Celebrating Bahamas Independence

Like we said before, Nassau isn't the worst place in the world to be stuck.  It is pretty expensive and the beaches are distant and crowded but there is still plenty to enjoy.

July 10th was Bahamas Independence Day so we have been enjoying the celebrations.

Here is that scary dredging barge that we had to sail and anchor next to at night.  It looks like it wants to eat sailboats.   We threw out a second anchor to keep from swinging into it and then it moved to harass other boats.

For $30 we can get 15 Kaliks and a bag of ice. This is how we reward our selves after a few days of blistering heat.

Our friend Francois has been anchored next to us and has been a big help with our engine.  We have been enjoying the city with him.

We went to Atlantis again, this time with Francois showing us how to do it cheaper.  They have complimentary movies in Theater!  So we saw Gnomeo and Juliet, and Just Go With It.  

We also found that you can just walk through the aquarium for free! (Nobody checks for wristbands)  Why did we pay $80 last time, ugh.

Then we enjoyed the gypsy/pirate show.  There were fire dancers, stilt dancers, and a mermaid.  It was a huge carnival party.

The rest of our time here has been hunting down free internet signals.  The Green Parrot, Starbucks, McDonalds, and the side of buildings are our favorite spots.  

Here is Christine being a rebel.

As for our departure plans we have decided to just sail to Florida just the two of us and fix the engine there. Here is the thread we posted on Cruiser Forum which has a lot of advice. We think it is a bad piston ring.

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/f54/cruiser-stranded-in-need-of-advice-63643.html

 Thank you for all the help and offers to crew but we want to get out of here asap before the weather gets worse. My mom is coming to visit this week and then we will get going.

We hope to sail into Fort Lauderdale, fix the engine and put the boat on dry storage while we are in MD.  So if anyone has any recommendations for a good mechanic or good marina let us know.

We Can See Our Breath

Well we turned off our last heater so now we are in a whole new world of cold! Its been about 35 on the boat all day so we are trying out our layering strategies. Sleeping is still warm because we have the heated blanket still. When we leave and have to turn off the heated blanket we will probably sleep in sleeping bags with blankets on top.

We got snow and had a pretty white Christmas. We are keeping an eye on the weather to avoid any upcoming blizzards. Ideally we will leave next Sunday at the crack of dawn with dreams of warmer weather.

If these ducks can swim in that cold water for some donuts, then we should survive.

We ran our safety lines across the boat on both sides.  We will stay tethered to these safety lines at all times so we dont get bucked overboard!

The last project was completed. We now have a cockpit fuel guage. Our old fuel gauge was under the couch and a pain to check.

The new gauge is right with our other instruments and will be easy to monitor. It wasnt too hard of an install, just running wire and drilling a new 2 inch hole in the cockpit. I really felt like it was the final test that we are ready. I was able to install it all with tools we already had and when it didn't come on at first I was able to troubleshoot it and find and fix the problem without anyones help. We are ready!

It even glows in the dark.

We hope everyone had a Happy Holiday and enjoyed the snow. We got a much needed spotlight and even more needed "marriage savers" hands free walkie talkies. We will post about them after we use them. Thank you to all our family for your support, both gifts and well wishes!

-Joey