<p dir=ltr>It is a friday morning 3:30am, We are anchored in Lake Sylvia of the ICW outside of Ft, Lauderdale. Today is the day we have chosen for our passage to the Bahamas. Mark and I are quietly doing morning preparations to set sail. We are nervous and rightly so. We are setting out on an adventure that is new to us. Anything can happen and we know that. We trust in each other. We trust in our boat. However the wind, the sea and the weather can be ever changing. That is where you have to be diligent and watch, be aware, and ready to change course or drop sails before it is on top of you. <br>
By 3:45 we were exiting the ICW and entering the huge ocean in total darkness. There is no moon to light our path. All we can see are the starboard and port pilons and the lighted boats in the distance. The forecasted wind is SE early and then changing to winds out of the south early afternoon. We navigated well through the darkness but it is very unnerving relying on your instruments and not your own eyes.
We motor sailed out about 7 miles and we started to see some daylight break. Ahhh! We sailed for a couple of hours more getting about 3 or 4 knots and our wind was straight out of the East, where we were headed. Over the VHF radio, channel 16, we hear a call into the coast guard with a report of a funnel cloud directly off port everglades where we came from. We look in that direction and sure enough there are not only one but 3 funnel clouds. That was the first time that I have ever seen anything like that. As I watched them they would disipate and then reform their funnel and grow in size. In the end I am glad to report that they didn't amount to anything but caution on our part.
It was looking like a storm brewing kind of day so we kept our storm jib sail up the entire way, with the main sail, and motored. We came into a few more storms with rain that called for me to go on the bow and lower the jib sail. Now sailing Flathead Lake that is a task that comes with ease. Out here in the gulf stream I decided that I am glad that I do yoga and have good balancing skills and that I may be the next Ty Murray, famous bull rider. It was super scary on the bow with us hitting the waves and bouncing back up. When we would crash back down, the nose of the boat would be immersed in the sea water, me along with that. I was wearing my life vest and harness with tethers and always clipped in on the jack line. We had so much water enterning in the cockpit. The ocean found any little crack it could to slither on in. But it is not surprising for the amount of water that came over head.
Once we were in the gulf stream , the water took on an indescribable beautiful cobalt blue. Simply stunning. We oohed and ahhed the whole way at the remarkable beauty.
The wind was frustrating for the fact that we were barely making any ground in the direction that we needed to go. What should have been a 12 hour crossing turned into 20. We hailed Old Bahama Bay marina on the radiio about 2 hours out to alert them of our late arrival. They said they had a slip for us and we could check in with customs in the morning.
We were both cold, wet and beaten up by the exhaustion and emotions of the crossing. We were both silently sitting next to each other donned in our raincoats, towel over our lap for warmth, desperate to see the first sign of land. When Mark pointed out the first tower of light that he saw, i started to cry in pure relief that our goal was in sight. I stood on the bow of the boat, a place I have come accustomed to, holding a spotlight to navigate our way in through the jette and into the marina. The water is 12 ft deep and in the dark we could see no color. We pulled up to the dock we were instructed to and were greated by loud Caribbean music, people partying and visiting, and a super nice Bahamian woman running the joint. She pointed out a suitable slip that we moved to and got checked in. After she left us, we got off the boat with our shaky land legs and walked around checking things out from the dock. We got in a nice shower up at the facilities bathroom to wash off all of the salt that we were covered in and went back to the boat for a good nights sleep in our damp beds.
What a day! But we did it. We crossed the ocean and we did it together as a team. We are partners on this boat, New Girl, and soon to be partners through life.
Love to you all.
Shawnae and Mark
No comments:
Post a Comment