Gulf Crossing 2016

1-25-2016
We are up early and getting ready to leave Lake Worth to cross to Green Turtle Cay. We plan on going in at Memory Rock which is a 57nm trip and should take about 9 hours at 6.5kts. Then we are heading to Great Sale Cay, another 40nm and should take about 7 hours.  We will rest at Great Sale for a few hours and then leave around 2am for Green Turtle. That trip will be 58nm and take about 9 hours. We have planned our arrival time to give us a rising tide so we will have enough water to get into Black Sound. As always, these times are dependent on the weather. The calmer the weather, the calmer the wind, the calmer the water, the better the trip!

We left Lake Worth at 6:45. We had a beautiful full moon still shining as we left the anchorage. The cruise ship Celebration was getting ready to leave. We beat her out!


Yes, it was dark when we got up to leave!

 

 

 

 We had a beautiful sunrise as we left the anchorage. We had a great trip south this year. Met up with lots of old friends and made lots of new ones. Richard and Connie, on Sea Salt; we'll see you over there soon. David and Emma, on Five Flip Flops; get our dock space ready. We're on the way!

I had not slept good the night before we left, so Shay let me go back to bed. The sea was not all that calm, so he made it easy on me.  It's hard to estimate the wave heights, but Shay said they were 4'-6' in the Gulfstream. Thanks for letting me sleep thru that!

We have video of some of the crossing. Hope to get it downloaded soon. Check back later.

 

Once we got on the banks, the water calmed down and we had beautiful calm aqua water. We got to Memory Rock, on the banks, about 2pm. We got to Mangrove Cay about 5:30pm. We saw several other boats we had talked to in Vero that left Lake Worth about 3am this morning. They were just pulling Mangrove to spend the night.

This picture was taken about 2:30pm. Calm water and beautiful blue sky and fluffy white clouds.

We knew we were in the Bermuda Triangle when we lost our route about 7pm. We turned things off and back on and they came up ok. Thank goodness!


Beautiful sunrise!

We ran 2 engines all day at about 7.5kts. That's faster than we usually run. Running faster makes the stablizers work better and that makes the ride a lot easier.

Our big full moon rising over the water about 8pm.

We got to Great Sale about 9pm. We traveled about 14 hours at 7.3kts and went 102.93nm. There were 2 other boats anchored there. Of course it was dark so no pictures. We went to bed and set our clocks to get us up about 2am.

This is our trip from Lake Worth to Great Sale Cay. The blue dots are two hour intervals.

Up and moving at 2:20am. There were 5 boats there when we left. Shay said he heard a motor running during the night and thought someone was dragging. Nope, it was someone else coming in. It's still dark so no pictures.

My sweet hubby let me go back to bed once we got out of the anchorage. Gosh, he sure is being good to me. He must be up to something!

He got me up just in time to see the our first Bahaman  sunrise. We have a great sunrise video. Hope to get it downloaded soon. Check back later.

Our first look at the entrance to Black Sound on Green Turtle Cay.

 

Fuel boat leaving Black Sound

 

This is what the markers look like heading into the Sound. They definitely want to make sure you go the right way!

Looking down the Sound toward Donny's Dock.

The first picture shows mangroves along the entrance. The next is a house along the water. The third is the fuel dock. This is where the fuel boat stops to leave fuel on the island. He was coming out as we were coming in the entrance. Of course we waited for him to get out before we started in. The last picture is another pretty house along the water.

Of course, David and Emma from FFF were there to greet us and catch our lines. It's great to see them!

This shows the last day of travel from Great Sale to Green Turtle.

This shows the entire trip from Lake Worth to Green Turtle. Great to be here. Can't wait to start exploring!

 We got to Donny's Marina dock about10am. We had traveled almost 8 hours at 7.1kts and went about 55nm.

Now its time to explore this island and surrounding area. When the weather is good, we will go out and explore and when the weather is not so good we will stay at the dock, Yes, we are at a dock. We don't spend much time at docks when we are away from Morehead City, so this will be different. All the water we can use, plugged in power, Wi-Fi, and no dingy ride to get to shore. This is living!

We are planning to be here until the end of March. Our daughter, Lauren, comes over for spring break the end of March, so we are looking forward to that! We will poke around the area and see what there is to see and do here. Looking forward to a great few months!

 

 

Time at Vero

Well, we have had a great stay at Vero aka Velcro Beach. It's called Velcro Beach because once you get here, you get stuck.

Our first mooring position. We moved from here so we would be farther away from the lights on the ball field and the music from the bar.

 

But we had a beautiful view of the sunset.

And the full moon rising.

Here's Salty Turtle, Vic and Gigi, with their mooring buddy.

 We had a great Thanksgiving meal with the CLODS and boaters. CLODS are Cruisers Living on Dirt. The CLODS provided the turkey and ham and the boaters supplies the appetizers, breads, sides and dessert. It was a beautiful day, great meal and wonderful company. We met lots of old friends and made new ones.

We've spent lots of time with FFF, David and Emma and Sea Salt, Richard and Connie. Salty Turtle, Vic and Gigi were here for a while.

This boat stopped at our dock for a while. It's a group of traveling entertainers.

You can see their equipment.

It's a big boat.

 We had David's favorite English meal, Shepherd's Pie. We also got to see the Christmas decorations on the boat and David and Emma! Please note the fuzzy cuddly bear slippers on Emma's feet!

FFF is ready for Christmas.

 

The Coast Guard came into the marina one day and replaced a floating buoy with a permanent one. It was really interesting to watch them install it. It sure took a lot of boat and a lot of workers. That was one expensive marker! Did you notice the Christmas lights on the boat? Yep, they are ready for Christmas just like FFF!

We celebrated Emma's and Richard's birthdays. We had a party at Bobby's and had a great time. We saw the boat Christmas parade from the dock, then had Emma's famous Bouillabaisse. Connie made a fantastic carrot cake that was enjoyed by all. Emma got new fuzzy flamingo slippers! She was very excited!

The birthday couple. I can't believe Richard let me take a picture of him with those antlers on! And no, he wasn't drinking!

And Connie made a delicious homemade carrot cake! Wish I had some now!

A different looking boat passing by our mooring.

Here we are all moored up with another boat.

This is a new screen we have installed while in Vero. Now we have them on all three doors.

We had a great time back in NC for Christmas. We rented a car and spent 2 weeks visiting family and friends back home. Of course, it was not enough time and we didn't get to see everyone. If we missed you we are sorry and hope to see you next time!

I spent time with my dad in VA and as always had a great time with him and Rascal, his dog.

Michelle and Ethan

Lauren and papa

Ethan and his present.

Chelle and her new top from me.

Sarah, papa, and her present

Michael

Shay looks happy

Lauren looks happy too!

Roux looks on as mom opens her gifts.

Papa and his grand-girls

Papa and his kids-kids.

Daddy and his girls

My daddy

Chelle and kids

Chelle and me

Lauren and Roux

Me and my babe

We had a great time celebrating Christmas at Shay's mom's. Jean, Shay, me, Jason, Ashley, Travis and Lauren opened our presents and had a good time celebrating before the rest of the family came over. 

 

Jeans models the necklace we got her

Roux dressed up for Christmas!

Shay and our "grand-dog"

 

We had a great time back home but it was time to head back to the boat. We were moored up with Cavara, Don and Barbara and had a great time with them. We always enjoy spending time with them. As they were leaving the marina, they tied to our stern and put their dingy up. We got some strange looks from other boaters. They are used to seeing two or three boats on a mooring, but not bow to stern.

Egret, a Nordhaven that crossed the Atlantic Ocean. It's new owners were moored to us one night.

Pretty bridge at night

Well, we have looked and looked at weather apps searching for a good time to cross the gulf stream and get to the Bahamas. David and Emma on FFF found a good window for sailing and took off. Shay spent hours-no days looking at weather apps, listening to Chris Parker-a weather person for cruisers in FL, Bahamas and Caribbean, and conferring with friends.

 

He finally decided we had a possible window January 25th, so we left Vero and spend three windy bouncy rough days in Hobe Sound. Then we moved to Lake Worth for the "final staging". So, if all goes as planned we will leave Lake Worth 1-25-2016 heading for Great Sale Cay for short nap and then on the Green Turtle Cay our vacation destination for the next two months and maybe longer. Who knows?

 

 

We had beautiful weather for the first part of our trip to Hobe Sound, as you can see from the first pictures. We even had dolphins welcoming us to the Fort Pierce area!

 

I think this is Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute.

This is Harbor Town marina, where Sea Salt is docked.

This is an old ferry boat that someone is remodeling. I bet this would have lots of room inside.

Looking out Ft. Pierce Inlet. We thought about going out here and going all the way to Lake Worth. Glad we didn't since the wind got up later on.

I love these! A toy tug boat for a boy and a floating barge for a girl!

Girl house

Boy house.

Look very closely at this picture. That bird has a fish in his claws. Yes, he does!

Love the gingerbread house!

These three pictures show our Hobe Sound anchorage the first night. Beautiful!

 

Our trip from Vero to Hobe Sound

 

 

Then the wind started blowing and blew for two days. We even had white-caps in the anchorage! Look at those flags! We stayed here until things settled down and then went to Lake Worth. We had a great trip.

 

Shay said the caption for this could be, "We'll buy this little place when we leave the boat, add on a few more rooms and call it home!"

Nice boat

I know I'm at Lake Worth when I see these buildings!

Boat in a dry dock. Getting ready to be worked on.

Our anchorage in Lake Worth

Shay said this was the best looking "ugly boat" he's ever seen. Note the paint job!

More pictures of our anchorage.

Our trip to Lake Worth

 

Tomorrow we leave for the pretty water!