The Crossing

4/22/09 Today turned out to be a very busy day for us. The weather window was looking perfect for our type of crossing, seas 3 feet or less and wind light only from the south or east. Jay and Ginger caught the 11:00 ferry over to Treasure Cay. We paid our bill at the yacht club and headed out.

First stop was Green Turtle Club to fill up with fuel. We then had a bumpy ride over to Allan's-Pensacola Cay arriving at 5:00PM. We prepared Born to Cruise for crossing and had a quiet evening after watching a beautiful sunset complete with our first green flash of the year. Just after sunset a laughing gull decided to take a rest on our wind generator. (With so much solar power we keep the wind generators tied up unless it is a really cloudy day. ) The gull tried to stand on the base of the blade but could not get his footing. He finally put one foot on the housing and the other on the blade. He stayed perched on the wind generator for almost 45 minutes. The picture in one of the bird books we have showed this laughing gull had his "breeding plumage". I wondered if he was trying to decide if he should build a nest on Born to Cruise. He did not seem to mind that I was taking pictures of him. I was tempted to feed him, but we don't need any pets. After he was rested and evidently decided there were better places to build a nest, so he flew away.

Earlier in the day on the VHF radio we heard our friends, Dave and Beth on Grateful Attitudes going by Green Turtle Cay heading to Great Sale Cay to stage for crossing tomorrow. We decided to call each other nightly at 8:00PM while making our crossing. Tonight on our first call we learned that they had made it to Great Sale late and were getting up early to head out.

The weather predicted was ideal for "our perfect crossing window" starting tomorrow, so it was time to go, so we told Dave we would be going too.

4/23/09 We awoke to a perfect day, gentle breezes behind us and seas 2' or less. It was a go. We had the anchor up and were underway at 7:30 headed to the US. What a beautiful day! Chris Parker, our weather guru, said this was one of the best crossing windows he had ever seen, and he has been doing cruising weather for over 5 years. On our first trip back from the Bahamas, we came into the US at Fort Pierce. With the current weather prediction, we knew we could make it to at least Canaveral with this weather window.

Two large dolphin came up and were playing with the boat. They love to swim in between the pontoons, go under the bow and swim beside the boat and back again. They are such beautiful animals.

Wayne decided with the gentle swell that he would just wear ½ of a sea sick patch. (That turned out to be enough, because he had no problems on our trip).

Wayne was so excited when we found our messages in the bottle that he wanted prepare some bottles too. It was so calm we were able to write a message to put in the bottles and print it on the computer. We prepared three bottles and would drop them off in the gulf stream.

The first day of our crossing was getting across the Bahama Banks. It was so flat and glassy that we could see the bottom! It was nice to have one final day of enjoying the aquamarine waters of the Bahamas. We put up the main when there was a little wind just to help us along, but it didn't do much. It was so calm that we were able to take showers and Wayne was able to be in the salon instead of sitting at the helm. He even played solitaire on the computer which he has never been able to do on previous crossings.

We check in on the single side band radio with the Cruiseheimers Net most mornings while we are cruising and all mornings when we are moving. Dick from St Jude, is the Saturday Net Control. Dick offers a net in the evening at 5:00PM called the Doodah net. Dick follows your track as you cross or helps when emergency contact is needed. We checked in with Dick to update our progress. At 8:00PM we also talked to Dave on Grateful Attitudes, they were about 4 hours ahead of us. Dave said they were headed for Brunswick, GA. Wayne and I thought about this for a while and decided with the perfect conditions we had so far we would go north of Canaveral, either Fernandina or possibly Brunswick depending on how much of a boost we got from the gulf stream and how much fuel we were using.

We had a beautiful sunset over the water and saw our second green flash of the year. At 8:25 we reached the Atlantic Ocean. It was still flat and glassy, just like we like it. We set the course and Wayne went to bed to get a little sleep.

A little after 10:00 PM I heard the Coast Guard hailing a boat by giving GPS coordinates. I responded to verify that it was not us. They were actually hailing another boat called Hawkeye, who was within sight of us most of the day and had been talking to us over the radio every now and then. I was surprised that Hawkeye was not answering. A few minutes later Hawkeye hailed me on the radio and said there was a blue light shining into his boat, did I know what was going on. They had accidentally turned off the radio while trying to fix an electrical problem. I told him the Coast Guard had been hailing him. He immediately hailed the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard wanted to board them for a safety inspection. Twenty minutes later the Coast Guard was hailing us. They wanted to do a safety inspection of Born to Cruise, they asked if we had a preferred side for entry. I told them the starboard side works best and that I would open the gate. I turned on the "landing lights" (our new LED lights on the bottom of the arch), opened the gate and then I woke Wayne.

It is really kind of a neat process. They launch a really fast dinghy. You maintain your speed; we were doing about 8 knots with the help of the current. They pull up alongside and two officers got on our boat. Their dinghy continued at speed while the two were on our boat. They were very polite. They wanted to see the bilges, our life jackets, flares, throwing devices, fire extinguishers, documentation and passports. We passed inspection with flying colors. They filled out a form and gave us the gold copy. They said if we are called again for another boarding that we could give them the number on the form and for one year we were exempt from this type of inspection. This all took about 20 minutes. They left and were off to do another inspection. We were in the gulf stream now, it was time to throw our bottles. It will be interesting to see where they end up and who finds them. It was my turn to sleep for a while, but I was so wound up it was hard to go to sleep.

4/24/09 Around 1 AM the wind picked up a little, so Wayne put up the main sail and turned off one engine to conserve fuel. He had been doing calculations and thought we could make it to Brunswick, especially if we could conserve fuel for a little while.

Every morning while in the Bahamas we listen to the weather, today was no exception. Chris Parker was still predicting perfect weather. We had entered the gulf stream after dark, this morning we could see it. The gulf stream water is an amazing shade of indigo blue. I would love to have a gemstone that beautiful color.

Our normal cruising speed with both engines at 2000 RPM is around 6.5 knots, while in the gulf stream our max speed was 11.7!!! But we were doing between 9 and 10 knots while riding the gentle swells. As they say "it doesn't get any better than this".

After all of our calculations and using one engine and the sail for over 8 hours we determined if we transferred the fuel from the bladder tank and the jerry jugs to the main tank we could make it to Charleston. We had about 20 gallons of fuel in the bladder tank. We pulled out the transfer pump and it would not work, the impeller was bad. Next Wayne tried one of the pumps that attaches to the end of a drill, it did not have enough power. He finally tried the oil change bucket pump and it worked! We got all of the fuel transferred and throttled up the engines. Our course now set for Charleston.

It was another beautiful day on a gently rolling gulf stream. We were able to use our Genoa & main sail for part of the day to add a little boost to our speed. Around 4:30 in the afternoon a small bird flew into the salon. We were 50 miles offshore so we were surprised that such a small bird would be out so far. He sat down for a minute and then flew out the door. We were both glad he left on his own so we did not have to figure out a way to catch him.

Another beautiful sunset! Sunsets are just prettier over water.

4/25/09 It was a peaceful night and the seas were still calm. Three times this morning pods of dolphins racing with the boat and playing with us. They are so much fun to watch. We also saw a pod of small whales off in the distance.

12:30 PM Land HO!!! That's what they always say in the movies. We were within sight of Charleston Harbor. We saw a large sea turtle, but when he heard the engines he went under the water.

We were able to get a cell phone signal when we were 6 miles off shore. We called Customs and Immigration, they said they would meet us at the dock. Then we called Charleston City Marina and made a reservation. Cell phone minutes are free on the weekend; it was good it was Saturday because we made quite a few calls.

We were tied up to the dock at Charleston City Marina at 3:40 and the engines were quiet after 56 hours non-stop. We had traveled 421 miles with an overall average speed of 7.5 knots. We were safely back in the US after what so far has been our easiest crossing and will probably be our easiest crossing ever. The Customs agent arrived within 10 minutes and quickly cleared us in. We were officially back.

Jay and Ginger's Visit

4/12/09 The 11:30 ferry from Treasure Cay pulled in to White Sound, Green Turtle and pulled up to our boat to drop off Jay and Ginger. Talk about service with a smile! They were tired after their trip from Denver. Their flight had departed at 1:30 in the morning! We did not give them much time to rest. We ate lunch and pulled up the anchor. The winds were perfect for an easy sail up to Powell Cay. After anchoring we headed to shore to walk the beach. It was near low tide so we walked the inside beach. There were only a few sand dollars but there were other treasures to find and things to see. The good thing about Jay and Ginger being so tired was that it made for an easier transition to get adjusted to not only to the Eastern time but also "cruisers time". Cruisers midnight is 9:00 PM.

4/13/09 After a rolly night at Powell we moved to Allans-Pensacola. The wind was not as cooperative today so we only put up the main to pretend we were a sail boat. After anchoring and lunch we walked over to the Atlantic side beach. Jay and Ginger added their names to the signing tree. Wayne and I walked to the point to see how the Atlantic side anchorage looked. The wind was predicted to shift during the night. The seas were already starting to lie down. Early in the evening Teamwork pulled into the anchorage. After dinner we taught Ginger how to play Mexican Train Dominoes. Jay only needed a short refresher lesson because he played Mexican Train when he visited us on our first cruise.

4/14/09 The wind was shifting to the south, so we needed to move to the Atlantic side of Allans-Pensacola. Teamwork left before we did and radioed to say that the anchorage looked perfect for the wind. We moved around the island and anchored not far from Teamwork and very close to where we had anchored when we were there before. Ginger had never snorkeled before but wanted to give it a try. We went to shore to let her try snorkeling. Although Ginger is a good swimmer, she has a touch of claustrophobia and is also nearsighted. Because she could not see well out of the mask and felt closed in, she decided that she would not be snorkeling on this trip. She did enjoy swimming around while Jay, Wayne and I snorkeled and explored the white sandy bottom near shore. Later in the afternoon Teamwork called to say they were going out to the reef so Bill could do some fishing and asked if any of us would like to go. Jay and Wayne joined them for a short snorkeling trip before the rain started. Ginger and I stayed on Born to Cruise and I taught her how to play Quiddler. We enjoyed Trigger Fish for dinner. Trigger Fish is a mild white meat fish that is very tasty. The Trigger Fish was from our freezer, Teamwork had given it to us after a previous snorkel trip. After dinner Bill called on the radio to say he was watching the radar and we were in for an evening of squalls and heavy rain. We had a lot of squalls this evening. Bill kept us informed of when to expect them. We played Farkle and kept a close watch on the storms. The boat got a nice rinse and we were thankful when the storms had finally passed around 10:00 PM so we could go to bed.

4/15/09 Teamwork was going snorkeling and invited us along. Jay and Ginger road over with Teamwork. Wayne and I took the dinghy. It was a beautiful reef with lots of fish. The first thing I saw when I got to the reef was a big grouper. I called Bill over and he caught it. Ginger fished some with Bettie Sue, then Jay took her for a dinghy ride using the Looky Bucket. A Looky Bucket is basically a 5 gallon plastic paint bucket that has had the bottom replaced with something that is clear so you can see through it. They really work well to see into the clear Bahamian water. Bill found a small turtle on the reef and pointed him out so I could get a picture. The turtle was not posing well so Bill picked him up so I could take a few pictures. As I was going back to the boat after snorkeling I saw a big Trigger Fish under Teamwork. Bettie Sue put a hook in the water and was able to catch him. There was a four foot barracuda hanging around keeping his distance. When I saw the 9' nurse shark I decided it was time to stop snorkeling for the day.

Earlier in the season Bill had mentioned he would love to climb our mast and take pictures. The conditions were right, so he came over and took pictures from the spreaders.

The winds were going to pick up over-night so we moved back to the main anchorage. After we moved Bill came over to take more pictures, this time climbing to the top of the mast. Bettie Sue had cleaned the two fish and gave us half the catch of the day. I downloaded the pictures I had taken underwater and got some good ones. Unfortunately when I tried to take another picture later in the day the camera would not work. Now we are definitely getting another underwater camera when we get back. After dinner we taught Jay and Ginger how to play Rummy Cube.

4/16/09 This morning Bill was burning his trash on the beach and Wayne and Jay joined him and burned our paper trash. I made granola and shared my recipe and technique with Ginger. After lunch we again snorkeled with Teamwork. We went to a beautiful area of reef on the inside of Allans-Pensacola Cay. I was so disappointed that my underwater camera was not working because I was eye to eye with so many beautiful fish. I guess we will just have to go back next year so I can get my pictures. Bill and Bettie Sue once again caught fish and shared them with us. We had wonderful fresh fish for dinner! When Bettie Sue cleaned the fish she saved the non edible parts, around sunset Bill threw these parts in the water between our two boats. He attracted 4 small reef sharks and a large ray. They enjoyed their snack and we enjoyed watching them. Tonight we played a card game called "oh hell".

4/17/09 The winds were again shifting so it was time to move. Teamwork was going to head north to catch a crossing window and we were going back south. We said our good byes with the promise that we would see each other soon. After breakfast we raised anchor and went to Powell Cay. We swam and snorkeled the ship wreck at Powell Cay. After lunch we again raised anchor and made the trip to Manjack Cay. The winds were already picking up and the water was choppy which made for a bumpy ride. We anchored at Nunjack Beach at Manjack Cay. Tonight it was Dominoes night, so we played Smutchski and Mexican Train dominoes..

4/18/09 Happy Birthday to Ginger! We spent the morning walking the north beach of Manjack Cay. A beautiful beach but not many shells and no sea glass to pick up. We did pick up some trash and put it in piles. After lunch we moved to the main anchorage at Manjack Cay. Jay swam out to snorkel the barge wreck while Wayne and Ginger followed in the dinghy. I made Key Lime Pie while they were gone. Ginger's birthday dinner was steamed lobster, green bean casserole, pasta salad and key lime pie. Games for the evening were Farkle and Mexican Train Dominoes.

4/19/09 Our adventure today was a visit to Bill and Leslie on Manjack Cay. They have 5 acres of property that they have spent 17 years nurturing. They have a beautiful home surrounded by plants and flowers, including vegetable gardens and fruit trees. They have beautiful chickens and feed a variety of birds. Jay fed the little birds in the palm of his hand. Ginger fed the chickens out of her hand. Bill explained bees and their importance to Wayne and me. It was a wonderful morning, we appreciate Bill and Leslie sharing their piece of paradise with us. After lunch Jay and Wayne snorkeled the barge wreck. This evenings games were Triominos and Farkle.

4/20/09 Again the winds were changing so it was time to move. We went to White Sound in Green Turtle Cay and set the anchor but did not like where we were anchored. We raised the anchored and moved to Leeward Yacht Club in Black Sound. Leeward is a new neighborhood with beautiful homes and a new dock. After lunch we rented a golf cart for 24 hours, Thanks Ginger. We explored the Lowe Art Gallery, the town of New Plymouth and got a few groceries. We decided to have dinner at the Green Turtle Club, it was excellent as usual, Thanks Jay. Farkle was the game for today.

4/21/09 It was raining early in the morning. Wayne decided it was time to pickle the water maker for the season. We only use the water maker in the pretty Bahamian water; we do not use it in the US. To pickle a water maker you put in chemicals to clean it out, flush those out and then add a chemical to "pickle" it to keep things from growing in it until you are ready to use it again. This process preserves the membrane so it can be used again. The rain stopped so we took advantage of the hours left on our golf cart rental. We walked a beach, revisited a few gift shops and had lunch at the Wrecking Tree.

The weather forecast was shaping for good a crossing window. Wayne and Jay emptied the fuel jerry jugs into the tank and were going to get them filled. We found out the nearest fuel dock was out of fuel. So Wayne and Jay just took a dinghy ride around Black Sound. Tonight's games were "oh hell" and Quiddler.

4/22/09 Jay and Ginger's flight was scheduled to leave in the early afternoon. They spent the morning packing and figuring out ways to take home shells, sand dollars and a few conch shells. We said our good byes. Once again they had door to door service as the ferry picked them up at the dock just in front of Born to Cruise. They left the Bahamas and found new snow on the ground in Colorado and unfortunately they were back to reality.

Snorkeling and Beach Walking, Life is Good!

Note: I will add a picture when we have a good internet connection

4/4/09 As predicted the winds were picking up, so it was time to move from Allans-Pensacola. We decided to move to Manjack Cay which is 20.6 miles and takes about three and a half hours. After anchoring, we relaxed and enjoyed surfing the internet.

4/5/09 We had a call early from Bill and Bettie Sue on Teamwork asking what are plans were for the day. They were going snorkeling and invited us to ride with them out to an ocean reef behind Manjack Cay. They anchored Teamwork in a sandy place between 5 or 6 large coral beds. We snorkeled them all! They were really beautiful and each one was just a little different. They were also tall and in very deep water. None of my pictures turned out very well. I think I was trying to take pictures
of fish that were too far away. Oh well, better luck next time.

We ate our picnic lunch on Teamwork in transit to the bay at the north end of Manjack. They took us to a place where we could get sea glass. This sea glass was in the water and you had to dive under to grab it off the bottom. The current was pretty strong, so it was a difficult task. In the past I had not done much diving under with my snorkel, but I did it today. Because I float so well naturally, if I am going to do much diving under the water and want to stay down instead of bobbing back up
to the top then I will need to get a weight belt. There was another small reef near the glass and we checked it out too. A great day of snorkeling!

After getting back to Born to Cruise we moved over to White Sound at Green Turtle Cay to be in a good spot for the next front. We slept well after a very busy day.

4/6/09 It was very windy today. We needed bread and lettuce so we took the dinghy over to New Plymouth. Our ride over was into the wind and we both had on our foul weather jackets, but anything that was not covered by the jacket was soaked by the spray coming over the side of the dinghy! Thankfully on the trip back from grocery shopping, the wind was at our back and it was like surfing.

I had broken the clip on my fin when we were snorkeling, so we went into Brendals Dive Shop to see if they had a replacement. They did not have the clip to fit my fin; thankfully we have extra fins that I can use and I will replace the clip when we get back to the US.

We were glad we had gotten a good spot to anchor because the wind was picking up and there were still boats coming into the very crowded anchorage.

4/7/09 This was our windiest day so far in the Bahamas this year. We saw winds of over 40 knots! Our big Delta anchor held well. We stayed on the boat all day. I used the time to make yogurt and granola. Wayne did more work on some new conch horns. One bit of excitement was the fuel tanker, Tropic Breeze, came into the harbor today. Two boats had to move so the Tropic Breeze had enough room to make it through the anchorage. We were thankful we did not have to move. We kept a close watch
all day to make sure no one near us was dragging on their anchor. Several boats did drag, but they were not near us. We left our GPS anchor alarm on so it would tell us if we were dragging and we did not. The GPS records how far you travel; we had swung back and forth on the anchor and covered over 2 miles!!! The winds were predicted to calm over night.

4/8/09 The winds had calmed so we raised the anchor and moved back to Manjack Cay. As we were finishing lunch a dinghy pulled up beside us. Larry on Dana Jean needed help with his computer and Teamwork told him maybe we could help. Larry's computer has a Vista operating system which we are not familiar with. It took us a while but between Wayne and me, we figured out how to resolve his problem.

We had a fun evening aboard BTC getting to know Larry and Dana while teaching them how to play Mexican Train Dominoes.

4/9/09 Once again Teamwork was calling on the VHF asking if we would like to go for a short snorkeling trip before their guests were due to arrive. We readily agreed. Bill found another reef for us to explore. This was a single huge bed of coral. At first we were disappointed that there did not seem to be many fish.then we swam around to the back side and found where all the fish were. We had another beautiful snorkel.

After they dropped us off on BTC we decided to kayak over to Crab Cay to look for sea glass. The "draft" on the kayaks is less than 3 inches but there were places that we still had to get out and pull them through the shallow water an hour before low tide. We went back to the beach where we had found so much glass before. We found some nice pieces but not nearly the quantity we had found before. The recent wind had put a lot of sand in the places we like to look so we think the glass was hiding.
We will go back to this spot and try it again sometime and hopefully find more. The tide was up enough that we had a nice easy kayak ride back to BTC. We were tired after a very busy day.

4/10/09 We once again took advantage of the free wifi offered by Bill and Leslie on Manjack Cay. It was also time to start cleaning and picking up. I am still not sure how the boat gets quite so cluttered and dirty in such a short period of time.

After lunch Larry and Dana joined us for a nice long walk down the beach at Manjack on the Atlantic side. There are some really neat rock formations on the beach that we explored and we found a few nice pieces of sea glass. Dana and Larry had never looked for sea glass, but they quickly learned how to determine a "Class A" rated piece of sea glass. On the way back to BTC we stopped and met Bonnie and Roger on Kokomo. Bonnie is the net control one day a week on the Cruiseheimers SSB radio net.
It was nice to put a face with the voice we had been hearing for 3 years. We did not get back to BTC until almost 7:00! Another nice day in the Abacos.

4/11/09 Time to head back to White Sound at Green Turtle Cay. After anchoring and lunch we dinghied over to New Plymouth to get fresh produce and bread. Once again it was an extremely wet dinghy ride over and I was soaked. Good thing it is warm out. While I put away groceries and did some cleaning, Wayne helped Dana Jean with some sail repair work. Wayne also got more dinghy gas in preparation for the busy 10 days ahead.

Once again Larry and Dana joined us for an evening on BTC, tonight we taught them how to play Farkle.

4/12/09 This morning we washed a load of clothes and are doing some final cleaning. My brother, Jay and his girlfriend, Ginger will be arriving from Colorado on the 11:30 flight. They will fly out on the 22nd. So far the weather forecast is for daytime highs in the 80's..Jay had snow this week so it should be a nice change for him. Now if the winds will cooperate we may even get to sail!

Suicidal Lobster!

Wayne showing off the first and only lobster he has ever caught. Picture by Bettie Sue on Teamwork.

3/30/09 Delay in plans. Well the plan was to get up and head out of White Sound this morning. The fresh water pump had been sounding sluggish, well this morning it died. The pump was at least 5 years old so we were not surprised that it died. We carry two spare fresh water pumps, because we need fresh water! The water pump installation itself is not hard but getting to the pump is a challenge. It is located underneath the stove. Wayne took out the old pump and installed the new one, but it took a couple of hours.

Most days we run the generator to make water. Well this morning the generator would not start. Wayne found out the battery was dead, it is not hooked into the main bank of batteries. He rigged a battery charger and was able to get it started. It has been working since then. Another item to add to the summer project list is to connect the diesel generator battery to the main bank bus.

We watched 25 boats leave White Sound that morning. There was a crossing window coming up and lots of people are headed back. After lunch we raised the anchor and went to Powell Cay. On the way to Powell Cay we had at least three dolphin playing tag with the boat. They are so much fun to watch.

After anchoring at Powell we still had enough time to walk the beach. The tide was low so we walked a loop around the south end of the island. We saw lots of sand dollars but I have so many so we did not pick them up. We also saw a ray, lots of baby conch, and horse conch (which are not edible). We picked up two pretty shells a Partridge Turn and our first Atlantic Figsnail. We were pleased to see that the path to cut across the island had been cleared more since we had last visited.

3/31/09 We were happy when the diesel generator started on the first try and we were able to make water. The wind shift was making the anchorage at Powell get rolly so it was time to move. It was a rainy, sometimes foggy trip over to Allans-Pensacola. We had the anchorage to ourselves for about 10 minutes and then our friends, Bill and Bettie Sue, on Teamwork pulled in and anchored. Teamwork hailed us and asked if we would like to go snorkeling after lunch out on the reef on the Atlantic side. They did not have to do any arm twisting to get us to go along.

Teamwork came by to pick us up and we headed out to the reef on the back side of Allans-Pensicola. I wore my shorty wet suit and Wayne had on his full wet suit, the water was wonderful. Bill is a hunter. We saw lots of lobster and Bill convinced Wayne that he should borrow a spear and try his luck. A suicidal lobster jumped on the spear that Wayne was holding. Today was the last day of lobster season so the lobster was determined, it had to jump three times but finally managed to commit suicide on the end of Wayne’s spear. Wayne was very excited to get his first lobster ever! Bettie Sue caught a HUGE trigger fish and gave us two LARGE fillets plus three lobster that Bill caught to go along with Wayne’s lobster. Yummy! I just had fun snorkeling and watching all the fish. The underwater camera battery died after 4 pictures so we did not get many pictures today.

After putting our catch of the day in the fridge and getting some rest, we waited for low tide. Bill and Bettie Sue showed us another beach where there is good sea glass. We found a few nice pieces but had to leave because it was after 7:00 PM and starting to get dark. We will definitely go back to this spot to look for more seaglass when we are in this area again.

4/1/09 You’ve got mail! The winds were changing again so we needed to move from the main anchorage at Allans-Pensacola. Wayne wanted to walk to the beach to see how the Atlantic side anchorage looked. Again we were pleased to see that the path to the beach had been greatly improved since we had last walked on it. We walked the main beach on Allans-Pensacola and then went across the old airstrip to the first of the back bays. The water looked smooth so we decided that we should move to the Atlantic side. As long as we were there we walked the beach. Wayne was excited when he found a message in a bottle! We went back to the boat and after lunch moved over to the Atlantic side of Allans-Pensacola, very near where we had anchored in January. Teamwork also moved to this side of the island. After anchoring we decided to explore the beaches. The first beach we walked had no treasures on it. Teamwork was on another beach so we decided to go talk to them. As I was searching for sea glass Wayne was searching the edge of the woods and he found ANOTHER message in a bottle!!! This was his second one of the day and our third for the season. We had fresh steamed lobster for dinner, a good end to a good day.

4/2/09 Teamwork once again asked if we wanted to go snorkeling after lunch. We rested in the morning. After lunch Teamwork picked us up and we headed over behind Hog Cay. (I don’t think I have mentioned that Teamwork is a 33’ Grady White fishing boat. Bill and Bettie Sue LOVE to fish, they spend their winters in the Bahamas and the rest of the time at their home in Folly Beach, SC. They enjoy going fishing off the coast and walking the beaches looking for sharks teeth.) We had another great snorkeling trip. The lobster knew that the season was over; they were everywhere looking out of their holes and laughing at Wayne and Bill because they knew they were safe. Today the underwater camera was working well. I took 74 pictures and got quite a few good ones. There were lots of kinds of fish and I managed to get a picture of a turtle. We also saw a green moray eel, unfortunately my camera batteries were dead so I did not get his picture. I will post some of the pictures when we get a good internet connection.

4/3/09 Today was windy. We walked a few beaches in the morning but did not find much. We had a lazy afternoon on the boat. Teamwork came by and we exchanged pictures. They have a wonderful underwater camera. I had taken several pictures of Bill. When he is snorkeling, he quite often appears to be standing on his head in the water as he searches the holes and little caves for sea critters. The winds are shifting tomorrow so it will be time raise the anchor and find another protected shore.