New Year's Eve Staniel Cay

Good Morning to all... Hope everyone has recovered from the festivites of the Eve!

Dwayne and I explored a little bit of the town yesterday (NY Eve) We hope to hike the other side sometime today, weather permitting, etc... She is a quaint village.... stopped at the local Breadmakers house and purchased some yummy Bahamian bread... The local dive shop gave us tips on where to "possibly" find some bugs (lobsters!) Took dinghy back to SeaVeyor and I snorkled some, Dwayne read, and we both just chilled out awhile... Nice and sunny..working on those tans! We took the dinghy over to the Yacht Club and purchased tickets for their New Year's Eve dinner... It was a buffet of Pork, Turkey, and veggies, etc... not too bad...Came back to SeaVeyor and watched the fireworks from our bow!! Beautiful nite!! A good steady rain woke us around 3:30am and had to scramble to shut all hatches!! Woke up to a beautiful morning today... Not too windy, yet... Expecting West to NorthWest winds this evening up to 30mph.... We believe our anchorage will be fine.. but keeping a good watch on it and listening to radio closely....I have attached some pics of the village and of us on the bow watching the fireworks!! More news at 11...............Happy New Year

Nassau to Allen's Cay

Left out from Nassau at 10am.. beautiful morning, but soon turned to light rain...We crossed the Yellow Banks at a steady pace... Dwayne watching carefully for the Coral Heads that were in our passage path ... We made it to Allen's Cay with no issues and dropped anchor around 2pm ( Mamma and Cats did better this time... seas were not too bad) Rain had stopped, and little bits of sun peaking out... The anchorage was very crowded.. I think we counted 24 or more vessels. You have to be cautious and make sure there's plenty of room to swing when the wind, current, etc changes... We both swam a little... I swam over to the little beach where the Allen's Cay lizards were...Bunches of them..So ugly they were cute! Well, at least I thought so. The pics I made were taken from the Seaveyor, so no close ups.... Dwayne swam down and checked the anchor... He was not happy with it, so we raised anchor and moved to a better, more secure spot... Recognized several boats at anchor with us... Nimue (we met at Chub) Amyrick, and Julia Maria (we met at Bimini) and several others ....Dwayne and I were having our sundowner and discussing dinner plans...the winds were starting to hit us out of the North, light rain and then the fun began!!!

OK, let me back up, when we came into the anchorage area, there were two basins, one very picturesque and one larger where all the boats were... when we first arrived, there was one sailing vessel, 38' Island Packet and one Sportfish anchored there....As I stated earlier around dusk, Dwayne and I were talking out in the cockpit area and we saw that the SV Island Packet was really hobby horsing due to the North winds coming thru the channel and less than 15 minutes later, we saw the Island Packet on it's port side on the rocks!! Dwayne made a quick call on the VHF to see if anyone had their dinghy in the water ... got response from a fellow named Howard that agreed to pick up Dwayne and they proceeded to dinghy over to the Island Packet to help...where they reset two bow anchors and came back to SeaVeyor to grab another anchor and reset it off of her stern...There was little else that could be done at the time other than lend moral support.. the owner was working as hard as he could to winch himself off the rocks... Around 9pm, he was off the rocks and righted , holed( hole in the hull) Next morning, we met with him, he had made repairs as he could,we did get our anchor back..He was planning on getting back to Nassau, but bless him, he saved his vessel... It just goes to show you how quickly things can change from beautiful to utter KAOS..... As my Captain says.... You can never have too much ground tackle...

The next day was beautiful, but very breezy, strong current... Dwayne took dinghy over to rock shores and looked for some bugs (lobsters!) none to be found there...so we relaxed a little and read... invited the couple from Nimue over for dinner... dinner was wonderful, but winds were really picking up again!! It felt like we were in a washing machine all nite, but we had a secure anchor.... Left out the next morning for Staniel Cay in good weather and not bad seas... We decided to come straight to Staniel and bypass the park at Warderick Wells.. because you can not fish there... My Captain wants to Fish!!!!! So, we will catch it on the way back....Staniel Cay is a very busy little island with lots of cruisers, fishing boats etc.. we plan on exploring today if rain subsides... Don't have many pics of it yet, but more will come.... the pics I posted were from Allen's Cay.. The pic with the lone palm tree was the little basin with the SV that got into trouble later in the evening...

Happy New Year to you all.... Dwayne and Linda

Chub Cay to Nasssau

Sunday December 27th

Good Morning to all, we arrived in Nassau yesterday afternoon from Chub Cay... We had spent several nites anchored out there and decided to come in on Christmas Eve to dock at the Chub Cay Marina... Beautiful facility, not many boats there either, beautiful homes on the shoreline with a private beach ( it's a private island) We stayed thru Christmas Day and were invited to a Christmas get together by one of the original island owners/investors... Very gracious family and met some of the locals too... It was fun and saw a gorgeous sunset from their porch! So, left out the 26th for a half day journey to Nassau.... The Eastern channel , the main thoroughfare, was very active with little boats, big boats, and there were 4 Cruise ships docked.. We are right across from the Atlantis Resort... talk about huge... WOW... we got in after lunch, were starved.. and went on our errand/provision run and just across the marina was a Kentucky Fried Chicken!! I think we actually ran to it!!!!!!!!!!!! Ha!!!!! After filling our tummies with good ole fried chicken, we got a few other provisions and Dwayne found me some dive gear.. those suits really show ALL your curves! But can't wait to try it snorkeling around the small islalnds..

Getting ready to shove off for the Northern Exumas... plan on stopping around Allen's Cay first...I doubt we have wifi access for a while, so it might be sometime before I can update the blog site again...

Dwayne and I wish you all a Happy New Year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chub Cay

Tuesday December 22,2009 Chub Cay

We left out of Bimini yesterday morning around 8am and made it to Chub Cay right at dusk last nite and found a beautiful little basin to drop anchor in.. It was a long day to say the least.. Seas were not too bad, 3 footers with wind out of the North ..just overcast.. no sunshine...Dwayne has said we can't post any pics of us until we get a tan...Geez... at this rate... who knows.. maybe a tan by February! Ha!

Woke up early.. still overcast and little peaks of sun here and there.. I decided to be brave... jumped in and snorkeled around the SeaVeyor... What fun...Very sandy/grassy bottom.. no rocks or coral here, but did see a few fish and got some good exercise.. did happen to see a very small lion fish... The water is 8'deep, but looks like we are in a foot of water.. so very aqua and clear.... Dwayne managed to catch a Remora fish this afternoon... It's a species that attaches itself to other larger fish/turtles....nice size fish, but not one to eat! We are watching a front in the distance, believe it or not, we want some fresh rainwater to wash off the salt from SeaVeyor...Hopefully it will come around and give us a little shower...

We plan on staying here thru Christmas , having wifi is nice, and we can communicate with family and friends during Christmas day... Hope to take the dinghy out tomorrow and explore some and maybe my Captain will catch me a grouper... Will attach a few pics..

We also had some visitors this morning... Cute little birds that did not seem to be afraid of us, although they decided it was time to leave when Monkey Butt came out in the cockpit!!

P.S. yes, I know I did not hit the right key for spelling "champagne" , so fire me as a journalist!!! Anyway, look forward to toasting all of our friends and family that support our adventure... I have not regretted one minute... Although, so much more to this than I ever expected....Navigation, weather, ship maintenance, and most importantly, becoming one with SeaVeyor and recognizing every sound she makes... good and bad.

Bimini (cont.)

Sunday Dec. 20th

Wind has died down a little and supposed to lay down a little more tomorrow and Tuesday.. Hopefully, that will give us a window to make it across the Grand Bahama Banks over the next two days... Thought we could make an early morning shove off, but must wait on dockmaster here to come in and check us out..(could not do it today because of power meter, makes sense)

It was very sunny today, just windy still.. Dwayne worked on the boat after a morning brunch of eggs, muffins, and peppered bacon.. First mate is not a bad cook, ya know! After lunch, I walked around the facility and made some more pics... Dwayne ran into another Canadian couple that were coming back from the Exumas and headed towards Florida. They shared with us their travels and likes, etc...They are also traveling on a Cat.. a Lagoon.. Very nice.. She is named "Sabatical"..

Tomorrow we plan to make it at least half way to the Berry's and then on to Chub Cay the next day.. then possibly down to Nassau... My Captain needs some boat stuff.. parts... etc... and that's the most logical place to find a good marine store... They should also have wifi there, so I can update the blog again... the attached pics are some of the resort here... the sweet shuttle driver told me that we missed the "action" by a week. She said the resort would be wall to wall people next week for New Year's Eve.. one of their biggest weeks.. Oh well, don't want to share my champayne anyway.... Merry Christmas to all of you and Happy New Year too.... Dwayne and Linda

Bimini

We were able to find dockage at the Bimini Bay Resort..We were not aware that this was

off season, so there was lots of room! By the time we got settled in and my Captain was happy , for the moment with the lines, it was late afternoon and the wind had really picked up. Winds were very strong thru the nite and continued more so during the day Friday with very strong horizontal rain.. Needless to say, we did not get golf cart and tour Alice town.. not yet..I will attach a pic or two of what it looked like in the bay/channel where we are docked.. So Happy we made dockage here for protection... The winds died down a little early morning, but still very strong... We did get a cart today, Saturday 19th and tour Alice Town. Not quite what we expected, but still interesting... We had lunch at Capt.Bob's and enjoyed grouper fingers and lobster roll... The town is to have a Christmas celebration tonite at the market and we will check it out... As for our departure here, waiting on that safe weather window.. We believe it will be Monday and will head out, possibly, for the Berrys.. The fun thing is that we don't have an agenda and are free to choose where....the when is Mother Nature dependent... We met two very nice Canadian families that have been underway for two months from Montreal!! Now that's a haul..They are out for 5yrs and the other couple are out for 8 years.. they have children on board that they are home/boat schooling..Where we are docked, The Bimini Bay Resort, is awesome.. It's a relatively new marina/resort with all the amenities one could ask for... it's just empty...The staff said their busiest time is June thru September... Go figure.. that's Hurricane Season... They have state of the art dockage, heated pools, shower facilities with teak and tile to die for.... uh, just don't drink the water!!!!!!!!! rum is good......... More news at 11***********

Cat Cay to Bimini

Hi to all,

We only stayed one nite at Cat Cay...the next nite we anchored just off of the shoreline.. I tried to snorkel some... how funny a site was I!!!!! So says Dwayne... But it was fun... Water was wonderful and not cold at all.... Watched a beautiful sunset and had a wonderful meal.. We raised anchor around 8:30 am this morning and headed to Bimini to get a little protection from the front that is coming in for the next couple of days.. Bimini was 8 miles to the NE from our anchorage, and saw a rainstorm come in this am and a water spout... Will try to attach the pics again. Hope to get a golf cart and see the old section of Alice Town this afternoon..