Author: Steve

Captain’s Log – Sun 4/20/25

Happy Easter! We spent the day in Little Harbor, taking care of a few chores. Fueled up the boat from the spare cans on deck. We have a full tank and 5 spare gallons for the trip to Eleuthera on Tuesday. We’ve found the aft water tanks have trouble filling from the water maker under sail when healed over or in rough seas, so I transferred the water from the bow tank to the aft tanks in preparation of making more water tomorrow when we leave the harbor. Defrosted the built in freezer again. Seems to need it every couple weeks. Finally I gave the engine a thorough look over to make sure everything is ship shape.

Chores done, we took the dinghy around the mooring field so Alicia could practice using the Hook-n-Moor dock pole which strings the mooring line through the eye of the mooring. It’s a pretty slick tool but takes a bit of practice. We’ll be grabbing quite a few dive moorings when we get back to the Keys so wanted to get some practice in.

We found a cool cave while exploring in the dinghy. I can just imagine pirates hiding treasure in there centuries ago!

We went over to the beach on the Atlantic side mid afternoon. It’s still pretty rough out, but we did see several boats braving the seas. Should calm down slightly by Tuesday hopefully so we’re just going to wait a bit.

Back at Pete’s Pub, we noticed the giant KC Chiefs flag hanging at the bar! Too cool!

We decided to celebrate our time in the Abacos tonight with a steak dinner on the grill and a bottle of 2016 Clarendelle Bordeaux. We need to leave here after lunch tomorrow with the high tide, then anchor out in preparation for an early departure Tuesday.

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Captain’s Log – Sat 4/19/20

Today was a bit of an adventure. As we were heading to bed last night we noticed an issue with the sanitation system. It was late, I’d had a few beers and was tired so I left it for this morning. But then I didn’t sleep well knowing that I had a literal shitty job to do before we could move on. I do carry a spare treatment pump but seriously hope it’s never ever necessary to replace.

After plenty of coffee for motivation I started to diagnose what the issue was. Fortunately, and using all the luck for the rest of the trip, it was a simple, no mess fix. Somehow the pump had lost its prime. Pouring some seawater down the pump-out port allowed the pump to prime and start working again. Not broken, Whew!

We set out for Sandy Cay, hoping there would be enough protection there to spend the evening and possibly go diving at the reef there. But we used that bit of luck up earlier. The wind was on the high side of the forecast and the waves were pretty rough as we passed exposed areas between islands. It was a bit much for the admiral. The wind didn’t shift enough to protect the anchorage so it was a no-go. We had to skip Sandy Cay and push on another hour to Little Harbor.

Using up any remaining luck, we arrived exactly at high tide otherwise the entrance to Little Harbor would not have been passable. But wait, there was even a mooring ball available! At this point I thought I should have bought a lottery ticket.

Grabbing the mooring ball in the breezy condition was another story. After failing to grab the mooring ball three times in the 25kt wind, one of the other cruisers came over in his dinghy to pick it up and hand it to us. Cruisers are nice like that, always willing to help each other out. Perhaps some good karma from helping out the Distant Shores II a couple weeks ago.

Then one of the other cruisers came over and told us there was a hog roast at the beach bar, so we headed over there. It was a wild boar, a first for us. Delicious!

We’ll wait here until the weather calms down enough to sail to Eleuthera.

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Captain’s Log – Fri 4/18/25

We anchored just south of Hope Town on Elbow Cay at Tahiti Beach today and took the dinghy ashore. We’re told there’s usually a floating tiki bar there, but it wasn’t here today. As I was walking along the beach doing nothing it occurred to me that is still doing something!

The shallow water near the beach was a literal conch farm. Hundreds of baby conch!

It was pretty breezy today, gusting over 20kts from here east and likely 25 tonight. We anchored in the lee of the island so it’s not too bad here, and the beach was pretty sheltered as well. We’re going to Sandy Cay tomorrow, where there are some five moorings at a reef. Hoping it not too windy or rough. 🤞

We’re getting pretty far south down the Abacos chain now. Sadly we’ll be leaving early next week. Absolutely love it here, but there’s so much more to see.

✌️❤️⛵️