Ft. Lauderdale to Green Turtle Cay, Abacos, Bahamas

First, let me say this:  My stay in Ft. Lauderdale was at my dear friends' Laura and Cory's house.  They put me up, put up with me, and they were free and easy with invaluable advice.  Their house is way up the New River and it's calm there and generally much cooler than downtown Ft. Lauderdale.

I've known Laura for nearly 40 years - we've sailed together on each other's boats, sailed together on our own boats, raced on each other's boats, and when Cory came into her life, deliveries together.  They are two of the very few people I trust offshore.  They deserve a huge portion of credit for this trip to the Bahamas for their unflagging encouragement and support.

My friend, John, flew into Ft. Lauderdale Friday, January 19th.  We Ubered into town for dinner at The Downtowner restaurant on the south shore of the New River.  It was a pleasant dinner and we got back to Pelican at a very reasonable hour.  A sleeping pill later we were out like lights.

Saturday promised to have good weather for 24 hours or more and that meant we'd be leaving Saturday night.  The plan was to go down the New River, get a pump out of the holding tank (which, despite Florida's fervent desire to have people use the service is nearly impossible to get done).

Laura came with John and I, Cory and his friend Mark followed in Cory's Contender, a very nice center console.

As we left their dock I hit a bump in the mud.  No problem, power over it.  Easy peasy.  As we went down the New River at the Davie Blvd bridge I was having trouble managing Pelican - more than I should have had but I put it down to some goop on the prop that would eventually wash off.  So we continued down the river. 

Now, you need to know that the New River is not so much a river as it is a wide-ish creek that flows at up to 3 knots or so.  Lining the river is some very expensive boats leaving not a lot of room for vessels to pass.  Sure, more than you think but less than you may need.

By the time I got to the next bridge, the 7th Avenue bridge, I was having trouble keeping pointed down river when going slow.  At the Andrews Avenue bridge I had go to a dock to wait and after that I had a terrible time turning down river again.  I'm chalking it up to the current and Pelican's normal difficulty in low speed maneuvering.

Finally, I managed, with variously cursing and laughter from other boaters to get between Andrews Avenue and 3rd Avenue bridges tied up for a pump out.  After finding the dock master, I found I had stopped in the wrong place and had to continue down past the 3rd Avenue bridge.  It went downhill from there.

After struggling for 15 minutes to get Pelican pointing downstream for the 3rd Avenue bridge amongst a great deal of ridicule from other boaters about 'sail boaters' and so forth and not one offer to help or not crowd me when I was obviously in difficulty I got through the bridge and tied up again near the pumpout.

Well, unlike pumpout stations everywhere else, this one doesn't have the fitting.  Not even the rubber nozzle.  Really?  Apparently, it's a Florida thing.  You need your own fittings.  Anyway, after some brouhaha, we left for the 15th Street Fisheries to pick up fuel and to have dinner.   But on the way down I noticed a stronger vibration.  Not devastating but more than I remembered.

After a nice dinner, we took off for the Bahamas.  We were only making about 4 knots and the vibration, instead of getting better if it were just smootch on the prop, got worse.  Around midnight John and I came to the conclusion that someone needed to check the prop - we were in the Gulf Stream and if there was damage to the running gear we needed to go back.  If not, we needed to clear it and continue.

So I dragged out my light wetsuit, mask and waterproof flashlight and with John running safety lines for me to hold, I went overboard.

First, the water in the Gulf Stream is really nice.  If it weren't for the 2-4 foot waves it would be very pleasant.  Also, if it were daylight.  Anyway, I saw what looked like a party ribbon hanging off the prop shaft and reached under to get it.  Well, sir, it wasn't a party ribbon.  It was the weighted rim of a casting net, a small polypropylene line with several ounce weights every few inches., perhaps 6 feet long.

After I got that off,  there was still junk on the shaft but it was too rough to be diving and cutting it off so I got back into the boat and we got underway.  Clearing that weighted line off gave us an extra couple of knots.  Woohoo!  No vibration!  Yay!

John Brown on the Banks

From then on it was just standing watch and keeping dryish in building seas and winds.  Not quite the weather report.  But around 11:30 am, only one and a half hours late, which included the time we spent clearing the prop, we passed onto the Little Bahamas Bank headed for Great Sale Cay.

Me on the Banks

The temperature went up 10 degrees!  The waters were clear turquoise blue.  The evilness of the last 24 hours dissipated in the complete marveling of the beauty of the banks!  Cory had said you can just stop and anchor anywhere.  You can hear this.  But until you experience it you can't believe it.  But yes.  You're tired? No worries.  Stop.  Drop your anchor.  Put on your anchor light.  Go to sleep.  Easy as pie and so completely surprising and refreshing.

But we ran until about 6 pm when we got to Great Sale Cay and anchored down.  It was a spectacular night, brilliantly clear with a crescent moon and stars like most people never get to see.  After a nice dinner of spaghetti and salad we went to sleep, the sleep of the nearly dead.

Lynn had said when we talked during the crossing that I needed to make John a real breakfast underway.  Well, underway, in 4 to 6 foot head seas, I wasn't going to do that.  But on Sunday morning at Great Sale, it was all bacon and eggs and coffee.  It was excellent, if I may say so myself.  Task completed, Lynn!

What the prop looked like

John and I decided that it would be a really long day to get to New Plymouth so that we'd stop in Manjack Cay for the night and take it easy the next morning - swim and stuff, then go to Donny's Marina for checking in to the Bahamas.  This provided a spectacular opportunity to check Pelican's bottom and clear the rest of the junk from the prop.  So for a couple of hours, John and I swam and generally carried on.

After cleaning

One of the things that really surprised me was how clean Pelican was, even after being in the water for almost 4 months and sitting for two of them.  Just a little slime on the hull was about it.  There was no real reason to clean the bottom.

What came off

Diver Bob finishing up

Anyway, after that and a simple breakfast, we weighed anchor and headed to the Black Sound of Green Turtle Cay to Donny's Marina.  Donny was very nice to move some boats around for us so we could stay the night, but he needed the slip for the next day so after checking in, on Donny's advice, we put the dinghy together and headed for the Other Shore Yacht Club where Pinapples happens to be - a bar and grill which is right near the dock and has pretty good food and great views of New Plymouth and the sunsets.

Pelican at Donny's

There I talked to Kevin, the dockmaster, and arranged for a slip.  Since they don't take reservations he indicated that I just come on over and tie up and we'd go from there.  So to help Donny out and to have a 'home base' for the northern Abacos off we went.

Pineapples

The dock's not much, really, but there's water and electricity and the pilings are pretty sturdy and that's all I really need.  Pineapples is a great little bar and burger shack.  There's a saltwater pool, shade, a great view of New Plymouth and spectacular sunsets over Great Abaco Island. 

The Other Shore Yacht Club has the only fuel in the harbor (there's fuel in White Sound north of here) and water.  Because a blow out of the northeast and east was predicted for the next week, essentially, we took the inside of the dock.  Very comfortable.

That night we moved we had dinner at Pineapples. We met Jason who takes people out for fishing and snorkeling excursions.  Nothing doing but we had to go.  I had to try out my pole spear, we had to see the reef and the stingrays north of Manjack Cay.  So, rather than discussing this trip, please enjoy the following pictures and a video...

John Having A Loo

Fan coral

Me, not quite on the reef

Me.  Just that.

Well, that's it for now.   John's back home, I'm wandering around the island and taking all sorts of pictures!

A Month In Ft. Lauderdale

Well, it's finally here!  After a month or so in Ft. Lauderdale spent in work on Pelican, play, and preparing for the jump to the Bahamas, the plan is to leave Saturday evening, January 21st, for the passage at south of Memory Rock into the Little Bahama Bank on the way to Great Sales Key and the Abacos.  My friend John Brown will be with me for a week and that'll be fun!

As you know I broke the windlass base in the Delaware Bay.  Well, you would if you'd read the entry.  Suffice it to say, you can't anchor there, you can't anchor in 5 foot seas with 20 to 30 knot winds.  That will break stuff.  What it broke on Pelican was the part of the deck that the windlass is mounted on and it bent the wildly insufficient backing plate.

Windlass removed,  deck repaired with
biaxial cloth and epoxy.

The process to repair, of course it to take it all apart, grind out the broken fiberglass, repair with new, and put it all back together with a stronger backing.  Also, I added 1" to the height so that the windlass was in a better position to bring the anchor over the roller without jumping off the gypsy.  The stronger backing is a 3/8" stainless steel plate that covers the entire area below the windlass.  It replaces the bent 1/16" plate which was exactly the size of the windlass base.

Base installed, 3/8" backing plate
before installation below.

You can see the added 1" spacer to
raise the windlass.

Windlasses are one of the most neglected pieces of equipment on a vessel.  The second most neglected are winches.  I've seen them literally disintegrate in the locker.  The owner's complaint is that the windlass won't raise the anchor and upon inspection the entire thing is a ball of mushy corroded aluminum.

So while I had to disassemble the windlass, I also did all the maintenance.   Greasing, oiling, corrosion control and painting.  The gear below deck looks and acts like new.  Above deck looks more or less the same.  One problem I ran into is that the added height causes some very slight interference with the anchor locker door.   The downside is that it's a bit difficult to open the door but the upside is that the door stays open without any hassle.

Besides provisioning Pelican for some extended time, there were many other projects to do or complete.  One of the things that had been annoying me was that the water pump ran for a second or so every few minutes.  That usually indicates leaks.  But when I replaced all the fittings and piping near the water heater and checked all the other fittings with no leaks showing themselves I was completely annoyed when the pump continued its behavior. 

It turns out that the inexpensive water pumps eventually get a build up on the diaphragm.  This causes them to leak backwards.  The pump is $110, the rebuild kit is $89.  So it's not worth rebuilding.  Fortunately, I had a spare so I installed it and hey! presto!  problem solved.  That all was a day out of my life.

I've been meaning to repack the rudder shaft which has been weeping for some time.  I've adjusted it a few times but it didn't last long.  I found that the packing was probably original with only two rings.  That's not a bad run.  I used Duramax packing with three rings. Problem solved.

Before I left Connecticut I replaced my port water tank with a Plastimo 200L (52 gal.) flexible tank.  It leaked.  It ruined my cabin sole.  That's another story.  I thought that perhaps that tank leaked so I tried the spare I had.  Leaked.  Leaks from the fittings.  So I tried a bigger o-ring.  Still leaks.  Finally, gooped it with 5200 where the fittings connect inside the o-rings and waited for 24 hours.  No more leaks!  Put tank in service.  Been brilliant ever since.  Performed the same operation on the spare.  I can see how those fittings are supposed to work.  Sadly, they don't work that way and a sealant is necessary.   I'm surprised no one else has had the problem.

Other small projects like maintenance were putting the water maker in service, changing the transmission fluid, cleaning the generator carb and so forth.  I rebuilt the old Racor and have installed it as a fuel polishing system/spare filter-fuel pump arrangement.

One of the great things about Ft. Lauderdale is that you can get anything that has anything to do with marine stuff done and for reasonable prices.  And one of the bright stars of those places is McDonald Hardware on State Rt. 84 otherwise known as Marina Mile.  They are an old fashioned hardware store but they have all sorts of marine stuff, really helpful staff and prices that are pretty close to the West Marine Pro prices for wire, hose, and fasteners.  And then there's the tools.  They have everything!  Even if you don't need anything you need to stop there.  Well worth the visit.

In between, of course, has been fun.  Seeing the Ft. Lauderdale New Years fireworks, a visit from Lynn, the odd barbecue, dinner with friends, visiting friends in Delray Beach and sailing a radio controlled boat, and much, much more.   There's been a lot of bike riding hither and yon.

As much fun as it's been, it's time to go!

***
Here's an addition to the time here.  When I last took a journey on Pelican to the Florida Keys I purchased a Citizen Bike.  Citizen makes a number of bikes, but this one was aluminum, light weight, foldable with Shimano 6 speed gearing.  Admittedly, it's spent a number of years in storage, but I've been using it pretty heavily down here rather than renting cars or whatever.

Long story short, the right pedal pulled out of the crank, threads stripped.  I thought it would be a MarineTex repair, but no, I thought, why not call Citizen Bikes and see what the best solution was.  Imagine my surprise to find they're in Dania, not 7 miles from here!

I made an appointment for this morning for the repairs.  Naturally, I arrived early.  Nothing doing but they took the bike, asked me to come back in an hour, which I did, and hey! presto!  Repaired like new!  Also, very, very inexpensively.

So if you need a folding bike, please check out Citizen Bikes.  Not only are they very price competitive but their service is, apparently, without equal.  Highly recommended.