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.
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