Salvio Sails!

The last few days onboard were a relaxing taster of all favored SALVio things, so here’s a bit of a photo dump.

While waiting out a short blow, we spent one rainy blustery morning watching movies, playing Banagrams and doing an endless amount of sudoku. We generally took advantage of being dockside to do laundry, and enjoyed some land-based touring in our golf cart. It cleared, of course, and the girls swam and sand dollar-combed at Gillam Bay, we had our favorite conch fritters (In all of the Bahamas! I’ve been on a testing mission for this entire decade.), and we generally spent the time reaching places easier accessed by land than by sea while we had the chance.

Fleeing the marina, we were able to spend our last day exploring the mangroves on Manjack before spending the night anchored off of the New Plymouth settlement. It was an all-time high for turtle numbers in the mangroves- they were EVERYWHERE. Dozens in sight at a time, zipping this way and that under and alongside our dinghy as we poled our way through. (We may have undershot the tide just a weeeeee bit, and spent much of our journey getting creative about getting over muck and sand bars.)

We had a really beautiful final day of sailing, and then a breathtaking last morning sunrise to cap it off. We helped a bit with decommissioning to not dump Andy with too much to do for his last days, and then we were off. Sad face.

A day later and boom, we three Allen ladies are back in the northeast, staring at muddy snow piles and listening to the snow melt trickling off of the roof. Super sad faces. But! Let the future trip planning and scheming begin again, in whatever shape it may take.

It’s a bit grey this morning after a really beautiful day yesterday. Our pale skin welcomes the break from the sun, but as I’m always cold, I’ll be a wimp and say that it’s a wee bit chilly. After a lovely breakfast with our friends overlooking the harbor yesterday morning, we sailed up to Fisher’s Bay on Great Guana Cay, where we met our friends for a Sunday Funday day ashore. The Sunday scene at the infamous Nippers is always a treat for people-watching, and yesterday was no exception. One swift pass-through of the cranked music, the leopard print suits, and the free-flowing Nippers’ punch had us thinking that the energy level was somewhere beyond our group’s vibe, however, so we headed down to the beach and had a relaxing swim instead. That strengthened our resolve for coping with the volume of the music (how old ARE we?!), so we tried again and tucked into one of Nippers’ pools for a bit to check the scene once more. For my Dirtbagger’s Guide to Bahamian Pools Used in Lieu of Showering, I’m sad to report that theirs was saltwater. The hunt for the elusive freshwater pool commenced.

Runabouts and boats with more horses than good looks flock to Guana in great numbers every Sunday, coming from Baker’s Bay (same island, but farther north), Hope Town and Treasure Cay. Fisher’s Bay and its landing spot, a beach bar called Grabbers, host the incomers with their bank-side docks. Over the years Grabbers itself has grown into a destination, likely to keep everyone from just using them only as a dockage space in order to get to Nippers on the ocean side. Music, games, a pool (freshwater! freezing!), a beach, decent food… the very stuff that Sunday Funday is made of. 

While there never feels to be enough time with dear friends, we had to take advantage of today’s mild weather for, you guessed it… crossing the Whale. This passage is starting to feel like the bane of the Abaco cruiser’s existence, and yet, if we want to ever leave Green Turtle, it’s a necessary challenge to conquer. I’m writing as we motor sail through it, so this time it’s an easy trip, thankfully.

We have a few more days of this cruise of ours, and somehow I’m not as melancholy about it as I thought I’d be. This is potentially our last full family cruise aboard Chickadee (Lily’s new locale for the next years in California won’t make it super easy for her to join in), but having come down twice already this year has made me realize that we’re quite sold on this way of travel and entertainment. (Of course we are…my logical brain was a few steps behind my emotional one.) Whether it’s here on Chickadee or in the South Pacific on… ‘new Chickadee’?, we’ll find ways to sail with our girls, their friends, our friends, new friends.. whether we have gaps or shift changes or college-funding taking precedence, we’re in it for the long haul no matter what, which is remarkably comforting. No finality to this trip, just the continued hunt for fun adventure and of course, freshwater pools.

Chickadee has flown the nest. After a hop ashore to the little farmer’s market in Hope Town, we had a short sail north to Man-O-War Cay yesterday. About a half a mile from the harbor entrance we had a nice puff of breeze that gave the shackle on the head of the jib a run for its money, and in the end, the wind won. As we noted on the remaining piece that came down, it’s amazing that it held out as long as it did, thin as it was…

Also en route I met our fifth crew member while hunting for whatever sound on deck has been plaguing me below during any movement recently. It sounds like a block or something somewhat heavy dragging and rolling, and alas, I still don’t know what it is, but when my eyes focused to look in the shallow area between the cockpit hatch slider and its housing, a pair of eyes were looking back at me. A frog. Looking pretty indifferent to my existence, remarkably. 

We’ve named her Diane. Four hours into knowing her and we already had major family debates about how hungry she is and whether or not she should be given some lettuce. (Apparently my family doesn’t know what frogs eat, despite me telling me them about their carnivorous ways.) She likely came aboard in the boat yard in Green Turtle, so yes, probably hungry, but do I want to think about a squishy frog living aboard and ALSO its poop? Not really. Also don’t you think Diane would find Man-O-War to a nice place to live, and don’t you think she should go check it out RIGHT NOW? I do too. But instead she’s been staring a piece of lettuce all night long, wondering what her roommates are up to and where are all of the good bugs are.

Despite the shackle blow-out and the stowaway, we had a nice catch-up with our friends after we arrived, and then headed to the beach so that the girls could get some body-surfing and skimboarding while the surf was still frisky from the easterlies. Following that, thankfully they came back to swim in the harbor to offload the pounds of sand they collected during their adventures before coming back aboard.

A dinghy ride to town for a few groceries, some ice cream, and a look around (not much doing in MOW, usually, but it felt like even less this time around, somehow) before heading back to the boat to fix the jib. We sent Lily aloft to grab the halyard (thankfully the other piece of the shackle was still attached to keep it from slipping through the roller and down the mast), and then remarkably found just the spare we needed on a nearby boat that had stores for the taking (a Dorian ‘survivor’ that is essentially using the rest of its life for spares for others). Sail bent back on, lickety split.

Lily cracked her second coconut before dinner with friends (you know people know you well when they hear you’re coming and they hunt for a perfect coconut for your coconut-loving daughter to get into), and bam, a full day of Abaco-ing complete. 

A bit overcast this morning, which sets the mood of the harbor fairly well. Yesterday, shortly after hearing him chime in helpfully on the morning’s Net (our daily VHF Cruiser’s Net/local info session), we learned that the unofficial mayor/commodore/harbor master of Hope Town died. He was found in his dinghy with the engine running, and I’m assuming heart attack but do not know for sure. Will was a staple in Hope Town, living aboard his sailboat Antares here in the harbor, and until we laid eyes or ears on him upon arrival, we never really felt like we were ‘here’ yet. (Last year they skipped their first winter in the Abacos in decades to stay in Maryland, and it did NOT feel right, much akin to this morning.) 

Will and his wife Muffin (and their ‘little dog Sophie’, as he signed on with every day) were/are (how do I convey this now, again?) characters. Will and Muffin each have/had their own dinghy, which I always thought was brilliant. No need for coordination throughout the day, simply one tied to port and one to starboard and do what you need to do when you need to do it. He preferred the standing-up putt-putt, so always had a tiller extension and a fixed post of some sort for his non-steering hand. He ran the Net most mornings, with humor and patience, and he loved entertaining any boater kid who had a good joke for the listeners (although he’d Dad-groan if they deserved it). He would come boat to boat on trash days to help out newcomers or those who didn’t have their you-know-what together in time to get to the ‘Sunshine Freight Dock’ before the truck left, he could recommend any person or business for any fix or boater’s need, he apparently was a great dinghy racer, and he was always ALWAYS wearing a white tee shirt and sporting his amazing mustache. We Chickadeeans affectionately referred to him as The Lorax, since he had a passing resemblance with his ‘stache, but also because he had a great little whistle when he spoke, and he was certainly a man of justice and oversight in his unofficial role of taking care of his beloved Hope Town Harbor. 

Our hearts are with Muffin and Sophie, and this harbor is certainly in mourning for the loss. Fair winds and following seas, Will. 

We’ve just realized that this is our tenth year aboard. Time for a tin can to celebrate! (Or an aluminum boat?)

So far our celebrations have mostly only involved the comfy routines. Games, snacks, reading, painting (for V), and an afternoon spent swimming and lounging with friends. Without a grand plan for our sail this year, we’ve just been weaving in and out of general ideas of moving to this island or that without much conviction. Friends are here and there, and moving around on their own schedules, so the lining up of the various meet-ups while also taking into consideration the forecast and its subsequent need for protected anchorages, etc. is making the task feel like something that requires more than two brain cells. And unfortunately for planning purposes, this time we left ours in Maine. 

Lily did go swim a practice set in the pool, and I pretended to be her coach while walking back and forth and just generally spacing-out. I’m not sure I was inspiring. It was cold and shallow and had more than one dead spider (one would have been quite enough for me, thanks) piled up on the bottom in one corner, but she swam and checked that box. 

Yesterday included a bike ride to the south end of the island to dip and lounge at Tahiti Beach before lunching on our way back to the harbor. After tucking in on the boat, we gamed (Lily and I taught another poor soul our favorite Banagrams, since Andy and Violet generally refuse to play with us), grilled pizzas and even managed to stay awake past cruisers’ midnight (ahem, 9pm). A full day for sure.

Today will include some amount of actual work for all of us, and then possibly some destination/route planning, but, at our current rate… probably not?

(A day off here in reporting…)

Back on board with the girls, after a day of travel from the bitterly cold and very windy northeast to the calm warmth of our Bahamian nest. A delayed flight prompted running in the airport in DC at a speed and distance I hadn’t attempted since high school, this time with a backpack and a full bladder for extra resistance. I felt like we were in a movie, complete with the ‘making it to the gate JUST in time’, and I for sure at one point looked back and asked if we still had Kevin with us.  

That’s all behind me now as I sit in Hope Town harbor this morning and watch the turtles pop their heads up all around me while the sweet sound of the water lapping at the dinghy provides the soundtrack. (Ironically this ‘sweet lapping’ will no doubt prompt the girls to remind Andy to raise the dinghy in its davits tonight, as they hear it in stereo in their aft cabin. Whoops.)

We have yet to formulate an action plan for our short trip this year, but were greeted by two sets of friends yesterday afternoon, so there is plenty to do, and plenty of wonderful people to see if we stay here in Hope Town for a day or two. The 25 meter pool here, which was destroyed by Dorian five years ago, is now up and running, albeit a bit shallow (it’s been filling with a garden hose, so I imagine it’ll be full by late March). I know that Lily is anxious to keep her practices in before her next meet, which regrettably in my travel planning, is the day we get home. Whoops!

Yesterday was a big one for Lily, as she officially committed to her top choice school, and withdrew applications from the rest. Occidental College gets a good one, that’s for sure. She is excitedly already pouring over packing lists and timelines, with joy and likely a huge sense of relief that this arduous process/part time job of college applications is finally over. 

My emotions are all over the place- excitement predominantly, because I know it’s such a good fit for her, and I have no doubt that she’ll have such incredible opportunities that she’ll be gung-ho to take advantage of. But wow, this next step in general for me, thinking of the fact that we’re on an official countdown of the last months she lives with us full-time is a bit overwhelming and time-flashing in a way that makes me truly wonder if it’s really here already. I am positive that I’ll be an actual wreck when the time comes closer to packing up and dropping her off, so I’m going to do my best in these next six months to keep my blubbering to a minimum so as to maximize the days left. I’ll just join Andy in the financialsobbing taking place as we wrangle how to help her pay for it without leaving school with a loan payment that’ll sink her. So at least THAT’S distracting!

It’s Monday*, and we’re off! We had a really productive day yesterday, and by about 3 o’clock had everything ready for launch. We took the afternoon to take a cart ride around the island, passing one roadside pig and a number of the usual roadside chickens before finding some beachside rum drinks and conch- the perfect reward for our toils. 

We greeted the yard workers with excitement this morning as they came in- Eddie, Craig, Laverne, Casio and Crystal are our steadies here, and it’s always so great to see them after our months away. They were all a bit surprised to hear that we actually were ready to launch as requested. (We’re getting the feeling that they hear a lot of  “We thought we’d be ready to go on Monday, but let’s shoot for Thursday instead”, and other delayed options. ) However nothing motivates us like a plan, and with the vague promise that we have a friend holding a mooring for us in Hope Town, a great weather forecast for crossing the Whale, and Eddie’s insistence that we’d have a whole 6” of water under our keel even at the lowest tide with which to exit Black Sound, there’s no time like the present! We splashed, bent on the jib, topped off our water tanks, launched, kitted out and hauled the dinghy into our davits, and now an hour later we’re closing in on Whale Cay. The day is clear, the seas are calm, and while the wind is a bit on the nose, we’re making good time in our southbound journey. 

Immediately upon launch and exit we realized that there’s only one thing we failed to think of: food. Thinking we might leave the boat out of the water if things didn’t line up to move it, we didn’t want stores to attract critters in our absence, and figured we’d be eating out for most meals anyway. 

I come from a long line of folks who tend to eat voraciously every two to three hours, as if we’ll never see another meal again, so you can imagine my panic when I realized that onboard we currently have three apples, a few peanuts, a half of a box of Triscuits and 4oz of cheese. That will effectively last us to Baker’s Bay, which I can see quite clearly already. I consider myself a survivor-type of character- I love MacGuyvering tools and mechanisms from bits and bobs, my tolerance for discomfort in most senses of the word is quite high (I thank my dentist and her inability to hit the right nerve with the would-be-helpful novacaine before procedures for this) and in general I am a clear-thinker without the tendency to panic in emergency situations. HOWEVER. I am also almost always hungry. (In fact I even own a cookbook that is called I Am Almost Always Hungry.) Also you know what doesn’t help this fact? Writing about it. Also, does toothpaste have calories? Asking for a friend.

*Posting lag for this trip: operator and connectivity errors at play

Aboard Chickadee, and couldn’t be more excited. Andy and I arrived at the boat yard yesterday afternoon for a quick trip to get the boat put together ahead of our trip with the girls next month. It’ll help get us ‘out of the barn’ faster when we arrive, and it’ll also give us time to work on any small projects we want to conquer. So continues the new era of weaving time aboard our beloved Chickadee into our very filled and crazy schedules. Ducking between swim meets and work and board obligations, we’ve found a couple of windows to make it work, and it’s worth every effort, we’ve all come to realize. We all miss our long winters so much. Lily yearns for the Exumas, (as do I), and we’ve [barely] come to grips with the fact that that will be in the next phase, when they’re out of school and when Andy and I are retired and sailing more full time. In planning and theory, it feels like lightyears away, but the reality of already having a senior in high school has reminded me that it’ll actually be here in the blink of an eye.

The first task upon arrival is to unwrap the boat, since we leave the boat covered with a tarp over the companionway, and then the entire boat with a sunshade cover, meticulously wire-tying it down to a thousand points on deck. Over the years we’ve felt like it’s kept the deck cleaner, but also the interior cooler, which makes a big difference when you’re storing so many things in such a small space for a long Bahamian summer. Once we un-snip, fold up and label the pieces of the sunshade, we’re in, which means picking our way through the cabin filled with halyards, jerry cans, our dinghy outboard, cushions, sails, etc. etc. Hatches are opened, and the game of Tetris begins, and I must say, I find myself grinning ear to ear all the while. 

I feel like a kid in a candy store, working with rote memory of necessary tasks, smelling familiar smells, unpacking this in ‘this’ direction in order to be able to get to ‘that’ item with which to do ‘that’ particular job. Solar panels on, bilge cleaned out, water tanks filled, decked and cockpit washed off, rigging items up, salon items out of the v-berth, fridge wiped out. It’s tactical and fun and also gets easier every year as we perfect our stowage and ‘put-away’ routines upon exit. 

Since the ferry dropped us off right at the yard, our quick trip to the store in town for coffee and a few snacks gave us the island overview we love every year upon our return. We get to see which building projects have finished (this category is almost always empty), which have stopped altogether (the bulk), and which houses and businesses are still plugging along, getting closer to their new faces since Dorian wiped out their old. There were new pop-up shops and convenience stores here and there, and this time a new Conch Salad stand, which we’ll definitely be hitting up at some point on this trip.

We had dinner at a familiar spot in town, caught up with the owner and his summertime activities, and then came home to fall into our bunk with bellies full of cracked conch, and, ahem, some rum.

Not having the girls here is definitely odd, and as I sip my coffee in the salon I find myself looking at their stateroom door, waiting for Lily’s head to pop out and wonder what’s for breakfast. (“Coffee” would be my only offer this time around, so she’d be disappointed.) Having ‘the band back together’ in February will be a special time, since it’ll be our last winter trip with the four of us for a while, considering Lily will be in college next year and the break schedules will likely be tough to navigate. Gah! How is that possible? 

Being here is flooding us with memories of the girls onboard. Playing their hide and seek game at anchor with the green piece of glass they’d found: they’d hide it for one another in the sand under the boat, just enough peeking out so the seeker could see a glint. Worlds built on beaches, cafes created with the finest of sea grape tacos and salt water sodas, friends made on remote islands, movie nights squeezed into the settee, dominos on the cockpit floor while sailing along the bank… holy cow we are all so lucky. 

And also so grateful. I’m here for piling on more memories, even if we have to work a bit harder for them these days. But first for now, we’re off to rig the main.

The more-bitter-than-sweet wake up of our last morning onboard has arrived. Fighting for my last cockpit sunrise moment, I sit tangled amidst removed running rigging (say that ten times fast), the packed-up jib, and the bits and bobs of a boat on its way out of the water. To add to the visual, I’ve wrapped any bare parts in salty damp towels I’ve found up here, because for the first time on our trip, the noseeums have decided that today is their day to attack. I suppose that’s an argument for staying in bed until the sun is up, but tell that to my internal clock, or at least tell it to bring the bug spray. 

As always, we’re finishing here on Green Turtle Cay, and after a couple of nights spent anchored off of the settlement, we came into the dock of the boatyard yesterday for ease of packing up and packing off. Andy stays for a few more days to really put things away, so we didn’t have to spend too much of our last moments prepping for storage. 

My mother’s arrival for their annual trip here has actually overlapped by a day, so after beach picnicking one day and visiting friends for lunch for another, we were happy to be able to dinghy in and meet their ferry as it came over yesterday, and then spend our last night with them. A great cast off for their vacation and our departure!

Nine years we’ve been doing this, which is crazy to think. Every time we come back, I remark that it feels like we’ve been aboard more recently than we have, which just emphasizes to me how natural and ‘home-state’ this wee little vessel feels. Motions of movement and tasks are second nature, and even as I’m thinking ‘wait, where did I stow that ‘x’ again?’ I find myself moving toward it and opening hatches or compartments to access it. 

The girls’ artwork from years ago that decorates the salon has started to peel on the edges, and some of it I’ve taken down to take home for safe[st] keeping. We donated our CandyLand and Chutes and Ladders this year, and gave away a lot of arts and crafts supplies as well; Chickadee is evolving with the family, growing up, I suppose, and simplifying its stores. I retain the hope that it doesn’t mean less colorful, less warm, but so far there is little chance. (For starters, the trails of clothing they leave on every surface are quite literally very colorful.) 

The evolution of our time onboard and its shortening lengths has us getting creative about different trips down here. Lily talks about sailing alone with friends one day, perhaps for a college break, which is fun to think about, even if all I can visualize is the fridge full of beer. Now that the girls are older and Lily is driving, it’s easier to imagine Andy and I coming down for a time without them (although shhh, don’t mention it to them). Barring any major storms, etc., it’s nice to know that short stints are still very much worth it, and that the work needed on either end of the trip is doable, and not overwhelming in its scope. It’s just part of the time, which we cherish. 

The fact that there is even a ‘sweet’ ending to our departure is borne from the length as well. Since we didn’t fully unplug and shift our lives from land to sea this year, there is definitely a feeling of being in two worlds, with one (ahem, land) detracting from the other in ways that more easily signify the time to go. Though the cruiser in me just wants to be floating at all times, the task-master in me is ready to get home and not let the things that I’ve put aside pile up even more. Always with the lesson it seems, all things in balance.  

And speaking of balance, or perhaps it’s very opposite, (madness?), the bugs are literally pinging off of my glasses making it hard for me to see the screen, so my current goal is to focus on not running around the yard flailing and swiping like a maniac. Time to go below and get packing. Until next time!

Our trip this year is so much shorter than usual, we’re working hard to check all of our family boxes while onboard: beaching, snorkeling, visiting with friends ashore and floating, nipping into our favorite shops, beloved walks and dinghy exploits, favorite meals (that we only seem to make and eat on Chickadee, almost as in reverence to).. it’s a lot to cram into just two weeks. A lot but not impossible, so we’re moving fast, seeing the things, and not so much tending to the boat tasks that normally fill the interstices of our days. Like cleaning. Or organizing recently-used gear. Or fretting about laundry, or trash. Throw in a couple of teenagers who change their clothes (usually just discarding old onto the sole to be tripped over by the next passerby) every seventeen minutes on average, and we’ve got ourselves a real scene.

It’s actually amazing how quickly I allowed my anal-retentive tendencies to fall by the wayside. Instead of sweeping sand from the companionway and salon a few times a day to tamp down the beach encroachment, I just spend a few extra seconds brushing it from my feet before I get into bed (always a habit, of course, but more time and attention is clearly needed now). The cockpit is strewn with our snorkel gear from days ago, little bags of trash that haven’t seem to have found their place in the locker, and sand, sand sand.. I’d be living my nightmare if I wasn’t living in my dreamiest setting. I should think I’d want to be able to bring this attitude home with me for maximum chill vibes, but… dirty secret revealed, I actually enjoy cleaning and having clean spaces, when I have the time.

We’re in Hope Town once again, and have swam and dined at our favorite pool bar, walked the beach (and subsequently watched a shark threaten to ruin a body-boarder’s day), shared dinners with dear friends and even spent a day racing (an unexpectedly fun activity for buoy-to-buoy-adverse me). It’s been only two days, and we’ve packed them to the brim.

• – – Turtle Interruption….. I don’t know what it is about the turtles this year, but they’re starting to feel like labradors. As I’ve been writing, a decent-sized green turtle has been coming up all around the cockpit; I keep hearing the ‘pfff’ of its breath as a funny little ‘hello’. And then I swear it’s looking me in the eye- is it expecting breakfast? Doesn’t it know that this is MY cockpit time?! Sheesh.

We’ll need to round the Whale today (staying in the Abacos is definitely a time to recognize this ‘hurdle’ of movement as a constant in our journeys), but we have time to do so, so we’ll leave here and head to Guana to play on the beach and wander around until later in the afternoon. I’d like to think that I’ll also spend some time tidying and perhaps polishing our very rusty stainless (“It’s stain-less, not stain-never!” as Andy says, groan..), but it’s more likely that I’ll… not. We’ve got paths to explore and games to play!