Crossing soon

We’ve had a perfect few days at Ginn Sur Mer waiting for our weather wind to cross back to Florida. The weather has been cooler than Turks and Caicos, especially at night which has been a very welcome change.

After travelling for so many days and being very busy with company onboard, it’s been a bit weird (and quiet) relaxing in our little hidey hole. Ginn Sur Mer is a very protected area – you feel the wind but there’s no waves so the boat is nice and calm. When we first arrived, there were 7 boats (including us) in the anchorage – 4 of the 7 were Canadian boats. We had a happy hour onboard our boat the second night here with 2 French Canadian boats. One couple had just arrived from Florida and the other couple were heading back. It was fun to hear their stories.

On Friday I did some laundry while Mark spent some time working on the fuel system for the engine. After a few experiments, Mark has pretty much determined it the fuel lift pump that’s not working properly. Unfortunately the 2 spares we have onboard are old and don’t work any better than the one that currently installed. Mark has now order 2 replacements – one being delivered to Reynolds Park and the other being delivered to St. Augustine Municipal Marina (our first stop when we cross back). For now we’ll just keep using the fuel transfer pump to help with fuel pressure and hopefully sail most of the way back to the USA.

Friday night we had a second happy hour with a couple from Nova Scotia, Cathy and Joe. They are sailing on a 38ft Island Packet named Lady Seagull and they met our friends Julia and Brad (Alizarin) in Hope Town just a few weeks ago. We had a great visit hearing about their experiences. They bought their sailboat in Europe and Joe (with help) sailed it to Grenada in 2023. Cathy and Joe spent a few months touring the southern Caribbean and then Joe, again with help from friends, spent the past 6 months (or so) bringing the boat north. Cathy joined Joe at Turks and Caicos. We picked their brains about travelling in the Caribbean and got some good info!

We finally got off the boat on Saturday and went for a walk to the little town that’s on the east side of Grand Bahama Island. It’s a nice town called West End Settlement – less touristy than some of the other places plus it was the weekend, so more people were out and about. After returning from our walk, we went over to Lady Seagull for a wonderful happy hour!! We had given Joe and Cathy some of the fish we caught and Joe made a very tasty curry dish with the tuna!

So we have one more day in Ginn Sur Mer to relax and get ready for our crossing. The plan is to leave here at 4am on Tuesday, April 9th and sail the roughly 240nm to St. Augustine, arriving there around 2pm (or earlier). We’ve reserved a mooring ball at the municipal marina and will most likely leave there on April 12th. If all goes as planned, we’ll be back at Reynolds on April 13. 🤞🤞