Sunday, March 17, 2024
Well, that was an adventure.
We started the day off Sunday quite slowly. I was the first one up at 6 am, so I made coffee and sat in the living room of our place. Nathan was the second one up, and one by one, everyone woke up and collected in the kitchen for coffee and breakfast.
We had decided to take it easy in the morning, so we packed up our gear and walked to the close grocery store, while we awaited Darville to come home from his church services.
At 1:45, he was home and we hatched a plan. Darville would take me, Todd and Nathan to the grocery store near the marina and leave us there while we shopped for our remaining provisions. Then he went back to our place, picked up Grant and Dave and all of our luggage and deposited them at our boat.
When we were done with the shopping, Darville picked up Todd, Nathan and I with our groceries and drove us to the boat.
Dave and Grant were on board the boat getting the rundown from Captain Ryan of Dream Yacht Charters.
The original plan was to sleep on board the boat at the marina, get the hang of things, cook in the galley, and set sail first thing in the morning. Since we were done with our boat briefing, Dave asked if we could take the boat out for an hour or so and come back.
Why come back, they said?
So, with rather little preparation, we disconnected from shore power, brought the dock lines on board and motored out of the marina.
This was easier said than done. We may have gotten into a little kerfuffle with a neighboring boat or two and their anchors, but with negligible damage, we managed to leave the marina through the channel and set sail for Rose Island.
Todd was at the wheel, with Nathan, Dave and Grant managing the sails. It was great. We were free! The sunset was so beautiful as we sailed away from Nassau and towards Rose Island.
Things got a little trickier when we tried to set the anchor in the dark, but we got the job done and congratulated ourselves on a job well done. We talked about what went well, and what we could have done better. We made a dinner of chicken, refried beans, salsa, cheese and tortillas, and discussed anchor watch.
We decided that we would take turns to watch the anchor in the order of the names in the sunshirts we had made up for this adventure – D + TANGZ. So at 10 pm, Dave watched the anchor to make sure we weren’t dragging. My first turn was at midnight, where I relieved Todd, and was relieved by Nathan.
I never fell asleep before my first watch, so when the alarm sounded for my turn, I just left our cabin, got the low down from Todd, and hung out in the cockpit until Nathan came up at 1.
I was able to sleep after my watch some, but I was definately awake when the Raymarine anchor drag alarm sounded in the 3 o’clock hour.
Grant and Dave were already on deck, and Nathan, Todd and I joined them for a middle of the night anchor dragging and resetting party. We worked in the dark to reset the anchor and then resumed our watch schedule.
My next shift was at 5 am, and Dave was asleep in the cockpit with me. Nothing happened on my watch, including being relieved by Nathan at 6 am.
Grant came up to the cockpit to relieve Dave, and he seemed quite awake, so he told me to let Nathan sleep and he would take his shift. I went back down to our cabin where I was able to sleep again briefly until the day’s light.
That was entirely too much adventure for our first day.