Starting the journey home

After leaving Hopetown, we spent several days in Marsh Harbor (the largest town in the Abacos) taking care of boat chores and reconnecting with friends.   One evening, we hosted a Happy Hour and all the guys celebrated the sunset in the traditional Bahamian way by blowing horns made out of conch or Triton Trumpet shells.   Joe made a conch shell into a horn last year and on the way south, the lock tender in the Dismal Swamp, Robert, tuned it for him.   To make a horn, you cut off the pointy end of the shell creating a whole to blow through.  Robert thought the whole was too small so while we were tied to the lock with the water filling in around the boat, Robert ran into his office, grabbed a screwdriver and a pipe wrench and banged on the shell to make the whole larger.   I think both of us looked at him with those rough tools and were sure the shell was going to fall apart in his hands.   But he knew what he was doing and proved it by playing "When the Saints come Marching In" after he tuned the shell.   A very talented guy.   In Vero Beach, Joe on Kajon, another expert horn blower further refined the shell and coached Joe on the finer points of horn music.   So now there is a  sunset tradition on Short Walk of blowing the conch horn and Joe tells me he is going to continue this at home.   That ought to make us popular in the townhouse community.  On the other hand, maybe we can finally get even with our really noisy next door neighbors!

After enjoying all that Marsh Harbor has to offer, we moved on to Man of War Cay.   Man of War is famous for their boat building and although most of the boats are now made of fiberglass instead of wood, they do have beautiful traditional lines and would look as much at home on the Bahamian waters as on the Chesapeake Bay.   Some of the racing boats remind us of log canoes.

We anchored for a night in Treasure Cay which claims the most beautiful beach in the Abacos.  Indeed, the gentle sandy slope of the beach is great for swimming and is very beautiful.   But listening to the weather we decided we needed to move on after one night and stage ourselves further north in preparation for the gulf stream crossing back to the US.   We anchored off of Spanish Cay one night and Great Sale Cay another night waiting for the weather window to leave the Bahamas.   On our way to Great Sale, we had perfect wind and were flying along between 6 and 7 knots slowly catching up to the boat in front of us when we heard a boat calling on the VHF "To the Island Packet sailing west, this is the Island Packet 40' Barefoot sailing east".   We answered at the same time as the boat in front of us did.  To make a long story short, the boat in front of us was Lark, another Island Packet 40 so there were 3 identical boats passing, all under full sail.  Later on in the same day, another identical boat, Tim Ton, called both Lark and us making 4 IP 40s (2 sailing east and 2 sailing west) withing 20 miles!    Unfortunately we were too far apart to get a really good picture but I got Lark and Barefoot. 

We left Great Sale headed to the US at about 4 pm on Sunday, April 1.   We had an uneventful crossing with a combination of sailing (7-8 knots) and motor sailing.   We had a Bahamian Mockingbird land on the boat and travel with us for about 6 hours and the Navy was conducting exercises off the Florida coast with Aircraft carrier 69 and Warship 42 asking everyone to stay at least 3 miles away.   At one point an F18 buzzed us.   Guess which one of us was jumping around on deck waving to the Navy guys?  We arrived at our destination in Fernandina Beach, Florida Tuesday around 3:30 pm.   Clearing customs this year was a snap.   The usual routine is to raise a yellow quarantine flag upon arrival into US waters and then call into customs when you dock.   You have 24 hours from the time you call in (they give you an accession # that logs your call to the second) until you actually have to show up at a customs office.   This time, Joe called in, the officer asked only a few questions and we were good to go.   No personal appearance to the customs office required.   Love it!

This is our first visit to Fernandina and we are finding it to be a lovely, hospitable town.   The only adjustment is that walking the town the first day, we seemed to have forgotten that not everyone in the US says good morning/afternoon or even acknowledges your presence.   We even get some glares as in "what the heck do these people want?".   We really miss the friendliness and openness of the Bahamas and hope to ignore the less than polite people here in the US and keep the friendly Bahamas feeling going as we travel north.   Anybody want to take bets on how long that will actually last?  

One of our last Bahamian sunsets

A bunch of crazy guys blowing horns at sunset!

One of the boats under construction on Man of War Cay

Beach at Treasure Cay

Lark and Barefoot:  2 Island Packet 40s sailing near Great Sale Cay

Bahamian Mockingbird joined us in the Gulf Stream

F18 (we think) that buzzed us in the Gulf Stream