We hope everyone back home had a very merry Christmas and is enjoying their holidays. We had a great visit with Susanne, Steve & family – they left the day before yesterday for home. We had a lot of fun and are thankful they let a couple of boat bums like us share their family vacation. This is what their car looked like when they landed in Ottawa. 🙁

I’ll wait to describe our time in the Turks & Caicos Islands (TCI) for another post. I think last we talked, I was going to tell you about our first big ocean passage from Staniel Cay, Exumas Islands, Bahamas to TCI (with a pit stop in Mayaguana). Seems like a long time ago, now, but it’s only been a week.

Staniel Cay, Exhumas, Bahamas to Providenciales, Turks & Caicos Islands (17-Dec to 20-Dec-2012)

After listening to the weather on December 16th, we decided we’d leave for TCI the next day; it sounded like the last weather window that could get us there in one shot before Christmas. We wait for near-high-tide to leave and go to weigh the anchor and the windlass motor wouldn’t quit. The windlass is a motorized winch on the bow that makes deploying or raising our main anchor and its (up to) 200 feet of chain as easy as pushing a button with your big toe. The morning we left, it got stuck in “up” mode, so we turned off the motor, raised it manually and decided we’d look into the problem later. We could deploy & weigh the anchor manually from now ’til forever, but the one-toe function is so easy, and in a world where Nothin’s Easy, we really like the windlass.

Back to the story. We motor towards Big Rock Cut, which is one of several navigable cuts that connects the Exuma Banks to Exuma Sound, and were confused about which side we were supposed to leave these boat-busting “rocks awash”. We turned around three times until we were sure, and made it out with no problems. Deep water (12+ feet) the whole way.

The sun was shining, the seas were easy rollers, and the wind was about 10 knots – enough to keep the sails full. We set up the Autohelm 3000 and watched the miles go by. We did four-hour watches, day & night, starting at 10 am (when we left Staniel Cay). I did the first watch, Phill took over at 2 pm, I was back on watch at 6 pm, and so on. It was pleasant; we had regular meals, we slept when we were supposed to – all in all, life was about as normal as boat-normal gets. I had the 2 – 6 am shift, and was able to enjoy the sunrise (a very rare occurrence in my previous life).

The second day of our passage (Dec 18th) was much like the first…we had to motor-sail to keep on track, time-wise; there wasn’t enough wind to get us where we needed to go by the time we needed to get there, but between the sails and the motor we were able to maintain about 6.5 knots. It was calm, we fished (not a nibble), I made some beaded necklaces, Phill puttered with some locker hinges that have been causing us grief since we left Kingston; easy, uneventful passage so far. By the time the sun went down, there was next to no wind, but we didn’t want to continue motoring (did not want to get low on fuel), so we tried to be happy with the 2 – 2.5 knots we got from the wind alone.

We did the same shifts as the day before, so once again, I was on the 2 – 6 am shift. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky – the stars were spectacular. Some were so bright, they cast light on the ocean, like moonlight, except starlight. It was very, very nice to be little ‘ole me looking up at the great big starry sky in our tiny boat miles and miles from nowhere.

Which brings me to the part of the story you’re not going to believe.

I notice this one star – it sparkled like a diamond. I recall the pleasant, sing-song thought “…like a diamond in the sky…”. It sparkled in all the colours of the rainbow – not just white-blue, or like the orange of a planet. Then I noticed it was only one, particular star that was sparkling like a multi-coloured diamond – all the rest were just pretty, twinkly white-blue or the rarer orange.

So now I’m curious about my diamond in the sky, and I get the binoculars to take a closer look. I nearly dropped the them – I had to re-position them at my face. I’m sure I jumped…it might have looked comical had anyone been watching.

Okay…what I saw looked like a rainbow jellyfish in the sky. It seemed to have two or three “lobes” that sort of pulsated into each other, all the while shimmering in rainbow colour. It was much more defined than looking at a star at the same elevation through the binoculars, and seemed much bigger (closer, I guess I would say).

Outside of an emergency, the person who is off watch should not be disturbed, but I really want Phill to see this thing (I can’t be the only person who sees it!). By now it’s about 4 am, he’s sound asleep, so I calm down, and try to observe the rainbow jellyfish in the sky more objectively. It remained at the same bearing – due south of our course, and at the same altitude, or elevation.

It was a little after 5 o’clock, the sky begins to lighten on the horizon, and I’m afraid the rainbow jellyfish in the sky won’t be visible for much longer. So at 5:30, I wake Phill up. He gets up quickly, I show him where it is and he has a look with the binoculars. Not sure when he went all “objective-scientist” on me, but he says “Hmmm….very interesting celestial phenomenon. You should take a picture.” Then he went back to sleep!

It didn’t occur to me to take a picture, because I didn’t think our camera or its operator could take a good photo of the night sky, but as Phill suggested, I took several. I tried uploading the best one to the blog, but it gets “crunched” so it just looks like black night sky. You’ll have to take my word for it…and remember, Phill saw it too!

I’ve searched the internet a bit for what it could have been – a geosynchronous satellite maybe? Not sure, but it was pretty interesting.

For now, we’ll just call it the Rainbow Jellyfish in the Sky.

We can see Mayaguana (pronounced MAY-guah-nah) for a couple of hours before we arrive. It is the only island of The Bahamas that retains its original Lucayan name, and was not settled until 1812, when people from Turks & Caicos began to migrate to the island.

We decide to stop in to see if we can get some diesel (which according to our guide was a possibility), and anchor in Abraham’s Bay, which is a huge harbour protected by an untouched, pristine reef on its south side. It was a couple of miles from the southwest entrance of the reef to the actual anchorage at the settlement of Abraham’s Bay. We’re anchored by about 11 am, and are pretty pleased with ourselves.

It’s about noon by the time we get the boat back together, the dinghy in the water and the outboard on to go ashore. There are three other dinghies tied up at the government dock, so we know we’re in the right place. We walk the half mile to the telephone office, and ask about getting ten gallons of diesel.

The very helpful lady makes a phone call, and less than 10 minutes later, Scully arrives. He drives up and says through his open passenger side window – “A very pleasant good afternoon to you“. Scully is sort of an “island facilitator”, and tells us that there has been another request for 100 gallons of diesel, so getting an additional 10 for us could pose some logistical problems, especially considering we were hoping to get it that afternoon. He’d see what he could do, though, so we agreed to call him on VHF channel 16 later in the day. In the meantime, we toured the settlement.

It’s a purely cash economy in Abraham’s Bay, and having not really planned to stop, we didn’t stock up on cash. We had just enough to pay for the 10 gallons of diesel (at $7.50/gallon), so we couldn’t partake of Miss Debbie’s island cooking, or have a beer at “The Club”. We stopped into The Club anyways, and there we met very friendly locals (who made a point of introducing themselves and shaking our hands; a very warm welcome!), and some fellow travellers, the ones who owned the three dinghies we saw tied up at the dock. An interesting bunch, that’s for sure!

It’s probably a good thing we didn’t have enough cash, because we might have stayed a while and missed our TCI weather window. Scully wasn’t too sure when he’d be able to get any diesel, so we went back to the boat to check the weather. The winds were going to be NE shifting to ENE then to East, 18 knots gusting to 23. A little more wind than we were looking for, but considering our diesel situation, we could use it. Rather than wait an uncertain amount of time for more fuel, we reefed the main and decided to leave around 10 pm and use the brisk wind to arrive in TCI in the daylight.

We motor out the southwest entrance of the reef (the same way we came in) in the dark, which is a bit unnerving, but we’re getting used to it. The wind has by now increased and the seas have picked up, and we know it’s just going to be worse when we’re out of the lee of Mayaguana.

It did get worse…the seas were on our beam, and too big for the Autohelm 3000, so we hand steered the whole way. Our four hour watch system was out the window too…it was pretty tiring so we did one hour watches instead. The off-watch person would just flop down on the leeward cockpit bench and fall instantly asleep.

Getting south was easy, but getting east was tough with the increasing easterly component, so it took us longer than we thought. By the time we’re ready to navigate Sellar’s Cut on the North side of Providenciales, it’s well after noon. We call the Turtle Cove Marina on the VHF to arrange for the complimentary guide boat to help us find our way. We’re salty, and very, very tired, so we’re glad to see Kadis in his boat ready to show us the way to the marina. It’s about a half hour motor from Sellar’s Cut to the Turtle Cove Marina. Kadis & George help us get into our slip, which was Carribean style and not like any slip we were used to. You have to lasso two piles on your way in, and secure the lines to the bow or stern, depending on which way to enter the slip. I’m not much of a wrangler, so the lassoing was tough for me (I’ve since learned to drape the loops over the pike pole/boat hook – much easier).

By about 4:30 three customs & immigration officials arrive. All three had some difficulties getting aboard (we entered the slip bow-first, when we should have backed in). They ask us a few questions, they complete the forms, and we pay the $50 entrance fee. One official notices that it’s Phill’s birthday the next day, so he suggests we go to the concert at Miss Moonies to celebrate. He makes a few other local recommendations, and then they’re off.

We have a well-deserved cold beer then go for much needed showers. We stop at the Tiki Hut on the way back to the boat, have some very delicious nachos, and talk a little bit about how proud we are of ourselves. There were a lot of people who didn’t think we’d make it to TCI for Christmas; “Pfffffft….good luck with that! Pick a place OR a time to meet someone – never both!” was a common comment from fellow travellers. We also had our doubts, what with getting stalled out by Sandy in Georgia and our technical “difficulties”. Others thought we could do it – we’d just have to keep moving, which we did.

So we go back to the boat around 6, I try to do a post, then we’re sound asleep ’til the next morning.

TCI is really beautiful. Can’t wait to show you some of it in the next post. We’re happy we’re here, and are in a great spot to plan the rest of our adventure. South to the Dominican Republic or back north to the Beautiful Bahamas…hmmm…tough choice.