An Incredible Passage and A Milestone

Sunrise over the mountains of the Dominican Republic

Steering for El Morro

Sometimes, everything goes right.  We left the Turks and Caicos at 11:00 am on Valentine’s Day, turned off the engine once we were out of the anchorage, and had the most delightful sail to the Dominican Republic.  At dawn I thought I saw dark clouds on the horizon, beneath the pink-tinged clouds overhead, but it was mountains!  The Bahamas are so flat, we’d nearly forgotten what elevation looks like.  We steered for El Morro, a singular, flat-topped mountain distinct from the DR mountain chain farther east.  In the distance to the southwest we could see the even larger mountains of Haiti looming in the haze.  If only all passages were this good.  While underway, our GPS hit the 10,000 nautical mile mark, indicating our distance travelled since we began our cruise: Florida to New England, south to the Bahamas, back north to Maine, and now underway to the Caribbean.  Pretty cool.

Trip log at 10,000 nautical miles, en route to the DR

Interesting Weather on the Caicos Banks

Sun and squall

Edge of the squall line

 The day we sailed across the Caicos Banks to South Caicos, there were rain clouds just to the south of us, though we were in the sun.  We were almost to our anchorage when we passed through a small squall.  After the clouds parted, we saw a disturbance on the water that came closer and closer, and passed less than 20 feet off of our bow.  After it passed, we looked up and saw a funnel extending from the cloud above – a waterspout in the making, though it never fully resolved into a full spout.  A little freaky, it being so close, but certainly interesting.  The day ended with a beautiful sunset.

 

The disturbed water in the center is the bottom of a nascent water spout

Beautiful sunset clouds

South Side Marina, Turks and Caicos

South Side Marina docks

Chris visiting with a couple of Australian sailors

Anne's new friend, who only loves her for the BBQ'd ribs on her plate

We have another recommendation for the Turks and Caicos, in case you’re coming in a boat instead of renting a house.  We went in to the South Side Marina (http://southsidemarina-tci.com/)to spend a night and get wifi, boat fuel, and water.  Simon and his wife, Charlyn, met us at the dock, and never stopped helping us for the time we were there.  Really terrific people.  They were cruisers in the Bahamas and Caribbean, and apparently have instituted changes at the marina to attract cruisers.  So, not only do they provide fantastic marina-based service, but they also host nightly happy hours, and a weekly BBQ.  They’ll even pick you up at Sapodilla Bay if you’re anchored over there.  For the BBQ, everyone brings their own meat to grill, and a side dish to share; the marina provides the gas grill, plate and napkins and plastic ware to eat with, and ice cream with chocolate and/or caramel sauce for dessert.  We met a bunch of other cruisers, and had a wonderful evening.  In addition, Charlyn drove us to the bank, supermarket, and boat store to pick up money and supplies, then gave us a tour of the Grace Bay area, where all the resorts and condos are.  If you want to catch them, be there before May, because Simon and Charlyn have bought an 85’ barge that they’ll take through the canals of France during the summer for the next few years.  How cool is that!

Turks and Caicos Islands

An overview of Sapodilla Bay.  Mr Mac is anchored toward the left-hand side of the picture.

A typical road in the untouristy, i.e., cruiser, part of town

All righty then, it’s been a while since I’ve posted.  When last I wrote, we were approaching the Turks and Caicos Islands.  We were there several days, but not nearly enough time to actually do everything there is to do.  We anchored in Sapodilla Bay, a beautiful spot with a nice beach, and surrounded by pretty houses, many of which are available to rent.  We did some walking around; since this a bit far from town proper (read: the tourist area), the roads aren’t necessarily in the best condition, but they got us where we were going.  One day we decided to go to lunch and, thinking we were taking a shortcut, turned down a side street before we got to the main road.  A couple of miles later, a kind gentleman, Jose, offered us a ride, because our “shortcut” had taken us well beyond the resort we were heading for, and he thought we looked stressed (heat+sun+can’t find the damned restaurant=stressed indeedy).  So here’s a plug for the house that Jose’s parents own, where he is the pool guy who recognizes stress when he sees it: Aqua View Villa, 3 br 2.5 bath, waterfront (www.vrbo.com/165679).  From the pictures on the website, it looks like the house is a sure cure for stress.  We finally found the restaurant, which was in a tiny little resort with just a few smallish houses.  The restaurant was on the water, pretty, great food and service, and inexpensive – what more could you ask for!

Anne trying to decide on what to order for lunch.  Chalk Sound in the background.

A Different Style of Cruising

We made an easy night passage from Mayaguana in the Bahamas to Providenciales in the Turks and Caicos, leaving about 4:00 pm and arriving early the next morning, with a beautiful sail most of the way.  In the middle of the night we were passed by a cruise ship.  It was HUGE.  Chris spotted its lights 13 miles away—it gave off more light than most of the islands we’ve visited—and he called them on the VHF radio to make sure they saw us.  The very pleasant radio guy on the ship answered, said that they were Explorer of the Seas, and that they’d deviate course a bit to stay clear of us.  The lights grew and grew until this enormous, brightly lit ship passed by about 1.5 miles away at 2:15 am.  I tried to take a picture of the ship (Chris woke me to see it), but taking a picture of a moving target in the dark from a rocking boat didn’t work well.  Instead here’s a picture of our radar display as it passed.  Normally, a contact will show up as a discreet little black bar.  Note here the huge return of the ship, which is the long, thick bar going around nearly half of the circle (our boat is the center dot).  That’s one big contact.  A ship like that is a whole different way to cruise: snug cabins, someone else cooks, unlimited bar, casinos and shows, ice-skating rink (yes, this ship has an ice rink).  But you know, I bet the guests on that ship couldn’t see the beautiful stars for all the deck lights, nor the ctenophores popping their little phosphorescent lights alongside the boat like we could.  So we’ll take our low-key and close-to-the-water style of cruising.  If you want more information and pictures of Explorer of the Seas, which is part of the Royal Caribbean cruise line, go to http://www.royalcaribbean.com/findacruise/ships/class/ship/home.do?br=R&shipClassCode=VY&shipCode=EX or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Explorer_of_the_Seas.

Beachcombing Treasures

You never know what you’ll find on a beach.  After a morning of snorkeling, we decided to take a walk on the long beach that runs along the northwestern shore of Abrahams Bay on Mayaguana.  We had to wind our way between the nearshore reefs, then walk the dinghy through the shallows to the beach, but we made it.  And what we found made it worth the trouble.  In the foreground of the picture to the right are four sea beans: one heart bean and three hamburger beans.  These are seed pods that float over from Africa and wash up on the beaches here.  The heart bean is large and dark brown, with an indentation that makes it look like a heart (a romantic heart, not a anatomical heart, which actually looks nothing like this ♥).  The hamburger beans have a dark band around the middle, sandwiched between (ha ha, pun intended) the lighter upper and lower halves; it looks just like a tiny hamburger – so cute!  Anyway, our big find was the bottle, which contained four messages!  They’re dated 2008, and we can’t read a single word.  If anyone can identify this language, we’d appreciate you leaving a comment to let us know.  Otherwise, I’m going to be trying out the translation programs online.  One of the messages included an email address, so we’ll email them, and let you know in a future blog what we find out.