Day 152, Thursday November 21

Day 152, Thursday November 21

We woke up to more rain, but that is okay as our anchor held last night and the feel of salt has been washed away.  Julie dons her bathing suit and tackles scrubbing the dinghy with the water that has been captured in the pails.  In Bahamas it costs to buy water to fill our tanks so we scrutinize its use and capture rain water to clean the decks etc.  As the scrubbing continues we hear a call on the radio from Forty Roses to the Bluff House marina which is about 300 yards from us.  Forty Roses left Hampton with us and we had not heard from then since day 1 in the passage.  We knew they were safe, but anxious to hear their passage story because they had gone back into port (Savannah) after 3 and ahalf days at sea.  We watched them come in and headed over once they were safely docked.  It was like meeting long lost friends even though we had only met John and Rosemary for about 3 day in Hampton before we had set sail.  Turns out their boat travelled a bit slower and after 3 days they were at least 60-100 miles behind us and the winds and waves were worse for them.  They also were travelling just the 2 of them with no extra crew so were getting exhausted.  We had a lovely lunch together at the Bluff House marina and suggested they join Comocean and us for dinner at Turtle Cay Marina across the bay.

Julie and Joanne.  Note large pina colada!

We then went for a bit of an explore and bumped into some Canadians from the Gulf Island Mayne on the West Coast.  They had rented a cottage for the week and were leaving the next day.  We had a lovely chat with them and they were telling us how the Bahamas is busy in the summer and basically it is their slow season over the winter.  We were surprised at this although we will agree, the docks are all pretty empty as are the restaurants.  I guess people from the USA come here in the summer time as the breezes are always blowing and the temperature is more moderate than the southern mainland.  Makes sense to me.  The other thing we learned is that both marina reduce your dockage fee by your restaurant bill.  We could have stayed at either marina for free today, something to consider at another time.

Dawson, Julie, John, Rosemary, Toby and Joanne.  All salty dawgs.

For dinner we met up with Toby and Joanne from Comocean and John and Rosemary from Forty Roses.  The restaurant was at the Green Turtle Marina and had a wealth of history and famous visitors.  It also had american money taped all over the walls.  Once the walls get too full, they take some down and donate it.   First off Julie ordered a pina colada which was huge and delicious and then had  lobster ravioli which was amazing, best meal so far.  It was a great social and we are starting to enjoy our fun in the sun.

Cheers

Julie and Dawson