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Date:Sat, 31 May 2025 10:27:00 GMT

Arrival in Marathon


Back in the USA!

     Day 4 5 and 6. We have 1-4 foot waves and 8-15 Knot winds. We were much relieved and the journey became hot and lazy.

     We were visited twice by pods of dolphins. They seem drawn to the motor sounds... Both times they came it was soon after we started the engines. Also a Bird came to rest and stayed on the lifeline till morning. He was some kind of land bird and we were at least 15 miles from Cuba.

    A note about the channel: It does get shallow quick on the north east side. On one occation we drifted about 3 miles north and sure enough by he times I noticed the change in color we were in less than 20 feet of water with our centerboard down! When you're sailing into the sunset you can't see the change in color till it's too late.

    There was a lot of traffic. Cargo ships going both directions but I did hail them on 16 to make sure they knew we were there but it took them a long time to answer so I'm sure that they were not actually watching for a little sailboat like us. A big ship like this would crush us and not even know they hit anything I bet. Because of this Sam and I kept a pretty close watch on the horizon and the AIS.

    Sam took first shift from 8-midnight and I took midnight to sunrise. But in reality it was a bit fluid. Basically I went to sleep early and Sam stayed on till he was tired and then I took it till breakfast. So sometimes our shifts were 6 hours, sometimes 4, but it worked out great. Hannah filled in sometimes too when both Sam and I were wasted.

    Sunrises and sunsets were absolutely amazing ! I have no words to explain it you just have to see the vastness of the ocean with the shades of the evening sun going all around the horizon from pink to orange to blue and even the reflection on the sea turns it a kind of wine color. The blue is such a pure deep royal color and the water was crystal clear.

    Poor Lila was miserable and wouldn't eat for the first 2 days and was drooling and throwing up. But around day 3 she started eating and 4 and 5 were pretty normal. She lost a lot of weight before she mellowed out. She mostly sat in a box below the dinette for 3 days. Hannah had to pick her up and set her in the cat box because she wouldn't move. When she did it herself for the first time we knew she was getting better.

    The generator was a constant problem it would quit at random intervals and we had to use the bicycle pump to blow the line out multiple times. There seemed to be no problem with the main engine. I wish I knew what was floating around in there. We ran the generator about 1 hour for every 4 hours of autopilot. We were pretty lazy on this trip and used the autopilot a lot. We also kept the centerboard down the entire trip. When we lowered it to stop the rolling of course it bangs about every 10 seconds, but you get used to it. But when we tried to pull it up it didn't work so sam and I had to diagnose the stuck switch. For the moment the limit switches are disabled so we can use the motor to pull it up and down. This means someone has to watch with the floorboards pulled up to make sure we don't run it off the end of the worm gear. I also found that our backstay is not in the best shape. I'm a little worried about it till we get it inspected and changed if necessary.

     We ate nuts, beef jerkey, eggs, sandwidches with home made bread, Coffee and cookies and soup. The soup and eggs were only on smooth days. Still a ,a warm meal is nice especially in the cool of the morning or evening.

     When we arrived outise Marathon we tried to slow down so that we arrived at sunrise. However I reefed the Genny too late and so we got up to the reef at 4am. To avoid a harbor at night I did a zig zag and a circle to buy time till about 6am when the first light came. Then we entered the reef dropped the sails and motored in to anchor. We set the anchor at about 8am. However on the first attempt the anchor windless would not release. We had checked the motor before we left but hadn't checked the spinfree function. So Sam was up there with a wedge and a hammer hitting the spindle to break it free after a year of non use. The anchor set easily after the second attempt and we listened to the morning net as Hannah made breakfast for our first morning back in Marathon.

     One of the first things we did after registering with the office was to take long long showers!!!! this was quite literally our first shower in over a year. I mean, we had the hose with a shower head on the deck but it is not the same as a full real shower and it was absolutely amazing. You get used to boat life and you almost don't remember what it was like with all the normal amenitites. Then we went for icecream and came back for the Happy Hour at the Tiki by the Marina office.

    We were so happy to see old friends we hadn't seen in over a year and also meet new ones. We stayed late and didn't return to the boat till after 10pm. After being up for nearly 48 hours I crashed and just got up about an hour ago to work on this blog, diagnose the broken dorade box on the foredeck, put up sail covers, empty the bilge, check the water level, Sam got fuel, and listen to the morning net! AND it's now nearly noon and I still don't have coffee because Hannah is making lime curd, french toast with home made bread, eggs and maple syrup. It's going to be a great day and we're glad to be back in the US.
Date:Tue, 27 May 2025 00:17:00 GMT

One Third of the way to Florida


Just Past Great Inagua

     Day 1 was pretty spicy. We have 6-10 foot waves and 25 Knot winds. We were all pretty miserable. We left Luperon around 13:00 and it took us amost an our to get out of the harbor and past the reefs. The winds were not quite what we would have liked them to be so we made our way north for quite a bit before turning NW. When we did, on a broad reach we were having trouble keeping the Genoa filled as it was blanketed by the Main. In that process we got the lazy sheet wrapped around the forward Dorades and it tore them off the deck. I'm pretty upset about this but it's fixable once we're in the yard.

     Day 2 the waves mellowed to 4-6 feet and the wind settled down to 15g20 from about 130. We moved to Gig and gigger and we're making about 5-= 7 knots. We're eating granola for breakfast and bean salad for dinner. We're still eating Hannah's oatmeal, cranberry, white chocolate cookies and fresh beef Jerky from Daryl and Tracy on Sparrow.

     Day 3 the generator clogged again and I tried charging with the engine but that seems to have died so we used Sam's bicycle pump to blow out the clog. However I spilt diesel in the process from the lines on the batteries and on my hands. After cleaning it up I went to go topside, and a wave hit. I feel off the stairs with my diesel slippery hands and hit my head hard on the cabin, landed on the refrigerator and then down to the cabin sole. I've got a pretty good headache and my ears are ringing. Hannah is telling me not to go to sleep.

     We are still on track for Thursday or Friday in Marathon... OH... we put the centerboard down and now it won't come back up so we will have to do it manually. For Now we have an 11 foot draft.
Date:Sat, 24 May 2025 11:55:00 GMT

Getting Underway


Leaving the DR for the Old Bahama Channel

     Well folks this is the test of our email system to blog. We were supposed to leave yesterday but the Windlass broke (bad connections and broken relay) so it took most of the afternoon to fix that. So we're leaving in a few hours this morning!
Date:Fri, 23 May 2025 00:33:00 GMT

Update and heading out


Heading north

    Well, the time has come and we're making final preps for leaving Luperon for the US. Our destination is North Carolina. We are planning on taking the Old Bahama Channel. Our first stop is Marathon Fl. I know it's been a while since we posted but honestly we were just enjoying Luperon. We've been getting ready for about 2 months but all kinds of maint items were getting in the way not the least of which were a new exhaust elbow... AGAIN!, and a clogged fuel line for the generator which took nearly a month to diagnose. We finally blew the line out with a tire pump/compressor. it took about 40 psi or so (don't know exactly) to push out the clog. We have found a miriad of small other problems that pop up just for sitting in the harbor for over a year. But we finally have them mostly fixed, and we are actively organizing and stocking the boat for the journey. We are excited to get underway again and to meet old friends along the East Coast. We are sad to leave Luperon DR and all our friends here but it is time to take care of some things in the US.




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