After spending a few days in Exuma Land and Sea Park and Highborne Cay recovering from William's passing we headed to Nassau. We intended to spend a few days there, catch up on boat chores and be tourists but the weather was dreadful. Walking on the muddy streets in the rain was a dreary affair. The marina we stayed in was surrounded by razor wire (as were all the area businesses) and guarded at night so we didn't go out at night. And we didn't get any siteseeing in either. The photo is of the famous Atlantis Hotel Complex...this is the closest we got to it!

I had boycotted Nassau for the last 38 years and upon arriving I immediately remembered why. The harbor was filled with fast moving vessels of all descriptions throwing monstrous wakes at all hours. We rolled in our slip at all hours of the day and night. It was great to walk a mile to the big grocery store and resupply all the foods we had been missing. Don was even able to score some NA Beer....something he had been searching for since we got to the Bahamas.

After about 4 days we were ready to go but TS Alberto was heading up the East Coast. One morning at 6:30 AM I spoke with Chris Parker (marine weather forecaster) on SSB radio about the next suitable weather window to South Florida. He said "if you don't go now you may be stuck in Nassau for 1-2 more weeks." Even though it was not our ideal weather window in both type of conditions and duration, we made the boat sea ready and left an hour and a half later! The photo is of the famous Atlantis hotel...this is the closest we got to it as we passed. by exiting Nassau harbor

The first 2/3 of the trip were benign, although a motor sail. About 3 AM we exited the Great Bahama Bank and entered the Gulfstream. For the next 3 hours it was a little rolly from the 3 ft northerly swells that the Tropical Storm, hundreds of miles away, sent our way. Not enough wind to sail but enough seas to roll. Ugh! Then the winds built to about 25 kts from the southwest and a cross sea started up.

Soon we had about 3 ft seas from behind us and the northerly rollers had built to 5 ft. THEN the squalls started. It was raining quite hard for the last few hours. So much so that even though we could identify an 883 ft north bound freighter on AIS he could not see us on radar due to the rain clutter. Good thing we talked to each other on the VHF radio and missed each other.

We arrived at Lake Worth Inlet around 10AM. Total trip was 187 nm, our average speed was 6.9 kts, total time underway was 26 hours. It was a wild ride but at least the uncomfortable part was over quickly.

Welcome back to the US. :(