The Bahamas Cruise - Things that worked...

The additions for the cruise that worked included the new electronics, especially the S1 Tillerpilot. Forget the solar showers. Get a 1 gallon garden sprayer, paint it black. It works well in the head or back of the boat and wastes no water.

The two 65 watt Kyocera solar panels proved more than enough power to run the electronics, refrigeration, lights, Sirius Radio and Stereo (which are power pigs) and the 160 watt inverter for charging various battery-powered stuff including the laptop.


While not US Coast Guard approved , the two solar yard lights on the capshrouds made us easy to spot at night.

I bolted a small anchor roller on the port bow net. The Admiral reports it helped retrieve the 22# Delta and Fortress 23, each on 30' of chain. The Delta only dragged once. We discovered the cause when we re-set it. A large plastic water jug was neatly folded in half on the plow...

We picked up the truck yesterday from where we had it stored and plan to hang around FL until the snow melts back home...

ICW to Stuart

After spending one night in Lake Worth, we left the next morning, deciding to sight see on our way north. We "sailed" up the ICW to Stuart. My advise, sail on the outside if you can. Don't do the ICW on a weekend... In many places, the ICW is nothing more than a man-made canal.

We are now back where we started, Southpoint Anchorage. Our plan is to get the truck tomorrow from storage as we can park it here without permit and hang around the east coast for at least a couple of weeks. We may take a road trip or two, so friends and family that are close by, you better hide...

Crossing the Stream to Lake Worth

West End at sunset...

The next morning we left at 6 AM and again motorsailed, crossing the Stream to Lake Worth, dropping the hook at 1:30 PM. Allot better than our easterly passage in February...



At sunrise the Admiral says goodbye to the Bahamas.

We called in to Homeland Security, reported to Customs and were at the Tiki Hut Bar in West Palm Beach by 4 PM......

Cruise back toward the States

We left Treasure Cay and crossed the Whale bar at Don't Rock. It helped to have current waypoints for that shallow water crossing. We ended up in the lagoon off of White Sound, Green Turtle Cay. It then rained for almost two solid days... We then moved to Black Sound, Green Turtle for two more days to refuel, get water and a few groceries. Our plan was to go to Manjack Cay and hang out a while, fishing, snorkeling, etc.

While in Black Sound there was a new Moorings 4600 Cat that had attempted to go through the rage a few days before. It was a Captained charter but the Captain made a wrong decision. The boat hobby-horsed in the middle of the rage and a wave came crashing through the windshield in the main cabin. Charterers were then washed through the rear doors, some of the getting hurt when going through. The photos show the broken windshield in the main cabin and bent stanchions on the starboard side.

Don't mess with the rage...



A group of boats saw a good window for heading back to the states and we decided to join them (Easterly winds). We sailed a great spinnaker ride of 60 miles to Great Sale Cay, passing all but a couple power boats. The Prout 34 under spinnaker is owned a a nice couple from Canada named Rob and Bev.

This photo was taken by Rob and Bev as we passed them (a slower moment that day....)
We flew passed this brand new Maine Cat 30 is sailed by a couple from the northern eastern seaboard of the States.

From Great Sale Cay we motorsailed the next day to West End.