

The winds would not die so we spend the next few days walking beautiful beaches and paths while finding new places to eat and relax.

Bev being here and having friends visit has been the highlight of my trip so far.