It's been 2 weeks doing weather checks 3 times a day looking at Windy, Marv's and NOAA weather forecasts. They don't always agree a few days out but as a date gets closer they usually align better.  We're gonna make sure we pick the right window it's the combination of wind speed/direction and wave height/direction.  It's been changing direction frequently right now and sometimes clock around 270° in a 24 hour period.  And the favourable conditions sometimes occur at night so we may be leaving in the dark....again to take advantage of that.  

We're planning on leaving from here vs. heading up to West End first.  It adds about 14 nm to the crossing trip distance but due to our jump off point the gulf stream current, which is somewhere between 2-3 knots, will carry us northward as we head across.  We can't predict how wide the current actually is as it changes so can't plan the actual course to steer with any degree of accuracy.  But I can set the target destination on the chartplotter and then set the autopilot to follow that.  As the current speeds up and slows down the AP will adjust the heading so we end up where we want to get to. And it continuously gives you an ETA so you know how you're doing.  The bonus it's the conditions we're gonna cross in is that we can sail with a following wind and sea, so we could be looking at 7.5-8.5 knots vs. the 5.5 we had coming over here fighting the wind and waves. So, we have a plan!

https://youtu.be/jnv0Afyp-fs?si=YwxVoYeoe7GMu8Km

It all sounds good in theory but you never know what you're dealing with until you're actually out there.  We also are seeing forecasts of earlier than usual hurricane conditions this year so the sooner we can over to the ICW, the more protection we'll have.  So it looks like a 5 am start on Friday morning to get this done! So we're now in finish what ya started mode!

https://youtu.be/Sp5Nd93gQ5I?si=FWRwjynP2TjjpQUS

Preparation included getting fuel which required a taxi ride to the nearest gas station and a 30 minute wait while the world's slowest diesel pump filled 20 gallons in 4 gerry cans! Sam went through all the food we had to make sure we are compliant with the regs surrounding what you can bring into the US. We also did a fair amount of research into what we need to do to be compliant with the new US alien laws, of which Canadians are included under. hopefully things will calm down as the 2 sides work through the trade war issues but personally I can't wait to get home and away from this chaos So dust off your Noforeignland app button as we're on the move again!

We also had a boat pull into the slip beside us on Tuesday from Ontario. It turned out to be a 35' trawler that the owner Bryan had converted to all electric. He was only here over night so I didn't get a chance to talk much to him but he has a Youtube channel with over 125 videos profiling his journey retrofitting the boat as well as his Great Loop voyage. He left Ontario in June 2024 and made his way through Lakes Huron and Michigan , down the Mississippi , across the Gulf of (insert the name of your liking as you see fit) Mexico, through the Bahamas to here.

From the videos of his engine room he appears to have done some very good work technically. His power system consists of 90 kwatts of battery power, 6.9 kwatts of solar panels and 800 watts of wind turbine generation. There are twin electric motors driving his propellers along with inverters and chargers. It's a pretty elaborate system and I would hate to guess how much he spent on it all ($ 6 figures I would guess) but it seems to work as he's made it all that way in under a year! You can check him out on Youtube. Here are a couple of clips out of the many he has.

https://youtu.be/3Wph378lQA8?si=uFgNd4wTz2bQH9SH

https://youtu.be/SnVTD-W4YFU?si=NuGO9oIsCTyGxZTh


Today's shot of the sun setting on Amaruq from the Bahamas for likely the last time.