20091219 Wind Gusting to 35 Knots! Seas 8-10 Feet – Staying in Nassau

20091219 Wind Gusting to 35 Knots!  Seas 8-10 Feet – Staying in Nassau

After two days in Nassau, we continue to wait for favorable winds to continue our voyage.  The last two nights have produced consistent 20 knot winds as the bottom part of the weather front that is dropping snow on Washington, DC and rain on Miami, FL approaches.  With an easterly wind flow, down the channel between Nassau and Paradise Island, there is significant swell passing through the harbor.  The first night, I was awakened at 4:30am when Angel “kissed” the dock piling on her starboard rail.  I arose from a deep sleep, dressed and was on the dock before she could get a second kiss.  I adjusted the dock lines to solve the immediate threat, then went deep into a lazarette to acquire 4 more lines to double up our security on all quarters.

I must admit, Cathy and I have mixed feelings about the New Providence Island area , where Nassau & Paradise Island are located.  The harbor is beautiful, where the government has spent millions to efficiently attract and moor tourist carrying cruise ships.  They now have dock space for 6 mega liners and a channel depth of 100+ feet.  The docks are adjacent to the main shopping district and the straw market.  The ships can unload tens of thousands of cash carrying tourists directly into a district designed to extract their due.

Nassau’s Straw market burned in 2001, and has a temporary home ½ block from the original site.  That site is under re-construction.  One end of the waterfront street has a fenced area for horse drawn carriage tours and blocks of taxis.  One block away is Bay Street, the main shopping district.  Bay Street is lined with jewelry stores, upper end clothing boutiques and liquor stores.  On the side alleys and perpendicular streets are smaller shops & open air restaurants.  These are where we enjoy spending time.  We purchased our picture postcards to document the trip, a painting from a local artist and another delicious lunch at a Mediterranean café.  They have American fare, but also tuna burgers and mahi-mahi burgers, which consist of a filet of the fish, with oregano mayo, lettuce and tomato on an oversized Kaiser roll.  They season the fries with oregano as well.

Paradise Island is a world of its own.  High rollers and curious tourists wander around with logoed T-shirts, including “I’m with Stupid è”, “If you see da’ Police..Warn-a-Brother”, and various NFL or NBA jerseys.  We have met people from cruise ships that departed Houston, Miami, Jacksonville, Ft. Lauderdale, but there are other points of departure.  People from Texas, Toronto, Montreal, Annapolis, Breckenridge (CO), Chicago, just to name a few.

Cruising couples that have sold everything and are now living aboard their sailboats are common.  Their boats are nicer, newer and more expensive.  Motivations are many, but tend to be along the idea that early retirement was possible, so why not.  Some have itineraries, others no plans.  Some have friends flying in for the holidays.  Others, specifically have no contact with their former lives and entanglements until, e.g. 6 months away. 

Yesterday, I as taking an afternoon nap, snoozing in the salon with the gentle rocking of the boat in the swell at the slip.  I was awakened by an unusual thump and was instantly on deck.  Two slips down, Dave from Annapolis had observed that an incoming rental sailboat, with French speaking crew was having difficulty managing the wind and getting into the slip next to us.  He leaped from the dock onto our boat to push off the offender.  The boat backed away and tried again.  I armed Dave and myself with fenders and the whole dock community instantly organized to handle fore and aft dock lines and keep the 42 footer off the dock and away from Angel.  Soon spring lines were secured and all was calm again.  No harm & no foul was incurred.

The cruising community is unique.  Everyone has run aground.  Everyone has miscalculated a docking and hung the stern out into the wind.  Everyone has lost power at a bad time.  The cruising community mobilizes with the approach of a vessel to the dock or call for help.   No compensation is expected.  Only a word of gratitude and expectation that the kindness will be passed on in the future.  Imagine if the whole world operated like that…Sounds like a John Lennon song.

My list of boat repairs is not growing any longer.  I can tweak and fiddle and get most things done in just a few minutes each day.  We have invested our time in Nassau, not only in sightseeing, but also in organizing our floating home.  Cathy dove into our food stores and got out liquids and dry food organized.  We separated our pasta and egg noodles into smaller packages, storing some in less accessible areas, saving several packages for daily use.  We went into our bow storage area and inventoried our canned goods and bulk dried goods, moving some to the galley for easy access. 

We have enjoyed great food on the voyage.  The restaurants available to us when we have docked at a slip in a marina have been great.  All the way down the intercoastal waterway, we enjoyed salads, seafood and great beverages.  In the Bahamas, conch fritters and cracked conch are mainstays, but there have been Greek restaurants with great Greek salads and gyos.  Aboard, we have created many dishes from our stores.  I purchased canned meats for the voyage.  These are not fancy in name or consistency.  They are named simply “chicken chunks”, “beef chunks”, “turkey chunks” or “pork chunks”.  With the addition of spices and other ingredients, they are really tasty.  Chicken noodle soup with multi-colored spiral pasta was really great.   Pork chunks with black beans and couscous needed more seasoning.  After a couple of meals, we offered the rest under cover of night to the fish, who seemed to enjoy a change in diet.  We also created pork chunks with dried vegetables and potatoes, which we enjoyed many meals.  The addition of fajita spice made this a hit as well.  Of course our pasta with canned hamburger in Prego sauce (mentioned earlier) was finished off with gusto.  We have sufficient food stores to last much longer than the time of our voyage.

This evening, we were invited by some new cruiser friends to a “sundowner” aboard Siggy Dancer, a 30’ C&C sloop.  We knew the marina was close, so we started out on foot, calling them on our portable VHF radio for final directions.  We met the owners, Dave & Jan Richards, who welcomed us aboard.  Our gracious hosts are 6 year veterans of traveling to George Town, Exumas and after others had left, invited us to view their pictures of the events there.  This retired couple keep their boat in central Florida, then drive down in October and sail to the Bahamas until April or so.  Cathy and I hope they will stop by Charleston on their trip north, so we can show them some southern hospitality.  Of special note is their cat, Rusty.  This male puffball has a mashed in face and weighs ~ 15 pounds.  He spent the evening in a cat bed over the companionway, behind the dodger.  He raised his head for a scratch and rub from all who came near.  Other attendees were Dave and Janet from “Auspicious” out of Annapolis, MD and another gentleman who gladly took time to point out the best lobstering holes and snorkeling areas in the northern Exumas.

We are enthused again about starting our trip south.

Wish us luck passing over the coral heads of the Yellow Bank.

Jim & Cathy.