A Quiet Day Inside the Boat
12 February 2012 | Thompson Bay, Long Island
Jill
Bud and I are still happy we made the 60 nm trip back here. It blew all night from just west of north, sometimes at 15 knots or less, but sometimes over 20 knots. This morning it was about 355 degrees and 20 to 25 knots. Gradually during the day the wind moved a bit towards the east and overall has tapered off, but it is still gusting to near 20 knots and is still much closer to the north than the east.
Bud and I were both exhausted and spent the day resting. Bud did add water and diesel from our jugs to the tanks. We're not too happy with the fuel consumption on the new Yanmar. We ran the engine mostly at 2000 RPM or less for between 6 and 7 hours and used at least 12 gallons of fuel. We're going to have to measure the tanks before and after a days run to get a better handle on this, but we seem to be using almost twice the fuel we should. Also, the stern is all covered with grey again. Now that we aren't breaking in the engine and aren't running it hard, we shouldn't be seeing this.
The front that came through is a real cold front. We haven't seen the internet for days, so we don't know what it's done in the US, but here we think the temperature is down to around 70, probably below that with wind chill. Bud and I both wore our foul weather jackets to take Fuzzy ashore this evening. Fuzzy has been shaking, but we don't know if it's from the cold or some other discomfort. I thought perhaps he was feeling seasick, because even here in this protected harbor the boat has been moving around a lot. This afternoon I gave him Dramamine along with his Prozac. I expect him to fall asleep shortly! Poor Fuzzy, I think it's tough being an old sailing dog.
This is the first real front we've seen this year, and probably the strongest front we've seen in the Bahamas. A lot of people come to the Bahamas and stay up in the Abaco chain at the north west of the Bahamas. Bud and I don't understand that, as front after front mosves off the US coast and makes it to the Abacos and stalls. They seem to get all the bad weather. Besides, they are crowded and developed compared to places like this. Even with boats coming in for protection from the front, there are only 42 boats here, and there's probably only another 50 or so on the whole island. Marsh Harbor, in the Abacos no doubt has at least 200 boats, and there are probably 500 or more in harbors and marinas within 30 miles of Marsh Harbor. We'd much rather be in the central and southern Bahamas.
I took a couple of pictures to try to show the harbor with all the boats pointed north. It's hard to get a good shot as the harbor is quite large, about a mile across. I'll have to see what they look like and post the best one, whenever I get access to the Internet again.