Wednesday, January 8, 2025 to Wednesday, January 22, 2025
216 nautical miles (249 statute miles)
The Former Cruising Mecca: Fort Lauderdale, FL
Wednesday, January 8 to Wednesday, January 15, 2025
After completing the second day of multiple bridge openings, we arrived in Fort Lauderdale and edged our way into a very crowded anchorage in Lake Sylvia. Several boats needed to be fended off with boat hooks when winds and currents caused everyone to swing around in different patterns.
Access to land was available by taking the dinghy to restaurants and at a city park. The restaurants would not charge a docking fee if you ate or drank at their facility. Useful amenities like multiple grocery stores, hardware stores, three chandleries, as well as a laundry mat were all in walking distance of the Southport Raw Bar.
The owner of Sailorman, a really neat chandlery, mentioned to us that Fort Lauderdale used to be a major cruising sailboat mecca, but now the local marine industry has flipped to serve the mega yacht sphere. This was evident while looking for a pump out facility and a place to fill up our diesel tanks. There are no mobile pump out services available, and the marinas claimed that their pump out system was not operational, or only for marina guests. There was a self-serve unit at the city park, but boaters need to provide their own nozzle, which we do not have. With this dilemma, we decided not to linger much longer in Fort Lauderdale and to head out to sea where we can legally dispose of our tank contents.
Crossing the Gulf Stream
Thursday, January 16 to Friday, January 17
Weigh Anchor 7:00 a.m., In Slip 9:00 a.m., 26 hours
Once we set our potential departure date, we reviewed the port’s ship schedule on the Port Everglades website. In addition, we monitored Channel 14 to listen to the large ship and pilot boat communications.
After fueling up, we caught the 8 a.m. bridge opening and felt lucky to be able to follow a large cargo ship out of the inlet. Outside of the inlet there were many ships waiting to enter the inlet. Channel 14 sounded like a sea version of air traffic control at a busy airport. The theme of heavy ship traffic continued throughout the Gulf Crossing. At one point we reached out to a cargo ship to see if our route crossing their bow was acceptable; and he very kindly told us to proceed, maintaining our speed and course.
Although the seas were larger than expected as we reached the middle of the Gulf Stream, we found it manageable, and perhaps better than the passage from Brunswick. While in the heart of the stream winds gusts up increased to 20 knots, when the forecast led us to believe winds would be less than 8 knots. We opted to motor-sail to minimize our time in the Gulf Stream.
We reached the Great Bahama Bank at Moselle Bank just before sunset. A change in the sea color was still visible even in the cloudy sunset lighting. The color went from beautiful sapphire to electric aqua as our depth sounder began to do a fast count down from its max reading of 360’ down to 20’.
The night was relatively uneventful with some light rainfall. Both the seas and winds gradually dropped off as the night went on. There was a still lot of boat traffic all around us but nothing like the Gulf Stream crossing. We only had to divert once for a cargo ship anchored near Bullocks Harbor.
Our quarantine flag went up shortly after sunrise as we turned into Bullocks Harbour. Since this was the first time we have ever flown the “Q flag,” it was a pretty exciting moment for us. As we approached the entrance to The Bay of Five Pirates, we were particularly glad to have read beforehand that the entrance to the bay is not visible until the very last minute.
From there we headed to the Great Harbour Cay Marina. Utopia was in the slip just before 9 a.m. and we had fully cleared customs and immigration before noon, where we received instructions to replace the Q flag with the Bahamian courtesy flag, which by the way, is not identical to the national flag.
It was now time for me to visit the Bahamas for the very first time.
The Bahamas!
Great Harbour Cay Marina
Friday, January 17– Monday, January 20, 2025
Making the first top in the Bahamas at a marina made the country check in process a bit easier and we thought bad weather was coming on Saturday, so we elected to stay a few days.
The view after walking across the island to the beach side. Free marina bikes for exploring the island. Meeting cruisers at the weekly “Grill & Chill,” featuring some awesome Bahamian food.
A wonderful highlight of our final day at the marina was dinner on board Sans Souci, one of the other Calibers at the marina.
Great Harbour Cay, Berry Islands to Nassau, New Providence Island
Monday, January 20 – Wednesday, January 22
Weather conditions allowed us to split this leg up into three days with great sailing conditions on each day. We left the marina just before sunrise on Monday. After rounding the northern side of the island chain a pod of dolphin came out to greet us as we deployed the whisker pole.
Later, Jimmy thought that the pole may have been extended out a bit too far and went back out on deck to shorten the pole. During this maneuver we accidentally discovered a lever that released the pole from the mast. There was a loud boom as it hit the deck and thank goodness Jimmy was not hurt. Once we had the mess cleaned up and the pole lashed onto the deck, (we did not figure out the reason for the fall until later), we enjoyed a calm sail down the eastern side of the Berries. Our anchorage for the night was near the southern end of the Berry Islands at Alders Cay. Here we put the whisker pole back onto its mount and will give it another go on our next downwind sail.
The following morning we enjoyed several hours of cruising close hauled at 5 knots in light winds for several hours before the winds dropped mid-day as we headed to West Bay to anchor for the evening.
Wednesday’s leg of this route was a fast sail, eastward to Nassau. During the two hours under sail power only, Utopia moved along between 5, and a hair over 8 knots. As the winds shifted forward from a beam reach to close reaching, we did not bother trimming the sails since we were already at 7 knots steady. Over time, we are getting the racing mentality out of our heads and not always trying to get the most speed out of the boat.
The sails were dropped as we approached Nassau Harbour, and by 10:30 a.m. we received permission to enter the very busy harbor. We both kept a sharp eye out to be sure we stayed in deep water, while avoiding boat traffic zooming all over the place. One of the four giant cruise ships began to sound its horn as we approached, but while looking through the binoculars, it appeared that they all were fully moored. We also kept one radio on Channel 16 and the other on 09 but did not hear of any cruise ship departures.
Going through the twin bridges was a little nerve wracking as it was not clear as to which span we needed to pass under. There were several mail boats moored under the tallest span of the westernmost bridge. As we got closer to the bridge, we could see the tiny navigation lights above the span next to the mailboats, where we were able to pass with plenty of room below the bridge.
Cruise ships and mail boats aplenty
Since there is a front to be passing through soon we selected an anchorage just south of Athol Island, on the east side of the harbor. Although there is a lot of zooming boat traffic around and through the anchorage, we are happy with the location. There are at least two docks were we can gain access to Nassau, and there is a little boat-access-only restaurant and bar here in the anchorage. So here we will sit until this front passes through and conditions calm down enough for crossing the Yellow Bank to the south.
(Post # 25-4; Use links below for previous and next post)
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