A CURIOUS PASSAGE

Charleston, SC

Our Norwegian friends conducting home school on Cumberland Island.

We've gone state-hopping. After two nights at one of our favorite stops, Cumberland Island, Georgia, we set off from the St. Mary's Inlet for an overnight passage to yet another favorite: Charleston.

The weather was finally, finally turning in our favor. The squalls skittered away and our northeast route would be blessed with 10-15 knots of east wind slowly clocking to southeast and easing at the end of the day. Then, the diurnals would kick in giving us some good wind for the night.

Well, none of that happened, but it was a beautiful trip anyway! For once, the unpredicted weather was in the other direction, lighter.

We headed into the deep at 6:30 and into pretty big swell on our beam. Under full sail, we were able to ride over it nicely.

Down:

And back up again:

The wind didn't ease much, and it never clocked south, so we rode on the closest point of sail we could manage, which put us exactly on course to Charleston. For the first time ever, we raised the sails and never changed the set for 30 hours.

The swell laid down in the late evening for a gorgeous night of stars punctuated at midnight with a half moon.

Sometimes dolphins joined us.

Photo by Chip

We rode in on a rising tide and reached Charleston Maritime Center at exactly slack water.

A perfect passage? Almost. For the first time in three years, I got seasick. :-\ Perhaps it was the particular motion of the swell, which wasn't anywhere near as bad as the Gulf Stream crossing. Curious. I was at the helm the first three hours, and then got sick. It never left me.

Chip was a superhero, helming about 2/3 of the trip.

Another cruiser posted this excellent article about combatting and treating seasickness. I know there were several factors that made me susceptible:

1. I didn't sleep well the night before. 
2. We had been inshore for a week or so, on smooth waters.
3. I started on an empty stomach.

All bad. Usually if I take a slug of Pepto before leaving, I don't have much trouble. This time I was not so lucky! I slept at least 12 hours of the passage.

Once we arrived in Charleston, the queasiness disappeared -- and Charleston awaits. Now that's perfect.

Thanks to Stian on To Be for the photos.

PARKED IN PARADISE

Coconut Grove, Miami, FL 25º43.532N | 80º14.193W

At 4:30 a.m., we untied from our much-loved temporary home in Coconut Grove, waved to a sleeping Jessie Marie and turned east into the darkness, happy, wired and only a little nervous, ready to face the Gulf Stream, ready to leave the fluky weather of Miami, ready for some brilliant turquoise water and Bahamian sun.

By my calculation we would arrive at the Biscayne Channel, running between Biscayne Bay and the Atlantic, right at sunrise, so, you know, we could see. I've always wanted to see Stiltsville, the group of houses built out over the water, now endangered.

I'm not a very good calculator. We arrived well before dawn. I took the high-powered spotlight in hand, we slowed to a crawl and crept into the ghost town I thought I wanted to see.

I was wrong about that too. The first time I swung the spotlight through the pitch black and a house loomed up, right in the middle of the water, oh boy. That was definitely NOT what I wanted to see. I'm not usually prone to the heeby jeebies, but all I wanted was to get the hell out of there! AAAAAAHHHHHH!

But we plodded slowly through. I stopped shining the light anywhere but directly at the marks, so we silently passed houses without seeing them. CREEEPY.

We passed safely through and offshore into the Gulf Stream -- and the sunrise.

It was slated to be a mild day on all counts. The one factor that did not get figured in was that storm that moved past yesterday. Seems it left some energy churning around in the Gulf Stream. At about five miles offshore we entered confused waters, popping up in big bumps all around us with a prevailing swell coming onto our starboard beam.

The boat rolled right and left, nose down, nose up, every which way in no particular pattern -- the only "pattern" that makes me seasick. And yes, I got nauseous. And then I threw up my ginger ale, right into the Gulf Stream. Take that!

This photo perfectly captures how I was feeling.

Discomfort aside, our crossing was uneventful and beautiful. I had heard of the cobalt blue waters but had never seen a blue so rich. I admired it even as I was hurling into it.

We approached Bimini between 1 and 2 o'clock, still in confused seas. Keeping a wary eye on the notoriously sketchy, poorly marked channel into Alice Town, I saw something move in the water off to port. I turned my head just in time to see a whole school (flock?) of flying fish take flight, landing again almost 30 yards away.

The spot where the flying fish flew -- just a few minutes ago. :-( Sorry.

As advertised, the entrance was treacherous. The red and green marks at the beginning were big and visible, confidence building, but as we passed into the channel, the water was still so rough we were getting jostled around so thoroughly that the GPS was useless, taking way too long to right itself after we rolled.

Okay, here's the easy one. Where's the green mark?
FYI: This photo was taken on a calm day, NOT the day we entered.

Welcome to visual navigation. We scanned the water for the purported second green mark, knowing it might not be there. Should we start turning? Maybe? Wait! Chip saw something ahead. A green mark, just about the actual size it is on the chart. Seriously, it is about the size of a yardstick. We spotted it just in time. We turned, terrified, pointed toward the entrance to the harbor and made it. We made it.

I even made this photo large for you. (HINT: It's just to the left of that sailboat.)

Pulled in, tied up at 2:03. Nine hours and 33 minutes from Coconut Grove to Alice Town. Not bad.

I pulled out the yellow quarantine flag. The dockmaster told me, "Ma'am, you don't have to fly that if you're going straight to Customs."

"Yes, I do!"

He stared at me blankly.

"How can I take a picture if I don't fly it?"

Yellow quarantine flag.

Soon enough -- ridiculously fast -- Chip returned with our papers, clearance to sail under the Bahamian flag. YES!

This long, long, long plod to paradise, by my count 943 days since my first blog post,  has finally reached a destination that looks like paradise.

Gulf Stream, conquered. Bahamian flag, flying.

Safe and deleriously happy in crystal clear, turquoise waters.

Alice Town Bimini, Bahamas 25º43.444N | 79º17.879W

Happy captain!

Oh, yeah. Water at the dock.