As happens so many times with us…we just decided! After listening to the weather forecast for
the week and checking a forecast on my favorite iPad app (Pocket Grib)
conditions look right…and the weather says GO!
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| Waiting for the Norther' to pass us |
Bruce and I have spent long hours reading “Gentlemen’s Guide To Passages South” and
Virgintino’s Dominican Republic CruisingGuide. We’ve poured through the
Waterway Guide and our Explorer Chart Books… We’ve perused the notes from
Active Captain subscribers on the islands in our path.
We think we have a plan… but as plans often go awry (read:
weather kicks our butts)… we won’t be sharing too much in advance. First stop: Long Island to the east, with
Thompsons Bay being south of east.
The perfect forecast would be for NNW winds at about 15
knots… It looked like we would get some of that as the winds from a Norther’
that was upon us continue to clock around throughout the day. Tomorrow the winds would be on our nose… and
we’ve had enough of that! What to
do…what to do?
 |
| Doesn't look promising... |
We looked outside and the weather said STAY! It felt sort of like the calm-before-the-storm
with ominous strings of clouds and a few light sprinkles. I checked the weather again and all sources
said that this would pass and we would have a nice day on the water.
We decided to go for it!
When we said goodbye to Georgetown on the morning net, we were the ONLY
boat (admitting to) leaving. We even
took a little heat for it, but we were committed. Our dinghy came up and off we went.
We raised the main and with engine churning out some speed
and energy for making water, we slipped out of the harbour that had been our
home for just short of a month.
 |
| Moving toward the exit |
Once outside in the Exuma Sound, the waves were rolling up
beneath our stern, pushing us along with surfing speeds up to the occasional 8
knots. Unfortunately we couldn’t really
see rolling out the jib and messing with the pole for this downwind run, so we
continued on happily motor-sailing with the main alone… Sure, we could have
shut down the engine but we would not have been able to keep up speed enough to
make it to our anchorage before dark.
We settled in for the ride, all happy, including
Jezabelle. We moved on down the coast of
the Exuma islands and entered the banks.
It was like somebody turned the lights on in the water as we went from
the deep-water blue to the brilliant aqua-blue of the banks.
Only a few small coral patches marred the stunning beauty
and I was actually kind of glad for the clouds… If there had been full
sunshine, the color of the water would have been more than we could hold all at
once.
We slowly caught up to and passed several other boats, obviously
moving under sail alone. All afternoon
we watched the clouds, menacing at first, but as the day progressed, they
became much more benign. The sun even
peeked out a few times and we congratulated ourselves on our decision to go as
our gamble paid off.
 |
| Purple line is our track for today |
 |
| Rounding Indian Hole Point into Thompsons Bay, Long Island |
There were more than a few boats already in the anchorage at
Thompsons Bay snuggled up to the NE corner where the water was bathtub
flat. We hadn’t felt the winds much out
on the water because we were traveling off the wind, but when we turned up into
it to drop the mainsail, we realized that it was blowing at about 15
knots.
That’s enough to kick up a bit of fetch but there was almost
none in the anchorage. We dropped anchor
in the “Morgan Section” between Magnolia and Kelley Nicole and watched as they
disappeared into town by dinghy. Too
late we realized that there was a happy hour going on ashore… Guess we’re going to miss this one.
With the boat tidied up and things put away, we sat on the
deck with our Sundowners and enjoyed a new sunset view. It’s difficult to describe this life to
you. In the beginning leaving was kind
of a big deal. Now it’s just a blip…a normal
part of life. No anxiety, no hoopla…just
load up the dinghy and go.
Will we feel the same about leaving the Bahamas? Not sure…
But we are excited about this next part of our lives as we leave the
familiar and travel on toward new countries, new customs, and new sights. It’s good to be going and we’re as ready as
we will ever be.
N23°21.472
W075°08.187
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