Our jump down to New Providence was quite good considering the wind and wave conditions. We left Bond Cay on Dec. 11 around 8:30am and we expected our trip to take about 7 hours. Leaving Bond’s south inlet was a bit tricky because we were heading to low tide. It’s a bit skinny (shallow) through that passage and we did move some sand at one point! Once out in the deeper, wider inlet, the waves were piling up and we had a bouncy ride until we got into deeper water. We had a lovely day – bright sun and very warm. Although the wind was on our nose (it was a motor trip), it decreased in strength over the day which helped the waves lay down a bit so our motion was smoother.
Our original plan was to anchor for the night and head into the dock on Thursday morning. It turned out that we made good time crossing south so we went straight to the dock on Wednesday at around 3pm. It was very calm by the time we entered the channel to our dock space and Mark had no trouble pulling along side our power boat rafting buddy. Right now there are 6 boats here, rafted up in twos. There are 2 French Canadians sailboats in front of us and one of the couple from those boats helped tie us up to the power boat. The 2 French sailboats will be leaving soon – they’re just waiting for the strong winds to die down a bit. Once they leave, we will be moving to dock wall. The owners of the power boat are gone right now and when they return on Dec. 25, they will be leaving soon we can’t still be rafted to them.
So we have 10 days on the dock before we leave! What will we do with all that time?? You guessed it – boat jobs 😁. We started yesterday (Dec. 12) with a job that I didn’t even know was on the list. It’s a fun, smaller job that (for a change) has easy access and good light!! We’re adding a new compartment in the cockpit. The original wind, speed and depth instruments were housed right beside our main companionway. The access to the back of the instruments (to turn them on) is a small compartment that is near the galley area. These 3 instruments no longer function so we decided to remove them, cut a hole and put a nice new hatch to cover the space – instant waterproof compartment with access from the cockpit and inside the boat!! Very cool! We’re going to add a 12volt usb power supply so we can charge the inreach, our communication headsets and our wifi box. We’ll also be able to store small items in there! The job is going well but will require a few more days until it’s complete.
Other jobs on the list include installing the air conditioning units and the new pulley system for the main engine. If it stops raining (we’ve got a rainy week coming up), the rest of the teak can have semco applied and we can start working on the non-skip paint for the deck. We’ll see if the weather cooperates for us!
One of the nice things about this lovely dock space is that it’s at the home of a British couple who have lived in the Bahamas over 50 years. They are super gracious hosts and always have a happy hour each night at 5pm. We’ve had 2 happy hours and have now met everyone who is currently here on their boats. It’s a very fun hour or so where we share stories and experiences and just relax. It’s a nice way to end our day!
Crimson Kathryn and her crew 