Georgetown in Review

It's hard to believe that we've been here just over 3 weeks.  I never thought we’d stay so long but I’ve really enjoyed our time in Elizabeth Harbour. We’ve been snorkeling, diving, driving, exploring, exercising, eating, drinking, dancing and even fishing!  Here’s what we’ve been up to with a lot of photos...

Sean & Louise at Chat & Chill

Chat & Chill is the closest beach bar to us. There’s a volleyball court set up and lots of picnic tables. We ate there a few times, enjoying sunset drinks, their Sunday afternoon pig roast and Wednesday DJ’d evening where we had a blast and danced for hours.

 Poison wood sign

Marten and I aborted our first hike when we saw this sign and realized that the narrow trial was lined with poison wood.  (My last brush with poison oak landed me in the emergency room and on prednisone for weeks, I need to stay clear of such plants!)  

View from top of Monument Hill

View to the east, Exuma Sound

Beach on the Exuma Sound

A few days later we went for a hike up to the Monument (a stone structure on the highest peak of Stocking Island) and back down to the eastern side of the island.  These trails were much wider and I saw very little poison wood. Absolutely stunning views.

We spent a couple of afternoons snorkeling the harbor – from a blue hole (that was rather disappointing) to several reefs along the eastern shore. There are mooring balls placed along the way so we were able to tie up and explore. The hard and soft corals were beautiful. There were fish, but not as many as I’d hoped to see. Our favorite was the southern most mooring where we were greeted by a school of sergeant majors.

Heading to snorkel mooring

Beautiful corals and purple sea fans

A trunk fish

Invasion of the sergeant majors

One afternoon I went out snorkeling with a woman from the sailboat Spiraserpula.  She named her boat after the sea worm she discovered and named. How cool is that!  It was awesome to go out with a marine biologist and ask questions about what this and that is.  While snorkeling I also found two lionfish. Martin and I returned a couple nights later and Martin speared the big one.  He became a "fish finger" appetizer for happy hour the next day. We missed the smaller fish, a minor wound but not fatal. I feel badly that we left him there, hopefully someone will come by and take him. They were the only ones we saw – I’m surprised and happy that we didn’t see more.

Lionfish

Lionfish fingers

We rented a car from Thompson’s car rental and spent a day on Great Exuma Cay.  We started off going north and circled the entire island (it's about 37 miles long). We found two beautiful beaches, one which is named for the meridian that crosses through it - Tropic of Cancer Beach.

We had lunch at Santana’s Bar & Grill – amazing fried lobster.

Tail of a plane, yard art?

 

Tropic of Cancer Beach

 

 Un-named beaches

Fancy frozen drinks at Turquoise Cay Boutique Hotel

We had dinner at Catch a Fire restaurant on the west side of the cay. That dinner proved to be our favorite in Georgetown. We met the owner, a Brit named Tony, and chatted quite a while. It was the first time we’ve been out and saw a restaurant that was packed, children were dancing to the band and the sunset was amazing.

Martin at Catch a Fire restaurant

Sunset seen from Catch a Fire

One afternoon a sailboat grounded on a reef at low tide. Ouch!  Several cruisers went out to see if they could help. We went out in our tender and were able to help a bit by giving some readings from our depth sounder. He floated off later that evening when the tide came up.

Dancing at Eddie's Rake & Scrape (Louise is center photo!) 

We enjoyed a Monday night Rake & Scrape at Eddie's with Sean & Louise and a few dozen cruisers. It was a true rake & scrape with one guy playing a saw. The cruisers organized a water taxi across the harbor so there were lots of people there despite the choppy harbor. (We were able to cross in our tender, Petal is just big enough to not get too wet in choppy water with the aid of towels and blankets). It was a great evening of dancing, drinking and meeting people.

 

Hanging on the beach playing Molkky

While at the rake & scrape, we met a couple from a boat that we had followed down the ICW. We had heard them calling at every bridge “boat name is Saltine, like the cracker”. It was fun to actually meet them!  They invited us to a small gathering on the beach the next day. We met a few other couples, played a great beach game called “Molkky” (which we just have to get now – it’s a kind of Finnish version bocce ball).

Martin at Volley Ball Beach

We went out a couple of days on our SUPs and kayaks.

View from Latitudes Restaurant

Dinghy dock in Georgetown

Heading home from town, crossing the harbour, not a bad commute!

We’ve also attended cruisers happy hours on Sand Dollar Beach and aboard Vector. Had dinner at a restaurant called Latitudes and attended numerous water aerobic classes.  I feel like we’re starting to meet people in the cruising community just as we’re getting ready to leave but I’m looking forward to bumping into them elsewhere in the Bahamas and up the east coast.

Sean & Louise started north ahead of us, leaving yesterday. We’ll be meeting up with them at Emerald Bay Marina tomorrow where we’ll take on some diesel for Blossom and fill up on gas for Petal. We hope to be doing lots of exploring in the dinghy as we wind our way up through the Exuma chain over the next several weeks. 

We’ll be spending at least another 2 months in the Bahamas since a possible trip to Cuba in May/June has fallen through. So after exploring the Exumas, maybe we’ll check out Andros and go back to the Abacos. From there, we can easily head north to Charleston where we plan to be for July.

Boat Business

There’s not much to report which is good, no news is good news. Martin tackled a couple of projects.

• Radio. Verified that everything was working, cleaned the contacts and treated it with anti-corrosion spray. We’re set to run from the fly bridge now.
• Fans. Installed a voltage regulator so they’re at 18.5 volts now so we have enough rpm that we get a breeze without them rattling and driving us crazy.
• Cleaned the engine room.
• Replaced the collar zinc on the wing prop.
• I sewed up our American flag which is starting to rip apart.
• Tested our air conditioning!  We haven't used the system since we heated the boat in St. Pete's. Just wanted to make sure it's working well in anticipation of calm, warmer weather to come.

On the hook in Georgetown, Bahamas

We’ve been in Georgetown now for about 1&½ weeks. There’s so much to do and see here that we’ll probably stay for at least another few days. It will also depend on the weather – it looks quite windy over the next week or so, so we’ll need to find a good day to head out.  We’re planning on stopping at Emerald Bay Marina on our way north for a couple of nights to get fuel. (We slightly underestimated when we fueled up in Florida).

We had a few more days of relative calm so we explored the harbor by dinghy and got out on our SUPs and kayaks as much as we could.

Martin SUP’ing (he stood on the way back but my camera flooded so no pictures!)

We had a pleasant surprise one afternoon when we were called on the VHF by another boat, Sea Monkey. Hike, Katrina & Troy were with us in the Dry Tortugas and we were lucky to catch them on their last night in Georgetown before they started back to Annapolis. They had us over for drinks aboard Sea Monkey. We had a wonderful evening sharing adventures and visiting their boat.  We were also able to catch up with Michel & Caroline from Sea Turtle one evening before they headed north as well. We were hoping to catch up with them and get to dive but I think we’ve stayed in Georgetown too long now. 

Katrina had mentioned visiting the meat market so decided to give it a try. They advertise in the morning on the cruisers net when the store will pick people up in town, usually Mon/Wed/Fri. About 20 people were waiting for the owner to show up in his pickup. He was right on time and we all piled in. A few lucky ladies got to sit in the cab while the rest of us jumped into the back for the <10 minute ride. It was a fun adventure and we came home with fresh grouper, a pork loin, cheese and a freshly baked scone.

“Selfie” from the bed of the pickup truck, en route to the meat store

The calm has ended now and we're back to windier, and lately, overcast conditions. I'm just recovered from being under the weather too. We’re living a fairly isolated life down here so I’m not sure how I caught a cold, but I did, so I was thankful for DVDs and my hand sewing a for a few days. I got sick just as Louise returned from the states so there was no hugging when she returned!  I was well enough to enjoy dinner aboard Vector though so we were able to catch up!

With me sleeping most of the day for a few days and the windier weather, Martin decided to test the sailing rig that we can attach to the kayaks.  He assembled the rig (which took a couple hours) and set off…

Martin on his maiden voyage. Sailing, sailing… (past Vector)

Oops!

I’m a bad wife, I admit it, I laughed so hard I almost cried. Sean saw an overturned kayak and came out to see if he could lend a hand…

Need a tow?

With the sail upside down in the water there was naught to do but swim her in. Poor Martin got his exercise in for the day.  Upon reading the instructions (post tip-over) we found that the ideal wind for sailing the kayaks is 5-10 knots. I think the 15-20k winds were a bit too much. Now we know for next time ;) 

The other night we had a squall blow by. We were just on the edge but had a bit of excitement just the same. At about 5:30 we woke up to the sound of a metallic crash. The wind was howling so we checked the fly bridge and boat deck. Everything was secure though we tied a couple things up more tightly. (I think everyone in the anchorage was out doing the same. Some in undies, some “au natural”. What a sight an anchorage is in the dark when a storm comes through J) When we checked inside, we found that the bathroom screen had been blown in with enough velocity to hit the opposite wall and knock some things down. That was the noise we heard.

Here is our anchor track:

You can see our second circle after we let out more scope. Normally, we move around and make a thick-ish line as we sail back and forth. Here you can see where there’s one movement that whipped us around.

Big gust!

Our Maretron system showed that the gust that woke us up was a strong one - 39 knots. It hit our starboard side, blew the window in and shoved Blossom right around. Yes, we’re happy that we let our more scope J 

So now, I’m on the mend and feeling better. The weather is overcast and cool (everything is relative – 74F feels quite cool at this point!) It’s been nice to have some gray days to stay in, cook and quilt.

Boat business:

• Transom shower. Martin dropped the shower head and it broke off last week. Sean had some hose and clamps amongst his spares so Mart was able to rig up a temporary fix until we get back to the states and can replace the nozzle.

Filling tanks

• Dive compressor. Martin used the compressor to fill our tanks so he could finish cleaning the bottom of the boat. One more day and it was finished.
• Gori prop. We were expecting squalls and high winds so we let out a bit more scope. While doing this, Martin ran our gori prop (the wing engine prop) in forward & reverse. We run the wing engine in neutral a lot because our hydraulics - thrusters and windlass - are powered by the hydraulic takeoff mounted to this engine but we rarely ever engage the prop (this is a maintenance no-no). He had knocked off a couple barnacles and wanted to make sure she was moving properly.

Georgetown, Bahamas

Entering Conch Cay Cut, arriving Georgetown

We’ve heard about Georgetown for years – that there’s a huge community of cruisers who spend the winter months here year after year… And finally we’re getting to experience it!  The prime time for cruising here is December through March. There is a “cruiser net” on the radio every morning where they give general announcements, the weather, locals and cruisers announce events, things to trade/buy/need, ask for help, newcomers introduce themselves, others announce that they’re leaving. There are organized volley ball games, prayer groups, aerobics and yoga classes, bridge games, snorkeling expeditions…you name it.  There's a water taxi that will take you to shore. Many cruisers get very involved with the local schools, businesses and charities.  We had heard that as it became more and more of a destination spot that it was getting dirty and there was environmental damage in the harbor. It looks like the community has tried to address this with a pumpout boat and garbage service that comes through the harbor regularly. We haven’t been snorkeling yet, but the water is very clean and clear.

We arrived around 3:30pm after a calm and beautiful cruise down the coast.  Sean & Louise had warned us about all the boats that were anchored in the channel and that we’d need to weave our way through. We had an easier time of it as about half the boats there had used the weather window over the past couple days to head out. We arrived just at the end of the season it seems. There were about 180 boats in the harbor when arrived, half as many as when Sean & Louise arrived and that was half again less than had been here about 2 weeks before. That’s a lot of boats! (It will probably get even quieter here once spring break(s) are over. There are lots of kids/family visiting these couple of weeks from the sounds of it.)

We found Vector and there was plenty of space to anchor right next to her - actually, in between Vector and Tabula Rasa, Scott & Paula’s Nordy 55. We had met them back in Ft. Lauderdale last year and were hoping we’d meet up with them in the Bahamas, so that was very cool.  We settled in and dropped Petal. Then Sean came over for drinks and we got to catch up on the past week J  Sean had the lay of the land and knew where to go so the three of us headed over to the St. Francis Hotel for dinner.

View from St. Francis

 Post water aerobics class at Volleyball beach

When we got in and settled I called Paula on the radio and she told me about a water aerobics class that is held every morning at Volley Ball Beach. It sounded like fun so Thursday morning she came by on her kayak and I got in mine and we went over to the beach. There were about 20 women there and we had a great time!  I plan on going as often as I can if we aren’t off doing other things. I even bought a noodle so I can really get into it next time.  In the afternoon we went into town with Sean and checked out the grocery store, the dive shop and the misc. store “Top to Bottom” which sells everything from pool noodles to boat line, shackles and back packs.  We scheduled a dive for Friday and headed home.  That evening we invited Sean, Paula & Scott over for drinks. We had a really nice evening sitting in the cockpit enjoying the perfect weather. Then we headed over to the Piece & Plenty Hotel with Sean for dinner and a “Rake and Scrape” (Bahamian dance party). We didn’t actually dance, I think we were all a bit tired and we had an early morning to go diving the next day, but we enjoyed the ambience.

This is where we beach the kayaks to go to the Chill & Chat restaurant or water aerobics class

 Signposts to the world

Friday morning we got up early and all headed over to the dive shop.  We went out for a 2 tank boat dive with Dive Exuma right off the east side of Stocking Island. There were only 9 divers aboard so the boat wasn’t crowded.  We dived a shallow reef first and then did a wreck dive on a 60 ft sunken tug. The dives were nice but a bit short. The downside of organized dives is that they always bring you up too soon but at 70 feet we could have stayed for a bit longer than 30 minutes!

The first dive I had an “interaction” with a fish. Given how afraid I am of sharks, it’s ironic that I had a close encounter with a remora. Remora’s are also called sharksuckers. They're harmless fish that stick themselves onto larger creatures (often sharks, rays, turtles) and get a free ride.  When we jumped in, the captain noted that there was a large remora (about 2.5 feet long) swimming around us. Martin and I were the last to go down because I was messing around with my weights (my new 5 mil wetsuit is very buoyant). As we descended, it was swimming around us. Then it decided it really liked me, swimming around my head and looking me in the eye. I thought he’d left when suddenly it clocked me on the top the head!  At first I thought it was trying to stick to me, but then I found this video which looks like a longer version of my experience and I think maybe it was trying to eat my hair. Well, after head butting me, it left! Freaky looking fish.

The diving was pretty. There was nice coral on the shallow reef and a decent number of fish. There were several large snapper and one as-yet-unidentified very large silver fish inside the tug. There was a big barracuda hanging out by the tug as well but he was curious and followed us up as we ascended. My, but they have big teeth! One of our fellow divers saw a lionfish at the first reef and we saw one at the wreck. We’ve been asking around and it seems that cruisers have done a pretty good job of fishing them off the shallow reefs.  It’s illegal to hunt them when you’re scuba-ing so we’re going to have to learn to free dive for them. We have our Hawaiian sling spears aboard and a fishing license so we’re hoping we’ll be able to help pick a few off while we’re here and have some tasty lion fish dinners.

On the way back to Blossom we saw Sea Turtle in the harbor and passed by in the dinghy to welcome them to town.  We also ran into our friends Nigel and his wife and son at the dive shop. It’s a very small cruising world and the Nordhavn crowd gets around J

We're starting to settle in here and really enjoy ourselves, there's so much to do and we've barely begun. We've spent a lot of time on Stocking Island (the long island east of Georgetown). We're anchored on the shore of Stocking Island so the businesses/beaches there are very close by. It's about a 3/4 mile dinghy ride across the bay to Georgetown proper.

Saturday morning Martin joined me at water aerobics. It was a smaller crowd but just as fun and Martin had fun hanging out with the ladies!

 Martin getting ready to head home after water aerobics

In the afternoon, Martin set up our snuba system and spent about an hour cleaning below the waterline on Blossom.  That evening Sean came over for drinks and we tried to go out but found that even on a Saturday night, the restaurants close at 6/7 o’clock. So we came back and had a lovely barbeque on Blossom.

Sunday morning Martin spent another 1.5 hours under the boat and I sprayed 303 protectorant on all things plastic including the kayaks, hatches and the epirb. The sun is brutal here and I’m hoping the 303 will provide a bit of protection. Then we picked up Sean and went over to the Chill & Chat for a pig roast. Lunch was tasty and we enjoyed sitting under the trees watching the kids and adults play and enjoy the beach.

People hanging out at the Chill & Chat pig roast

We’re finally getting out in the kayaks and into the water, we’re both a bit sunburned, we have bathing suits and wet suits hanging out to dry in the cockpit, are tracking sand into the boat, and we’re very happy J

Over the next several days we hope to get out snorkeling and free diving, take out the SUPs, do some hiking on Stocking Island (when the winds pick up and it'll be a bit cooler), explore the harbor by dinghy and explore Great Exuma Island a bit more as well!

Boat Business:

Flybridge radio. The radio stopped working when we left North Palm Beach. Suddenly, it came back on. We think there’s a leak somewhere in the flybridge helm and that water got in when the guys were cleaning the boat (we removed the cover for the cleaning). In theory it’s all water tight but we think water got in there and now it’s dried out.

Pilot House Radio. We turned it off the first night here because there’s so much radio traffic and in the morning it wouldn’t turn back on. Martin messed around with it and found that there’s a short between the back of the radio and the plug where the command mic plugs in on the flybridge. Water under the helm up there would explain both. Now the radio works unless the command mic is plugged in but it should easy enough for him to find the short and fix it.

Power management. We’ve turned off our direct tv satellite and turned on our second, 100A charger adding almost 50% more to our charging rate. (Thank you Sean! We’d been told not to do it because it could confuse the charger but Sean said we could and yes, it’s working just fine!)  We’re down to needing about 4-5 hours of generator time a day. It’s almost not enough time to cook, do laundry and make water ;)