Tuesday, June 22, 2021

The Journey from Panama: Chapter 8, Reflections

What a trip! Six days planned out to go straight from Panama to Turks and Caicos, sailing, avoiding high winds and currents, turned into  11 days with way too much hand steering, too little sleep, and too much wind and current in our faces.

Friday, June 18, 2021

The Journey from Panama: Chapter Seven, We arrive, at last

Heading into Great Inagua at 2 AM, bone tired, slightly loopy, but oh so happy to be there, where we could get fuel and continue on. I was on watch as we approached the harbor, trying to make out which lights were on shore and which were boats we should be avoiding. Coming into a new harbor in the dark is something we try very hard to avoid. Fortunately we did have a Bahamas guidebook which said that the harbor at Matthew town, where we were headed, was an open roadstead anchorage, meaning that it was clear of obstacles and all we had to do was to pick a spot and drop the anchor. Super easy if you have a functioning windlass to lower and retrieve the chain, a little more complicated when you have to pause at 20 foot intervals to tie a retrieval line onto the chain, but we managed.

Monday, June 14, 2021

The Journey from Panama: Chapter Six, We get a break

By Bob

As we rounded the south eastern tip of Cuba it was mid day of day 8.   24 hours more of hand steering from Navassa left us a bit fuzzy from all night cat naps again.  Light fluffy clouds and bright sun followed us past the rocky cliffs and wooded plateau that was our only glimpse of this 600 mile long island.