Our last few days in Key West were fantastic. We had a great time hanging out with Rick & Michelle. Michelle and I took the kayaks out one morning and explored the NW side of the island. Then we went for a jet ski ride in the afternoon. This time the weather was more settled so they took us all around the island. It was pretty bumpy on the south side and we returned completely soaked and thoroughly high on adrenaline. It was a blast!
Kayaking with
Michelle
Michelle ready for
speed on the jet ski
In the evening we barbequed some mutton snapper that Moose
had caught the day before and generously given us. It was delicious. We hope to
do some fishing this year in the Bahamas and as avid fisherfolks, Rick &
Michelle had some great tips for us and even gave us a couple of primo lures!
Now the pressure is on to land a mahi J
Ghost Rider heading
home, we were so sad to see them leave!
On Thursday, Rick & Michelle left and Jim arrived. We’ve
decided to use our first month in the Bahamas to push ourselves a bit. To help us
achieve this, we’re bringing our training captain, Jim Mobley, back aboard for
a while. We have several goals that we’d like to achieve while we have Jim with
us. Primary among these is to get me more proficient in operating Blossom. We’re
going to try to sneak into some very shallow places, give fishing a try and
hope to finally get scuba diving off the dinghy as well. Jim has done a lot of cruising in the Bahamas
with boats smaller and larger than ours and we’re looking forward to learning
and enjoying the islands with him.
We spent Thursday night planning our passage. Unfortunately,
there’s a storm brewing northeast of the Bahamas so we’re aiming to get to
Georgetown as quickly as we can. We hope to check in, get our sim card and then
sit the winds out there. We’ll head out as soon as we can to visit some out
islands once it’s calmed down. At least that’s what we think we’ll be doing at
this point - cruising plans being written in sand at low tide and all… We’d
like to explore new territory in April and then we’ll be back visiting some of
our favorite places in the Exumas in May when our friends and family come
visiting.
Today was a crazy day of provisioning for the next two
months, picking up some last minute fishing paraphernalia and getting Blossom
ready for a 54-hour passage.
I had just enough
room to squeeze into the back seat!
Next time, we’ll be saying hi from turquoise water…
Boat Business:
- Leak in chilled water loop. It remains elusive. We may just fill it up every couple of days, we’re not sure where to go from here.
- Impellers. Martin changed the impellers on the 2 gen sets and the wing engine. It was a general maintenance task but was timely. The 9k gen impeller was starting to fall apart.
- Water makers. Both have been commissioned and are ready to get to work.
- Fishing gear. We’ve dug out our gear and we’re ready to go! John Hoffman helped us gear up when we commissioned and he steered us right, we have 2 great rods and several lures. We picked up a fish card because how do you even know what is edible if you catch it? Or if it’s the right size? Now we have everything we need, we just need to give it a go!
- Provisioning. We have enough food for two months with 3+ persons aboard. It’s amazing how much you can stuff, stow and hide on this boat. We’re using lockers/hidey holes we’ve never used before.
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