Duer Family Cruising Adventures

 We arrived in Brunswick GA one week ago, a 54 hour trip from Chub Cay in the Berry Islands. The passage - our first time trying to ride the north setting Gulf Stream, rather than just get past it, was lumpy, squally and generally just not much fun. Will have to reassess using the Gulf Stream, it just seems once there is enough wind the seas just build to a level that is fun sapping. Brunswick is a very nice town, the marina we are in is outstanding, nice to be able to fully re-provision the boat. This also kicks off our summer 2023 refit, lots of small and a couple of large projects.  Leaving the Bahamas - the tried and true strategy is to get as far south and east as you plan then pick a routing back to explore. We made it as far as Salt Pond Long Island, then transited back via Cat Island, Eleuthera and Chub Cay.  Cat Island has become my favorite spot, just the perfect blend of clear water, un touched reefs and coral heads throughout with great fishing, a very welcomi...

 Well it has been a while, apologies, we are in Georgetown now, arriving on March 7, 2023 to the Mecca of Bahamas cruising. Georgetown has a fabulous, large, well protected harbor and a substantial local support network built up around the cruising community, which first started coming here in the 1960's. We passed through in 2009 as well, very little has changed - a few more resorts but for the most part, same beach bars, cruiser volleyball and a lost of boats. Georgetown is also referred to as chicken harbor, because the sailing gets much more difficult/more open ocean exposer/fewer anchorages/longer distances, very few people leave until it is time to go back to the U.S. in April/May.  Let's roll back the clock three weeks though, we found ourselves in Oven Rock on Great Guana Cay, hiking into a fresh water cave - plenty of bats. Fishing was pretty poor.  A stop at Black Point Great Guana on our way north for some provisions and some hiking to some very nice ocean side...

                                          Bahamian regatta boats practicing for the Farmers Cay Regatta.  Well I rowed our dingy for a few days, a sailing rig as above would be much better. We had a dinghy with sailing capabilities a few years ago but that did not make the cut for this adventure. Our outboard engine was a 15HP 2 Stroke Yamaha - one of the most reliable and durable engines in the world. We had purchased this engine on our previous cruise - so was put into service early in 2009. The engine had served faithfully since - all the way through the Caribbean and Pacific, then as a work horse on the Spokane river as we installed and removed our club slalom course each year and finally got us off and going on our current cruise. I am not sure if my service was up to date - the simple things like clean fuel filter, plugs, lower unit oil, grease points w...

The Bahamas provide a great training ground for working on sailing skills, whether knocking off the rust, learning new skills or learning a new to us boat, well for us all of the above. The winds generally have an east component while the islands roughly run in a NW/SE direction so there is always a sailing angle. We have been sailing on the banks the past month, thus seas are 1-3 ft chop so very stable and easy conditions.  We have never used a spinnaker or asymmetrical spinnaker on any of our previous sail boats. Tenacious came with an asymmetrical spinnaker. We had brought this on deck in Annapolis to see if we had the bits and pieces required. We had a nice down wind run in the past week that gave us the perfect sub 10 knot winds to give the spinnaker a try. We were able to make 4-5 knots with an apparent wind of 6-8 knots. The sail was reasonable easy to handle with a sock to pull down/dose the sail. The sail is big and all 3 crew members were fully engaged to manage her....

For the past week we have been traveling with our seemingly life long great friends on board, ok only 30 years but you get the picture. The Bahamas in winter are a bit tough when planning a week adventure, weather and tide are a huge factor as well as distances between useful ports for arriving or departing guests. Accidentally, or with great luck it seemed to all work out as we were able to meet in Nassau, get out 36 hours later make our way through the Exumas to Staniel Cay where our friends departed about 30 minutes before a strong cold front arrived that left us at anchor with 30 knots of wind and 12 hours of torrential rain. During the week - nothing but blue skies and relatively light winds. We were able to stop at Allens for a visit to the pre-historic iguanas, Highborne for some fuel and grocery, Warderick Wells for hiking, snorkeling and wildlife before arriving in Staniel for some swimming pigs, snorkeling and an afternoon at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club to celebrate Rae’s birt...

  Above our Anchorage in Highborne Cay Exumas. Departing Chub Cay had us head SE for the western end of New Providence, where we spent a couple of days waiting on sailing winds to head to the Northern Exumas - Allens and Highborne Cay area. West Bay in New Providence was new to us and really should just be used as a useful stop over, the anchorage experiences lots of water movement from the New Providence Channel and the Tongue of the Ocean. There is an underwater sculpture garden and some nice reefs for snorkeling that passed some time for us.  Allens Cay is home to prehistoric iguanas, which are generally curious and somewhat aggressive, at least they charge then feint away at the last moment. We found a stunning reef to snorkel just north and east of Allens Cay, that because of the relatively calm weather was easily accessible.  Alas the first significant cold front of the season is on top of this weekend, and as I type this we have 30 knots sustained out of the NW. We...