Atlantis

We decided to spend two days in Nassau because there was just too much to see.  We ended up walking quite a bit.  We went downtown where the cruise ships come in and there were three ships in port so it was VERY BUSY.  Then we took a cab over to Atlantis and toured as much of it as we were allowed.  You have to be a guest to actually see all of it or buy a day pass and since it was so late in the afternoon we figured it wouldn't be worth it.  It's just like one of the casinos in Vegas except it has a marina where you can pull your boat (or in most cases your Yacht) up to.  Then we walked through the shops in Marina Village and took a cab over to the other side of the bridge where the local fisherman have little shacks the back their boats up to and they serve fresh made conch salad and fish dishes and of course beer.
Now we are getting ready to head to the Exumas and keep trekking south.  No signs of any hurricane activity YAY.

Atlantis

The stingray pool at Atlantis

The turtle pool at Atlantis

The local fisherman booths under the bridge

In Nassua

We made it to Spanish Wells and then to Nassua. 

Matthew: You might recognize the boat next to us in the marina. 

It’s the Blackbeards boat you were on. Morning Star. We meet Charlie who trained you and we went and partied with the crew last night.

We are going to stay in Nassua two nights. Karen wants to look around Atlantis and we may only be here once.

We had a great sail down here. We didn’t have to use the engines at all and we made about 5.5 knots average. That means when we were sail fast we were doing close to 8 its. We did finally reef when the winds got over 20 kts, but that only lasted 5 minutes.

Stuck in Marsh Harbor for the Broncos game

We are in Marsh Harbor today for the Broncos game. We are going to watch it at a bar called Snappas. It's right on the bay where are boat is anchored. Here are some pictures.

This is the bar.

This is our boat from the bar.

This is us.

here you go Amanda

Boat Repairs

We finally left Man o War, It cost us $4000 to get everything fixed. But they did work for the 4 grand. We had two sails fixed. We had a cover made, We had the transmission replaced, we had the starboard drive shaft replaced, we had our port side strut strengthened, which required some fiberglass work. So we actually got a good deal, but it still hurts to spend that much on the boat.

We had a pretty good time in Man o War. I started running again, the dogs and I would go about 4 miles, it was two miles up to the north end of the island.  We went to every beach on the island. They are gorgeous beaches. Every once in a while you would see some of the locals swimming on them. tThe dogs loved the beaches. The beaches are protected by an offshore reef but there are still some rollers coming in. Max didn’t care, we get to the beach and he would just runs right into the waves and starts swimming.  It’s amazing to watch because when we first got him he didn't know how to swim at all. 

Today we are in Marsh Harbour. We will be here until Monday. Karen needs to see the Bronco’s game tomorrow. Today we are also going to resupply. They have a grocery store here that is the biggest in the Bahamas. They have almost everything and we need some stuff. After that we are going to start heading south.  I want to be in Turks and Cacaos by the 15th of October. Then we will make the passage to Puerto Rico.

Stuck in Man O War

We are stuck in Man O War until at least next Tuesday. The reason we are stuck is we need a new drive shaft for the starboard motor.  We already changed the transmission on it. We also tried a new prop. But we still have a vibration when we put that engine into gear.
I think Man O War is probably the best place in the Bahamas to get the work done. The folks we are working with are definitely competent. But although it may be the best place to get work done it's one of the worse place to be stuck in.
This is a dry island. We are down to 5 beers. Luckily we have a lot of rum and wine so we can stay here a month if we need to.  But since they don't have any beer for sale they don't have anything like a sports bar.  No place to watch football.  Last weekend we were at Nipper bar on Guana Key. They had all the games on. Karen got to see the Broncos although we had to stay up until midnight to see the whole game. She was also forced to sing "paradise by the dashboard light" during halftime. But different places have different rules for watching a game.  I'm not sure where we are going to watch the game this week. I think we can get it on the sling box. If we can then I won't be in trouble. If we can't then, I might be.
We also got some sail work done here so I now have good sails and tomorrow we will put the main sail back up. Other than that we are just stuck here.
Once we get everything functioning correctly we are going to start heading south. I want to be in Turks and Cacaos around Oct 15th. Then we can plan the trip over to Puerto Rico.

Green Turtle Cay

We motored over to Green Turtle Cay and stayed at Black Sound Marina.   Just as we pulled into the bay there was a mama dolphin and her baby playing and they came right up to the boat.  We walked around the island and bought some really good coconut bread from this local woman.
Then we decided to head out to Gilliam Bay which is on the south side of the island because they say you can find sand dollars there.  I think we were a little late to get some good ones.  We found a few small ones.
Then we dinghied over to No Name Cay, which is uninhabited but the lady docked next to us at Black Sound said there are wild pigs there so we went to check it out.  They were so cute but they sure didn't like our celery and limes that we brought.  Picky little guys 

Nipper's~Great Guana Cay

We spent Monday and Tuesday in Marsh Harbour at Harbour View Marina.  Marsh Harbour is really nice and has just about everything that you would need except CO'2 tanks for my soda stream.  They have a really nice grocery store (Maxwell's) that is comparable to King Soopers.  We met some really great people in the marina and had a great time eating their ox tail stew. We rented a scooter and ran all over the island which was a lot of fun.

Then we headed for Man of War Cay and then the trouble began.  I unzipped the canvas cover to the entryway and the wind kicked up and it blew off the boat.  We went back to find it and it must have sunk.  Then the thunderstorm came and we headed back to Marsh Harbour tried to anchor and I backed over the dinghy rope which stopped the starboard engine.   Then the winless wouldn't work so  Wes had to manually drop the anchor.  We finally got anchored and once the thunderstorm passed, Wes dove down to get the rope untangled from the prop.  It was a very eventful afternoon.

We finally made it to Man of War Cay and picked up a mooring ball. 

We met some really nice people that were moored right behind us.  Some of them were actually from Steamboat, CO and the others were from Ohio.  It was their last night cruising so they asked if we wanted their left over provisions, which consisted of a ton of stuff from Gin to Cinnamon.  Thank you Ocean Breeze and we hope to see you again in the tropics.

Today we made it to Great Guana Cay.  We dropped the sail off with Jay on Man of War to have it repaired along with the canvas measurements for the cover that I lost and hopefully he will have them done by Tuesday as he said, but again, we are on island time.  

We are now at Nippers for a little relaxation rum, which is an awesome beach bar that overlooks the 3rd largest barrier reef.

Nippers bar which is where I will be watching the Broncos game on Sunday

To all my Banker friends, don't you wish you had hours like this?????