"The Elephants"

Alright now universe we're ready to leave - help us out!!! We've defrosted the freezer, done arts and crafts, obsessively watched the Canadian dollar plummet, played uno, learned two new card games (Gin and Golf) and dominoes, gone for bike rides, I've painted my nails, played hours of Farm Story, dyed my hair, we've even cut each other's hair! It's cold - we're ready to leave. Plus the longer we wait the more conscience we are of the pre-hurricane season time being eaten into. We have to be as far south as Grenada for June which means we've already lost a month of our time in the Caribbean - we're antsy. We keep reminding each other that we can't get so fed-up that we start letting our guard down and choose a risky crossing. We walked down to South Beach the other day - the wind was about 20knots from the north. You can see offshore to about where the Gulf Stream starts - approximately 6 nautical miles offshore and we got a pretty good view of what they call "the elephants". When the north wind is hitting the current of the gulf Stream it looks like a herd of elephants charging from a distance - an excellent reminder to wait out the weather! I think we've resigned ourselves to the fact that a perfect crossing is not going to happen so at this point we don't care about rain or wind on our nose the whole way - we just need safe, not comfortable. Half the battle is the weather once you get there - there have been a couple of 10 hour windows that would have allowed us to cross but then you arrive to 30+knot winds and there is very little shelter in the Bahamas and you're anchoring in sand which doesn't hold as well as good old American mud. We have already heard of a few boats this month dragging in the wind and ending up onshore with considerable damage, so for now we'll get the Uno out again and make another pot of coffee. There have actually been quite a few boats that have decided not to cross until February or March because the wind is so bad this year.

We're in for some more harsh weather this weekend - high winds, lots of rain, and the temperature is going down to 8'C tonight and tomorrow! Now I know for a lot of people reading this that isn't very cold for January but keep in mind we have no heat or insulation and the companionway door is louvered. The weather has made it a bit challenging to re-provision (since we have gone through so many of our previous provisions we had to redo it!). We have restocked our groceries, filled up our water, and have one more fuel run. Our fuel gauge doesn't work and we have learned the hard way that idling the engine to charge the batteries apparently uses more fuel than we realized. There is only one fuel dock near us and it's not easy to get into so we thought we would be clever and dingy to shore and walk to the nearest gas station that sold diesel and just fill up our jerry cans. This brilliant idea has resulted in us hand filling our entire fuel tank - at this point we have carried 200 litres of fuel and we have one  more run to do!

Our new solar panel is installed and operational! Considering how jobs usually go on this boat we were both amazed at how well it went! It took us the better part of a day but nothing went wrong. We had to drill a hole in the toe rail above the transom to feed the wire through - we were apprehensive about drilling a hole in the boat but it was fine. We had to take the panel off near the head of our bed and it took some impressive contortionism to feed the wires from the deck all the way down under the bed and floorboards into the engine room to hook up to our controller. We now have 225watts and on a sunny day we can bring in 80amp hours. I want to add another two solar panels but James looked like we wanted to cry when I suggested it, so perhaps a project for another time.

Running the wiring for the solar panel

We are waiting for the wind to die down and are planning on leaving "Broke Down Harbour" for No Name Harbour tomorrow. No Name is a small protected harbour right next to a quiet channel to the Atlantic - an excellent jumping off point to the Bahamas!!!

One thing I had no idea existed in the Cruising World was business cards - boats have cards made up to exchange with each other. At first we found the idea to be quite strange and resisted it but then started to feel like the oddball when we someone would give us a card and we didn't have one to reciprocate.  So we caved and had some made up. They are actually a great way to keep in touch with people you meet because often you meet people at an anchorage, restaurant, grocery store etc and can quickly exchange contact details. This is very likely the only time I will ever have a business card!


The latest addition to our living room is a giant world map. Some days we feel like we have come so far and then we look at the map and it completely dwarfs our progress. It also inspires and excites us as to where we can go! The black line along the East Coast of the States is our route so far!

James eating the world's largest sandwich

We have photos in our bedroom!! It's starting to look like home :)