yes dear …

April 30, 2019 Tuesday Harbourtown Marina, Merritt Island, Florida  0 nautical miles

28°24’30.7″N 80°40’42.4″W
28.408533, -80.678443
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

Tom and Adam took Jake and Bre fishing in the Ulumay Wildlife Sanctuary right behind Tom’s house. The kayaks were full to the gunwales with tackle, bait and fishermen.

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Final Score:
Bre – Tarpon Trifecta (Tarpon, Snook, Redfish)
**A Tarpon Trifecta is better than a Trout Trifecta (Trout, Snook, Redfish)
Adam – 1
Tom – 0
Jake – minus 1 for the Catfish
**Jake said the minus 1 was better then a 0 like Tom

The old folks (Mary and Dale) had an exciting time doing other stuff. They went to the Bass Pro Shop and looked at alligators and wild boar.

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

Tarpon are mouth breathers. They are one of the few fish in the world that have a swim bladder that acts as a lung so they can breathe raw air. They can still breathe like most fish breath through their gills too.

Tarpon are a prehistoric fish that date back 100 million years. Female tarpon grow as large as 300 pounds and can reach over 8 ft long. The females can live for over 50 years while the smaller males 30 years. The oldest tarpon in captivity lived in an aquarium in Chicago and died at 63 years of age.

Nauti Words

Full to the gunwales – Full to the brim or packed tight.

Origin: Gunwale (pronounced “gunnels”) are the upper edge of a ship’s side in large vessels and the piece of timber extending round the top side of the hull in smaller craft. The expression first referred to heavily loaded ships.

April 26/29, 2019 Friday/Monday Harbourtown Marina, Merritt Island, Florida  0 nautical miles

28°24’30.7″N 80°40’42.4″W
28.408533, -80.678443
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

They’re heeeerrreeee.

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Jake and Bre are here for a visit. We treated them to a store bought pizza, their pick. The one they picked had this cut out mustache. The mustache was cool but the pizza tasted like crap.

Cocoa Beach – Safari first stop is Ron Jon’s of course.

Safari late Sunday morning at Cocoa Beach

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Safari Cocoa Beach Skate Park stop

Back to the boat

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Cousin Tommy took us for boat safari up Sykes Creek through the land of almost affordable homes and mythical creatures.

Alligator and bird safari along Blackpoint Wildlife Drive Safari. Mary had her camera put away for most of it because she thinks she takes too many pictures. She finally broke down at the end. Fun drive.

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

The famous Ron Jon’s Surf Shop in Cocoa Beach is not the original.

The first Ron Jon Surf Shop was opened on the Jersey Shore in 1961, a fitting location for an owner who with a wild reputation. Owner Ron DiMenna opened the original surf shop on Long Beach Island, New Jersey, after following his dad’s advice ‘Buy three, sell two at a profit, then yours will be free’ when he wanted a new fiberglass surfboard.

The Cocoa Beach Ron Jon store is, however, the largest at 52,000 square feet and is the company’s flagship location.

Nauti Words

Turn a blind eye – consciously ignore unwanted information

Origin: From Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson’s awesome display of badassery at the 1801 Battle of Copenhagen. Nelson held his spyglass to his blind eye and to avoid signals from his superior telling him to withdraw from battle. He then proceeded to kick butt, of course.

April 24/25, 2019 Wednesday/Thursday Harbourtown Marina, Merritt Island, Florida  0 nautical miles

28°24’30.7″N 80°40’42.4″W
28.408533, -80.678443
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

You must check out S.F. Travis Hardware Co store if you are ever near Cocoa, FL http://travishardware.net/

It was established in 1885 and has everything. Some of the items have probably been on the shelf since 1885 too. The store is comprised of about 4-5 two story buildings and is chockablock full of everything in all sizes.

We bought velcro.

I need to repeat that …. It’s a Norfolk Island Pine. WOW. I have only seen these as house plants in Minnesota decorated as mini-Christmas trees. This tree is unique because has a double crown, most don’t. Laura has had this tree since it was about a foot tall.

Down the rabbit hole ….
Adult trees are tall, up to 190 feet, and skinny canonical. They look Jurassic.

Norfolk Island is a small island in the Pacific Ocean located between Australia, New Zealand, and New Caledonia. According to 2014 data, 2,210 people call Norfolk Island home. Norfolk Island has a very unique phone book. A new one is issued every three years and features a section with everyone listed by their nickname rather than their family name as so many share the same surname. Islanders are so much more familiar with one another’s nickname that many have long since forgotten their birth names.

BTW. It’s against the law not to give way to cows

Today Dale Fixed

One of the big items Dale checked off the boat list was Ceratopogonidae biting midges (a.k.a. no-see-ums, punkies, five-O’s (related to biting around 5 PM), pinyon gnats, and moose flies depending on the geographical region you are in) screens for the boat. Although CBC Canvas came highly recommended, our screens must have been made by the B-Team. For starters, Dale ordered black trim. They used white. One of the screens was cut too short so an extra row of trim was added to the bottom. The velcro is attached to the trim so it doesn’t attach to the velcro on the boat.

They knew they had screwed up and they knew we were transient boaters. They knocked $50 off the bill and said take it or leave it. It would take 3 weeks to remake the screens. We took the screens.

The white doesn’t look too bad but I still wish they were black. You can see the messed up corner in the lower right if you blow up the picture.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

Mascara and eyeliner are some of the most ancient cosmetics known. Egyptians used a substance called kohl to darken their lashes, eyebrows, and eyelids. The first recorded use of eyeliner suggests royals in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia were lining their eyes as early as 400BC. The more the makeup the higher your status was, so Egyptians would pile on the kohl, winging it out to their hairline (kinda like what is haute couture fashion now)

Yes Dear’s status is going up in the world.

April 14-23, 2019 Sunday/Tuesday Harborview Marina, Merritt Island, FL  to Roseville, MN 1484 nautical miles (1708 statute miles) and back again another 1484 nautical miles

Along the Way – April 14 – April 16

End of the line April 16 was Minnesota!
45°01’33.9″N 93°09’03.0″W
45.026077, -93.150840
Elevation: 927 ft

Couple of marina pictures.

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At the airport.

Thanks Tom and Dale for the ride to the airport!

The plane was chockablock with babies and toddlers. I think I’ve said enough on this topic. I did score on random seat assignments. I was assigned seat 2F. It’s in the 4 across section not the 6 across sardine section.

Today Dale Fixed

The boat list had over 20 items on it when Mary left…..

Floccinaucinihilipilification

Chockablock – crammed tightly together to prevent movement

Chocks are wedges used to secure moving objects and a block and tackle is a pulley system used on sailing ships to hoist the sails. When two blocks of rigging tackle were so close together they couldn’t be tightened further, it was said they were “chock-a-block”.

Along the Way – April 17 – April 23

End of the line April 23 was Harbourtown Marina, Merritt Island, Florida
28°24’30.7″N 80°40’42.4″W
28.408533, -80.678443
Elevation: 0 ft

Mary’s week was jammed full of family, fun, taxes and other tasks. The camera was on a hiatus in Minnesota. The cell phone managed to catch a couple pictures. Sarah, Jake and Emily coined a new word: Momitoring

Thanks Gary and Barb for having me over for Easter! Great to see you Margo!

End of the Line. Thanks Emily for taking me to the airport at 4:30 am. (Sorry Jake, Bre and Sarah for kicking you out last night at 10:15 pm so I could go to bed.

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Dale worked his boat list down while Mary was gone. Don’t feel too sorry for him because he played too.

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

Momitoring – Taking of turns monitoring whatever Mom is doing so that she doesn’t kill any more of Emily’s yard, over feed the dogs, ……….

April 13, 2019 Friday Harborview Marina, Merritt Island, FL  0 nautical miles

27°28’16.2″N 80°19’30.5″W
27.471170, -80.325148
Elevation: 0 ft

We bought the month. At Harborview Marina it is $15 cheaper for a monthly rate than for 2 weeks. Things are going to slow down while Dale does routine maintenance, changes oil and fixes a few things on the boat. Mary will be in Minnesota from April 16 to April 23 (Tuesday to Tuesday).

Most-likely there will not be a daily post until we are underway again.

Along the Way

Dale’s cousin Tom and his wife Laura live about 6 minutes drive from this marina. Tom stopped by early afternoon and took us grocery shopping. Laura joined us later that evening.

We went to the marina restaurant for supper. Good  food an extremely cheap compared to the Bahamas.

Today Dale Fixed

Today Dale fixed both air conditioners while Mary washed all the dirty clothes and household items she could find.

Simple pleasures. The air conditioners took all the sticky humidity out of the boat. It is great to sit on non-sticky vinyl seats and sleep on fresh crisp, non-sticky sheets.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

Today is Friday the 13^th . Paraskevidekatriaphobia is the fear of Friday the 13th, which is considered to be a day of bad luck in a number of western cultures.

Dale was born on Friday, April 13^th 1951. He has been alive for:
— 24,838 days old
— 596,112 hours old
— 35,766,720 minutes old
— 285 dog years http://www.onlineconversion.com/dogyears.htm

Billy the Kid (1881) and Butch Cassidy (1866) were born on April 13.

Love you!

April 12, 2019 Thursday Fort Pierce, Florida to Merritt Island, FL 67.4 nautical miles

27°28’16.2″N 80°19’30.5″W
27.471170, -80.325148
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

Mary carrying two cups coffee to the upper helm: “Lookit Dale! I can walk without holding on to the rails!”
Dale: “You SHOULD be really good at it with only one inch waves.”

First stop of the morning was to purchase fuel at the Harbortown Marina and checked into customs. We turned on the Customs and Border Protection app and checked in. After a brief pause we were welcomed back by the app and customs cleared!  No video chat.  I was bummed we didn’t get to do a video chat cause I wanted to see how that part of the app worked. Cool app.

It’s different being back and on the Atlantic Intercoastal Waterway (ICW). We are back watching day marks, avoiding in-channel crab traps and playing high speed dodge boat. I already miss the aqua blue Bahamian waters.

OMG! Did you see that?????    I know it Mary! I saw it!!!

It was a pretty run today. A lot of beautiful mangroves, parks and houses.  A lot of people were out enjoying the day and people were pitching tents on the islands.

The sea hawks are back to their assigned day marks for nesting. 😊

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Interesting boats

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I do blow boats too.

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Whoa! One big airplane. I found myself compelled to duck as this C17 flew by.

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Running the river

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Our marina is just down the Cape Canaveral barge canal. There are two sea hawks in the picture fighting over territory. We also saw two flamingos fly over. Neither of us had ever seen a wild flamingo before. 14-Apr-2019 correction – They were spoonbills not flamingos. Still cool.

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Canal Life – live aboards

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

A record-breaking 17 foot, 140-pound Burmese python was recently caught in the Florida Everglades and is the largest ever removed from the state’s 729,000-acre Big Cypress National Preserve. Measuring about the height of a one-story building or a five-meter diving platform, the snake was carrying 73 developing eggs at the time of her capture.

Drollies and Yuks

HA! Spat between YO MAMA and another boat today on VHF channel 16:
“If you wanted to plow you should have bought a farm!”.

Good one. We loved the line. Apparently the other boat didn’t because the language escalated, severely.

(In case you didn’t get it plow means pushing too much wake)

Rants

I wasn’t going to ever do this again in Florida. But here I am, back from the Bahamas and suddenly North of the Tension Line. I have to get it out of my system.

DERELECT BOATS – I hate these.

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UNAFFORDABLE HOUSING – With all the self-control I could muster I took only one OMG look at that house picture. There were much better houses. I should have bided my time for the better ones.

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Then I had to take the below picture just because I thought it was cute.

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Whew. Out of my system, I hope.

April 11, 2019 Thursday West End, Grand Bahama to Fort Pierce, Florida 88.1 nautical miles

27°28’16.2″N 80°19’30.5″W
27.471170, -80.325148
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

WOW. We were greeted by an unpleasant surprise as we left the marina harbor. 4-5 foot rollers. It must have been the wake from LET’S GO, NOT JUST DREAMING and the rest of the pack who had just left the marina in front of us. Windy.com and Marv’s Weather couldn’t be wrong. About an hour later as they continued towards Lake Worth and we headed north towards Ft Pierce we finally out ran their wake. The rollers flattened out for a much more enjoyable ride just as Windy.com and Marv’s Weather predicted. (you know I’m kidding about the wake don’t you)

For those of you who know Dale, you know red traffic lights are his nemesis. It’s almost impossible for him to catch a green light. It’s really aggravating. Here in the Bahamas his nemesis is sailboats. He is forever in the middle of nowhere and there is a sailboat crossing from his starboard side so he has to yield for right of way. Where do they come from?

We rode the Gulfstream for several hours. It nudged our traveling speed from 9.2 knots to 12.1 knots.

Once Florida was in the offing cell our USA phones were turned on. The USA offers an online Customs and Border Protection app that you can check into customs with. Dale filled in all our info and submitted the form. Presto, a Customs office called us for a video chat. That’s as far as we got. Turns out we have to be on USA soil, like a boat dock, to clear customs. We are anchoring out tonight and not dropping the dingy. We will have to complete Customs at our next fuel stop.

Space X taking off from Cape Canaveral. Thanks for the call Mark H. We would have totally missed seeing it.

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Neighbors

Our other neighbor is the the N. Causeway Bridge. It’s a little noisy but interesting to watch.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

Fort Pierce has a colorful history. Edwin Binney, who lived in Fort Pierce, invented Crayola crayons. Binney and his cousin, C. Harold Smith, produced the first box of Crayolas in 1905.

Nauti Words

In the offing – imminent or likely to happen soon. “Offing” is that area of sea that can be seen from land, so when a ship was seen to be “in the offing” it would be expected to dock before the next tide.

April 10, 2019 Wednesday Mangrove Cay, Abacos to West End, Grand Bahama 28.2 nautical miles

26°42’03.3″N 78°59’28.2″W
26.700922, -78.991153
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

Back to where we started from. We crossed our Bahama’s wake here at Old Bahamas Bay Marina, West End, Great Bahama. We are docked three doors down from where we were February 3^rd.

What a great way to spend our last night in the Bahamas! LETS GO (Marshall and Judy) and KNOT JUST DREAMING (Shawn and Cindy) are crossing tomorrow and were in the marina too. We spent the afternoon at the swimming pool.

A fisherman came in to sell his catch. He had fish, lobster, conch and snow crab claws. He also had a few shells. Mary bought a couple. You might get a picture once she cleans them up. She bartered for them, $5 and a beer. It was Dale’s last beer.

And when we got there the cupboard was bare. We are down to our last provisions.

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Good thing Dale caught fish. Marshall and Judy invited us over for a pot luck supper. We brought red snapper that Dale had caught and Judy turned it into delicious almond crusted fish fine dining with homemade beach cobbler for dessert.

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Today was our last full day in the Bahamas. I’m going to miss the conch horns at sunset, the crowing chickens and the barking dogs.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

West End is the capital of Grand Bahama. It first achieved notoriety as a rum-running port during the Prohibition.

Quotes

“The only way to get a good crew is to marry one.”
~ Eric Hiscock

“There are good ships, and there are wood ships, The ships that sail the sea. But the best ships, are friendships, And may they always be.”

It’s been fun here in the Bahamas.

April 9, 2019 Tuesday Great Sale, Abacos to Mangrove Cay, Abacos 25.2 nautical miles

26°55’14.4″N 78°36’50.3″W
26.920675, -78.613962
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way          

The waves when we woke up this morning were 1 inch height and 1 second duration. You could call them ripples. We knew it was going to be a lumpy ride to Mangrove Cay once we left the shelter of our anchorage. It was.

We were the first boat to pull into anchor on Mangrove Cay at about noon. Once we pulled in the blow boat in front of us turned around and pulled in too. There is a safety in numbers mentality with boaters. I get it. He’s pretty little, 32 feet(?) was traveling alone in lumpy water (2.5 feet and 4 second duration). It’s nice to have someone in VHF hailing distance. Cell service doesn’t work out here.

I thought where we were last night was the middle of nowhere. Wrong. This is.

Neighbors

As the afternoon progressed 4 more blow boats pulled in to anchor.

Two of the blow boats still have quarantine flags. Hope I don’t get the bubonic plague or anything.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

There is nothing interesting about Mangrove Cay.

Quotes

“At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much.”
~ Robin Lee Graham

April 8, 2019 Monday Hawksbill Cay, Abacos to Great Sale, Abacos 25.9 nautical miles

27°00’44.2″N 78°11’51.5″W
27.012265, -78.197630
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

Dale towed line from Hawksbill Cay to Great Sale. Persistence paid off. Just off the Barracuda Rocks Channel Dale had a hit.  Zzzzzzzzzzzzing! Engine in neutral … we both stood in the cockpit fully expecting to see a good-sized barracuda surface as Dale fought the fish in.

Dissector Dale. Dale was surprised at how strong the backbone was as he cut through it.

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A 6+ foot bull shark circled Yes Dear for a couple of hours, maybe longer.  We are thinking the snapper head and guts drew him in.

The honey sesame chicken Mary had planned for supper is on hold until tomorrow night.

The Great Sale Cay, where we are anchored, is in the middle of nowhere. It’s an important cay for slower boats leaving the Abacos and heading to West End, Grand Bahama as the distance is too great for them to travel in a single day.

Neighbors (and waiting for the Green Flash)

Anticipation

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

There is concrete obelisk on Great Sale Cay that once supported a US space program radio telemetry dish. There are also wild pigs on the island.  I wonder if it has chickens too?

Words of Wizdom

Mary’s Dad used to say:
Winds from the West fish bite the best.
Winds from the East fish bite the least.

He called it right today.

Disambiguation

Toe the line – When called to line up at attention, the ship’s crew would form up with their toes touching a seam in the deck planking

April 7, 2019 Sunday Umbrella Cay to Hawksbill Cay, Abacos 7.7 nautical miles.

26°56’02.4″N 77°47’46.8″W
26.933994, -77.796333
Elevation: 0 ft

It’s surprising how many people we’ve met that have been coming to the Bahamas for 20+ years. We’ve started to talk about what we’d do different if we ever came back to the Bahamas and where we’d go. Yes Dear needs a few modifications. For certain we would add solar panels and possibly a wind generator. Bringing bottled water was a good idea, but maybe not as much next time. Dale says more beer and fishing tackle. Over all I think we provisioned pretty well for novices. Next time we’d bring canned meat, Spam. Chicken too. More canned veggies other than baked beans and chili beans.

We’ve found the social scene at congregating and party areas a blast but we prefer the remote and quite anchorages. The social scene in the remote areas is good too but you need to work harder at it. IF we ever go back to the Bahamas we’d definitely go back to the Berries then hit some of the other areas we missed like Bimini, Andros and Cat Island. We’d love to go to the Ragged Islands in the far south but that might be pushing our limits. It’s hard to say you did the Bahamas if you didn’t go to Georgetown, so we’d have to check that out too. (Besides, it’s on the way to the Ragged Islands if we change our minds.)

Along the Way

Dale caught a barracuda on his first cast of the morning.

The weather between now and Thursday, our target crossing date, turns 180 every day making it challenging to plan our passage/anchorages to West End, Grand Bahama.  With today’s prediction we might move a little slower than we were thinking yesterday. We see a lot of boats maneuvering towards West End besides us. It’s going to be a crowed run to USA.

The Tuesday/Wednesday weather, waves and wind doesn’t look as bad as it did earlier this week. New plan for today ….slow down for two days. Onward to Hawksbill Cay. It was beautiful. Glad we didn’t miss it.

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Fly fishing for bonefish is a popular sport in the Bahamas that requires a special license.

Dale fished while Mary walked the shoreline. It’s definitely more interesting above the water line here at Hawksbill Cay than below the waterline.

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

Every four seconds, somebody in the world opens a can of Spam. 

April 6, 2019 Saturday Green Turtle Cay, Abacos to Umbrella Cay, Abacos    31.9 nautical miles.

27°00’20.0″N 77°42’55.1″W
27.005562, -77.715306
Elevation: 0 ft

Count down. We’ve been watching the weather for the past week. It looks like there is a weather window for an end of week crossing to the USA.

Along the Way

Yew. We’ve moved into the land of no-see-ums. But we can see them. They are little and can get through our screens.

Side walk city (Coopers Town). See blog March 27, 2019. One by land. Two by sea.

Unused Government Harbor Marina north of Coopers Town.

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North-most tip of Great Abacos

On the hard, the hard way. Owners are not required remove their wrecks and insurance doesn’t cover it. Hence, they are stripped for salvage and left.

Mary wanted to snorkel. Morraine Cay is a picturesque, pristine, small private island with a great reef just seaward into the Atlantic that can only be accessed in settled weather days. Today was a perfect weather day. Sunny, no wind and flat water.  Anticipation mounting. Mary read up on current anchorage comments in preparation to set hook. Ugh! A reef shark has recently taken residence. Possibly more than one as there are ‘frequent’ sightings.

As long as we were so close to Morraine Cay we decided to keep going and explore the reef by dingy. Neither of us have enough experience snorkeling with sharks and didn’t feel like tempting fate. No one else was here snorkeling with so the minnow theory (selfish herd effect to get in the middle of the group for maximum protection from sharks) was out of the question. We didn’t want to be chum (bait fish used to lure bigger fish, like sharks with their keen sense of smell). We dingyed around the entire island.

Anticipation at low tide

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Above water, underwater pictures

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Passed over a large area of Minnesota fan, old growth fan coral brilliant purple and gold. (pic didn’t turn out.)

BTW, we saw the resident reef shark and a whole lot of barracuda. Some of the barracuda were sizeable. Barracuda are pretty ballsy fish. They swim directly towards the boat when they see it coming. Other fish scamper.

The day still young we backtracked to Umbrella Cay, a small unoccupied cay with a large sand beach for our overnight anchorage. It turned to be an inordinate choice for a water walk.

Finds

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Fighting conch??

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Too bad we couldn’t have coaxed him out a bit.  Mary wanted to see if the eyeballs to see if it had eye lashes.

Good Night

Hermit crabs can live to 30 years of age. They are not throw away pets.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

Nauti Facts

Sailors in port in Yokohama liked to visit Hunki-Dori street when they felt carefree – in the center of the city’s red light district where sailors were wont to go after a long time at sea.

Drolleries and Yuks

VHF channel 16:   St Somewhere hailing Geezer Pleezer

April 5, 2019 Friday Man O War Cay, Abacos to Green Turtle Cay, Abacos 24.5 nautical miles.

26°47’15.1″N 77°20’23.4″W
26.787538, -77.339822
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

Nippers, on the Atlantic side, is one of the popular bars in town. Barefoot Man is playing to night. https://www.barefootman.com/$15 cover. (We didn’t stay). The place was packed.

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There is a reef just off Nippers and Mary really wanted to snorkel.

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About the town

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Dingy dock and anchorage. There must have been over 50 boats in the anchorage. Can you find Yes Dear?

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The day was still early, 2:30 pm. We pulled anchor and shot The Whale. The Whale Cay passage is the most challenging passage in the Abacos due to they way the swells and waves break. From the south you cross out into the Atlantic heading into large swells then cut back into the Sea of Abacos across larger swells through a VERY narrow coral cut. We encountered 6 foot confused water swells even though the day was calm. The passage is only about two miles long and interesting to say the least.

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

Sea Change. The expression sea change is derived from the play The Tempest, produced by William Shakespeare in 1610: “Full fathom five thy father lies; Of his bones are coral made; Those are pearls that were his eyes: Nothing of him that doth fade/ But doth suffer a sea-change/ Into something rich and strange

April 4, 2019 Thursday Tavern Cay (Tilloo Cay), Abacos  to Man O War Cay, Abacos   8.7 nautical miles.

26°35’44.7″N 77°00’36.3″W,
26.595761, -77.010091
Elevation: 0 ft

After a day off yesterday, Mary is really chatty today.

Along the Way

We’ve tuned into the Abacos Cruisers Network every morning at 8:00 am on channel 68 ever since we’ve come to the Abacos. It’s a great little community group serving the boating community. It starts with weather and tide, invitations and announcements, arrivals to and departures from (hellos and goodbyes) the Sea of Abacos then finishes up with open mike. The VHF (very high frequency) radio is like a party line. Everyone eavesdrops on everyone else conversations. And sometimes not so secretly. In the Berries and other remote cays it is used like a telephone because cellular reception is so poor.

Man O War Cay Harbour

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I love Looper people! As we were dingying into the harbor a woman yelled out to Mary “I love your hat”. Mary yelled back “Thx! Are you a Looper?” We were invited in for coffee!

Walk about

Man O War Cay is historically know for boat building, sail making and wood work using island hardwoods.

Albury Brothers Boat Yard

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Other Boats

Art and Gardens

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Shell shop. Mary tried blowing a conch horn and couldn’t get a sound out of it. May be if she’d have take tuba in high school she might have been able to blow it.

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This type of flotsam art is pretty common on all the cays.

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Hot and thirsty we had to stop for an Arni Palmer.

Man O War didn’t have a bread lady but it did have an Egg Man. He said they were laid yesterday. $5 a dozen. Mixed sizes and mixed colors.

We stopped at a grocery store for a couple of other items. Look what we found!

You know morbid Mary. She can’t get past the cemeteries. Beautiful wood work the cay is known for. Not a bad place to spend eternity.

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Dale took these pictures. Hard work to manually dig a grave site.

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HA! Man O War Cay has a mini me Glass Bridge. We had to check it out.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

You get a couple today ….

Eavesdrop started off literally: first it referred to the water that fell from the eaves of a house, then it came to mean the ground where that water fell. Eventually, eavesdropper described someone who stood within the eavesdrop of a house to overhear a conversation inside.

John Lennon nicknamed Eric Burdon, vocalist of rock band The Animals and funk band War, “The Eggman” https://dangerousminds.net/comments/the_true_story_of_why_john_lennon_nicknamed_eric_burdon_the_eggman

I Am the Walrus ~ The Beatles
Lyrics
I am the egg man
They are the egg men
I am the walrus
Goo goo g’joob

Dr. Eggman, a fictional character, is a rotund mad scientist who plans to conquer the world is the main antagonist of Sega’s Sonic the Hedgehog series.

Drolleries and Yuks

Boat Names
– Cow Pie …. It’s gotta be a mono hull sailboat
– Scaramucci ….“The Mooch, The Mooch”

Dale re-christened our dingy from “The Escape Clause” to the “The Mooch”.

April 3, 2019 Wednesday Snake Cay, Abacos  to Tavern Cay (Tilloo Cay), Abacos    3.6 nautical miles.

26°28’31.4″N 76°59’28.7″W
26.475387, -76.991291
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

The cold front came in. It dropped to 73 degrees.

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We crossed the back over to the barrier reef side for shelter from the east wind.

Neighbors

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

Down day. Mary didn’t do squat. Dale even had to cook.

April 2, 2019 Tuesday Tahiti Beach, Elbow Cay, Abacos to Snake Cay   5.2 nautical miles.

26°27’07.1″N 77°02’57.5″W
26.451975, -77.049315
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

We are on our own again. Good bye to Looper friends THE BLESSING.

Make all the plans you want …. It depends on the weather whether they are do-able. We pulled together the Plan A list of things we would like to do before we leave the Abacos and started our count down.  If weather holds to the current prediction, we will be crossing The Whale Friday afternoon, April 5 and back to the USA on Tuesday, April 9.

The wind was not cooperative for the Plan A list today. Plan B was East Abaco Creeks Land and Sea Park. We anchored just outside the park east of Snake Cay.

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We did not see any snakes.

There is supposed to be a blue hole just west of Snake Cay in the East Abaco Creeks Land and Sea Park. We didn’t find it (but we didn’t look too hard either). It was pretty windy on the stream-side making it hard to see into the water. We did see a lot of sea turtles and some rays.

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Not sure but there might be a baby blue hole in the middle of the cut to the park. It’s not on the charts and it looks a whole lot deeper than charted.

We both thought the creek side of Cormorant Cay, just north and outside the park was prettier than the creek side of Deep Sea Cay inside the park.

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Once the wind changed to the west it was an easy decision to remain anchored here for the night. Flipping horseflys and it’s not even Canada yet!

Mahi Mahi tacos for supper.

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Goodnight

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Floccinaucinihilipilification

Snake oil really is made from snake, a Chinese water snake.

Maybe snake oil salesmen were on to something. Snake oil really is a cure for what ails you, if that if that happens to be arthritis, heart disease or maybe even depression. ~ American Scientific

There are more omega 3 acids in snake oil than salmon oil.

Apri 1, 2019 Monday Lynyard Cay to Tahiti Beach, Elbow Cay, Abacos   23.1   nautical miles.

26°30’15.2″N 76°59’04.5″W
26.504207, -76.984578
Elevation: 0 ft

Along the Way

The morning started with short trek across Lynyard Cay to the small sandy beach on the Atlantic side where we encountered Cindy the Sea Glass Huntress (SALTY DOG)

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Other sea glass hunters

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On to Sandy Cay in Pelican Cays Land and Sea Park. Sandy Cay had some of the best snorkeling we’ve ever had. Lots of coral. Lots of fish. Lots of varieties.  And a little bit of Sargasso seaweed on top.  Mary used her noodle (the foam thing not her head) to snow plow through it. There was enough of a tidal current for it to be a challenge to stay near the dingys. The men graciously told they ladies they could drift down the reef and they would pick up on the other side. Barb, Judy and Mary didn’t need to be asked twice. Thank you Jay, Marshall and Dale!

Next stop Tahiti Beach on Elbow Cay. Starboard turn ahead.

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Tahiti Beach is a giant sandbar at low tide and covered by a couple inches of water a high tide. They have a rum barge there 😊  (Mark and Greg you would love this. Just like the sand bar on WBL)

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Good bye to Looper friends LETS GO and KNOT JUST DREAMING. They were off to marinas.  THE BLESSING stayed on the hook for the night, like us.

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Our anchorage off Tahiti Beach was really beautiful. We played if money was no object, which house you buy?

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Cold front coming in.

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Just like everywhere else in the Bahamas we listened to the chickens and conch horns at sunset.

Floccinaucinihilipilification

Apple was founded on April Fools Day.  No fooling!