s/v Silhouette: January 2013

Staniel Cay

We made it to Staniel Cay the same day at dusk and met our friend John Hromadka the next. We moved over to the bigger anchorage but turned left instead of right and had a few minutes of fun trying to get off the sand bar - drat!

Oh…and I was prepared for the pigs this time - I purchased 6 pounds of carrots before we left the states. We have most of the action on video including the part where one tried to climb into the dinghy with us.

What…an island without a bar…

We liked Spanish Wells but believe it or not, there is not a bar on the whole island. We stayed two nights and needed a pilot (Bandit) going in the north entrance and out the south…it was mighty shallow

Spanish Wells

Rats! Since we had the wind on the nose the whole way we are running low on fuel. We decide to detour to Spanish Wells which is the northern tip of Eleuthera Island.

What a difference a day makes

What a difference a day makes! Here I am now barefoot and polishing my nails.

Most unusual New Year's Day (what no hangover…)

New Year's Day finds me sleeping cocooned on the settee in the cockpit - Mark (the bum) can sleep in our cabin below but all I do is toss and turn.

Dinghy not behaving

The seas were kind of rough and the dinghy was not behaving well so I added another tether which fixed the problem.

Then a water leak

During a routine check of the engine room Mark discovered a slow water leak on the hose connected to the sea water (for cooling purposes). It had a slit…so he had to replace it while under way.

MOST unusual New Years Eve ever…

So far (New Years Eve night) we have traveled 252 nautical miles in 30 hours

Radar Screen

This is the radar screen - nothing seen within 36 nautical miles of us - and during the whole trip we only saw one or two boats which was indicative of when we left.

Chart Plotter

Thought we would show you what we see on our chart plotter while under way - this is zoomed out to 1041 nautical miles…we usually watch it at 4 or 8 nautical miles.

And we are off - only 2 months later than the First Mate thought

We took off from New Bern on 12/29/2012 after fueling up. Went on to Morehead City - and were planning on continuing across. We topped off and spent the night - since gale warnings had been issued. We left on the 30th. Somehow our reef line chaffed thru (already) and we had to repair it at sea.

A good sailor only makes a mistake once

While Chris reattaches the recovered anchor - being extra careful of course.

More work…

Mark continues working on various engine room stuff...

Shrimp but not to eat

and also found a shrimp

What the heck…

We found this eel in the filter

Wonder why the gen set is overheating

Then we were having an overheating issue with the generator while testing it. Mark changed the impellor and it was still overheating so decided to clean the water filter….cannot tell by this photo too well but..

Grenada 'hanger' finally put to use…

Mark found this stainless steel 'hanger' in

Grenada

and saved it to use on the dinghy davits. Now, he implemented his plan - hindsight says it is working really well.

Diver to the rescue

Our local diver, Jessie was brave enough to get in the water and in a huerculin effort found it - thank you Jessie

OMG

What is wrong with this picture? I will tell you the $^%$ anchor is missing. Yes, yours truly was attempting to replace the swivels, etc. on the anchor and the old ones were so tight that when I put all my available muscle to it the shank twisted in the bow roller an it flipped overboard.

s/v Silhouette

Thursday, January 31, 2013