The Bahamas



Bahamas Greeting Committee



At long last, we made it to The Bahamas. Our crossing from Florida took two days. We crossed the Gulf Stream and the Great Bahama Banks without any problems. This was the first multiple day crossing with just Troy and I and Storyville. We had a perfect crossing. We took three hour shifts at night and shared the day shifts while taking turns napping. The sail across the Great Bahama Banks was just absolutely amazing. This is what we’ve been waiting for. Beautiful water that is so clear and blue it looks like a swimming pool. We were even greeted by dolphins. They escorted us for quite a ways, playing in our bow wake.



We made the crossing with several other boats and we were able to stay in touch with all of the boats, checking in with each other on the radio every three hours. Steve, on Anchor Management was single handing so we wanted to make sure to keep him in sight if we could, just in case he was trying to get a little sleep. The moon was full and moon rises and sets were stunning, so were the sun rises and sets. On both days I was on watch for the sun rise. It was awesome to see the full moon setting behind me and the sun greeting the day in front of me, both at the same time. Just beautiful, and absolutely incredible.



Sunset



I wish I had the words to describe the colors of the ocean. We were in water that was around seven thousand feet deep and it was dark, dark blue, almost black, but still clear, reminding me of an obsidian blade, then we would cross over into water that was twenty feet deep and turquoise blue with patches of green, with white sand on the bottom. Such a change from the brown waters of Galveston Bay and Clear Lake.



 We’ve been here in Nassau on New Providence Island for a couple of days. It is a busy city and we are anxious to move on to the Exumas, a chain of islands (or Cays – pronounced Keys) with beautiful beaches and great anchorages. We plan on spending the next month or so exploring all of them. We’re looking forward to swimming, snorkeling and exploring.

s/v Kaleo

We plan on buddy boating with Steve on Anchor Management and Matt and Christie on Kaleo for a while. We also hope to meet up with some other friends that are already in the Exumas, Rene and Stacy on Pipe Muh Bligh and Steve and Alice on Ocean Star.

I can’t wait to get out there and try to spear a fish. We feel like the cruising has finally begun!

Unbeing dead isn't being alive. ~e.e. cumming