Georgetown, Bahamas
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23
30.49 N 075 45.66 W
March 16, 2006
Photo: Starboard Home at anchor in Georgetown, Bahamas
After spending a few days in the British Virgin
Islands, we left Leinster Bay, St. John, right after a front went through, and
started on our trip to the Turks and Caicos and on to the Bahamas. The
seas were very lumpy, with an 8 foot swell from the north east and large waves,
driven by 20-25 knot winds from the east. We were sailing well with a
reefed main and staysail.
Originally, our intention was to stop in the Turks and Caicos,
but we needed to get to the Abacos within a few weeks and the weather was
somewhat unstable, so we decided to continue
on. We stopped for a quick swim off Salt Island in the Turk Islands and
then sailed through the Turks Island Channel into the Atlantic. The waves
in that area were some of the roughest we've encountered, reaching heights of at
least 8-10 feet and very close together. The good news was that we were
sailing wing-on-wing down wind at that point. We were using the Monitor
wind vane to steer and that had been working very well.
On the evening of March 12, we noticed that
"Bob", the wind vane, seemed to be having a very difficult time
steering. Tom leaned over the stern pulpit to check it out and was
dismayed to find that the paddle had broken off, rusting from the interior. We switched to our Alpha
autohelm, which had just been rebuilt in St. Thomas, and within an hour, it too broke
down. There was nothing left to do but hand steer for the next 2 1/2
days.
The first night we took shifts steering 1 hour off and
1 hour on, and both of us were exhausted in the morning. We then decided
that we could handle 2 hour shifts, which would give us each a little sleeping
time.
We stopped at Conception Island the night of the 14th
and were thrilled to be able to get a full night's sleep in a beautiful
setting. We then hand steered the 41 miles into Georgetown the next day in
calm seas and very little wind - the first calm day we had on the entire trip.
The total mileage for the trip was 746 miles, longer
than our trip from Beaufort Inlet to Bermuda. We'll be
in Georgetown until we receive our new wind vane paddle, which is on the way,
thanks to son, Garth, who did all the ordering and handled all the Fed Ex
business for us. And then we'll work our way up to the Abacos.
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