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It’s Friday morning and we are about 200 miles south of Cape Hatteras and just a bit more than half way home.   For the last two days we have been navigating from waypoint to waypoint provided by Chris Parker, the weather router, with the goal of staying in the middle of the Gulf Stream to make the most of the 3-4 knot northward flow of this north flowing “conveyor belt”.

As I have mentioned, and you probably know, the “stream” is a massive “river” of water moving up the coast from the Gulf of Mexico toward the North Atlantic, carrying a huge amount of tropical heat along with it.  This flow has a dramatic effect on the climate of the North Atlantic as well as coastal areas such as England and parts of Europe which would be substantially cooler without the heat that the stream delivers.

As I understand it, this flow is a result of the strong easterly trade winds that blow relentlessly, day after day, month after month, across from Africa toward the Caribbean.  As these strong winds blow from west to east, they cause currents to form that flow toward the west, through the Caribbean and into the Gulf of Mexico.  As a result, water builds up as it reaches Central America and has to go somewhere.  And, the only place for this water to go is around the north side of Cuba, past the Florida Keys and north between the Bahamas and Florida.   I don’t know how much water the Gulf Stream pushes past Florida each hour but when you consider that the Gulf Stream is about 40 miles at that point and about a mile deep, that’s a lot of water moving along at an average speed of say 3-4 knots.  Let’s see, I guess that would be about 12 cubic miles of water every hour.  Hmm…  Hard to wrap my head around that one.  It’s probably safe to say that that’s more water than flows from every river in the world, combined.   I can’t “Google that” so perhaps you can tell me if I am on the right track.  Well?

Anyway, we are still in the midst of the Gulf Stream and making our way north.  Another thing that strikes me when I am on passage is just how S-L-O-W sailing really is.  Brenda left Nassau and flew home in a few hours.  Us, we will take a week.  They say that the world is getting smaller but when you are on a sailboat it’s still VERY, VERY BIG.  As a rule of thumb, it takes a day in a sailboat to go the distance a car can go in a few hours.  That’s unless, of course, unless you live in New York.  Never mind, it’s too early for such sophomoric comparisons and is probably akin to questions that I might have asked when I was in college, late on a Friday night like “what if there was no gravity”.

Ok, so here’s where we stand.  With 200 miles between us and Cape Hatteras, we have covered about 570nm (nautical miles) from the Bahamas and have about 620nm left to go for a total distance of about 1,200nm.   However, the distance that Pandora has gone “through the water” is less as the Gulf Stream has been giving us a boost for several days of between 3-4 MPH.   Because of this, the mechanical log, a small paddle wheel on the bottom of the boat, only shows about 400 NM.  That’s a big difference; a combination of the positive flow of the Gulf Stream combined with any problems with the calibration of my mechanical log.  One way or the other, by boat, it’s still a LONG way home…

Some time back I noted that cruising is often described as “boat repair in exotic places” and we got a small dose of that yesterday.  When we are using the engine, I open up the engine compartment a number of times each day to check and to be sure that all is well.  I check coolant levels in the engine, signs of oil leaks and look for any stray water in the bilge.  Yesterday during one of these checks, I noticed a very small amount of water weeping from a drain hole that comes out from behind the engine.  So, I pulled up the cover to the engine in the aft cabin and discovered that there was a small leak in at the top of the muffler where cooling water is injected into the exhaust.  The leak was more of a drip but I could imagine it becoming a BIGGER leak over time.  And, if it really broke, we’d have water and diesel exhaust being pumped into the boat.  That wouldn’t be good, not good at all.

So, we stopped the engine and sailed as best we could, given the very light winds at the time, and considered how to address the problem.  Happily, I carry lots of spare parts and “goops” of various sorts. In this case, I had some epoxy putty that hardens in about 20 minutes and is very sticky and turns rock hard when cured.  We cleaned up the offending area and gooped it up using half of the package.   When this was hardened we fired up the engine again.  Alas, there was still a very small leak where we had ended the patch, half way around the fitting.  Happily, I still had half of the package left so we continued the “patch” the entire way around the fitting.  SUCCESS!  No more leak, for now…  Fingers crossed.  No, make that fingers and toes crossed. I’m optimistic.

I was pretty proud of myself to have had something aboard that would solve the problem.  The difficulty in having spare parts and repair “potions” aboard as it’s impossible to know what’s going to fail, and something ALWAYS fails.  In this case, while I didn’t have a spare for the piece itself, I did have “goop” and goop can solve a lot of ills.  Problem solved, at least for now.   As Gilda Radner used stay “It’s always something”.  Yes, indeed and double that on a boat.

As I write this we are motoring along merrily, still with a 3-4 kt boost in speed over the bottom, compliments of the Gulf Stream, that we will carry for the next 200 miles until we reach Cape Hatteras and exit the Gulf Stream.  At that point, it’s a straight shot of of about 380 miles to Montauk Long Island where we will enter Long Island Sound.

According to Chris Parker, the weather router, we should begin seeing solid SW winds beginning tonight or tomorrow ,Saturday, as we exit a fairly windless ridge that is between us an Hatteras.

It’s amazing how wind speed and direction can vary, even over very short distances.  Our friends on Kalunamoo left the Bahamas at the same time we did but left from the Abacos, about 100 miles north and east of Nassau.  While we have had wind of about 10-15kts much of the time, they have had to motor the entire way, usually on glassy calm waters with virtually no wind.  As of two days ago they were about 200 miles east of us and just a moment ago we heard from them on the VHF radio that they were able to work their way west and are now about 40 miles behind us in the Gulf Stream.   And, now they are the ones sailing and we are under power.  However, as they enter the area where we are now, they will likely lose the wind and not pick it up again until they clear Hatteras.  Are you following this?  I sort of am…

So, as we continue to head north I am hopeful the Chris Parker’s forecast will hold and we will pick up wind tonight and carry these SW winds for the rest of the trip.

So, when will we be home?

If we can carry an average speed of 7kts for the rest of the trip, and we probably can even do a bit better than that, we will be in Essex at some point on Monday, a six day run from Nassau.  That would be quite good.   Well, we’ll have to see what Mother Nature has in store for us.

And, I have to remind myself that we are only half way home and a lot can happen between here and there.  Besides, we still have to pass Hatteras, the “graveyard of the Atlantic”.  No, probably not a threat in the next few days but hey, you never know.

“Bob, Bob, stop it, you’re getting dramatic!!!”.

It’s 03:00 on Thursday morning and all is well aboard Pandora.  Jim and Rich are sleeping below and I have been on watch for less than an hour.  The moon has set, the stars are out in profusion and there is a phosphorescent glow in the water surrounding Pandora and streaming off in her wake.  It’s a truly remarkable time to be out on the ocean making passage.

We are about 1/3 of the way through our voyage from the Bahamas to home in CT and I have to say that I am enjoying this trip more than perhaps any I have taken in 40+ of sailing.  Pandora’s performing well with no major issues and the weather, THE WEATHER, is perfect; Sunny warm days and pleasantly cool nights.  I have even taken to wearing shoes, if only at night, can you believe it?  I haven’t had shoes on since leaving home in late January.  Who knew?

With a third of our 1,300 miles behind us, we have been able to sail the entire way, all but a few hours, without running the engine.
Conditions have been about perfect with a nearly flat sea and winds that are running in the 10-15 kt range on the beam or just behind, ideal for Pandora.  Our speed through the water have been consistently in the 5 to 7 knot range, which is great for fairly light winds.  Unfortunately, the forecast for today is for the wind to go light so we will likely be motoring much of today until the wind fills in from the south.  I’ll learn more from Chris Parker later this morning.

With regards to putting miles under our keel, what’s even better is that we have been able to keep Pandora in the strongest part of the Gulf Stream for nearly the entire time since leaving the Bahamas, giving us over-the-bottom speeds in the 8-9kt, sometimes 10kt range for the last two days.   The “stream” runs north at a good 3-4 knot clip which adds to our speed as we move along.

The near perfect conditions that we are enjoying are in stark contrast to those being “enjoyed” by our friends Bill and Maureen on Kalunamoo who are about 200 miles east of us.  They left about the same time as we did but from the northern Bahamas. I have been speaking to Bill each morning and evening on the SSB long range radio to compare notes and their experience has been very different.  While we are having moderate and favorable winds, Kalunamoo has had virtually no wind.  That’s amazing as they aren’t very far from us. They have had to motor the entire time and I can assure you that listening to the drone of a motor 24 hours a day can get pretty old.

What’s causing the difference in conditions is that there is a high pressure area east of us that is surpassing the wind so while we are sailing merrily along Bill and Maureen have no wind and have had to keep the motor running the entire time so far.  I am certainly sorry about their plight but am happy that we are where we are.

Speaking of “where we are”, our current position puts us nearly 70 miles from land and off of St Augustine FL.  It’s hard to believe that we have been underway nearly two days and are still in FL.  It’s a big state.   Of course, you can check out “where’s Pandora” on this site and see where we are on a Google Map.   As I have mentioned, we “push the button” on our GPS transponder every four hours to keep everyone up to date on where we are.

It’s certainly hard to say exactly when we will be back to CT but it’s looking like it could be as early as Monday or Tuesday.  Of course, as they say in the investment community, “past performance is no predictor of future returns” but we are making good time and I am hopeful that our good fortune will continue.   Yes, indeed, and as Brenda says, “Bob and the dog, ever hopeful”.

Or, on the other hand, as my dad used to say, “we’ll be there when we get there”.

Having good weather has been just terrific and I am appreciative of Chris Parker, the weather router, for giving me forecasts that have turned out to be spot on.  He also provided me with coordinates for the Gulf Stream which I am following as we head up the coast.  In southern Florida the “stream” is well defined and very close to shore, but as it heads north, it becomes more diffuse, with eddies and meanders along the edges.  These “eddies or meanders” can be very frustrating as while currents a few miles away might be running 3-4 knots to the north, you can find yourself in an area where the currents may suddenly head off to the east or west.  Happily, our task heading north is simple, as we are just trying to stay in the middle of the stream where the currents are quite consistent. Chris provided me a series of about 10 waypoints to put in my navigation plotter and steer for as we head from the Bahamas to Cape Hatteras.  This course looks like a gentle curve the northeast after we hit Georgia and, at times, diverges from a northerly course to one that’s nearly east in direction.  Yes, this means that we are not going the most direct route but with a 3-4 knot current pushing us along we get quite a boost to our speed and will cover the distance faster.

Sailors spend a lot of time thinking about what constitutes an “ideal cruising boat” and one of the greatest attributes of Pandora in this area is her ability to sail in conditions with marginal wind.  The fact that she can keep up a respectable turn of speed with winds in the 10-15 knot range is remarkable with most cruising boats needing at least 15 knots to keep moving well.  Pandora can make good speed in conditions where most boats will need to have their motor on to make progress.  I am also appreciative of her easy motion as she reels off the miles.  There have been many times in the last few days when I was resting down below and thought we were nearly dead in the water only to learn that we were moving well but so smoothly that it was hard to tell we were making any progress at all.

As I sit here, alone in the cockpit writing this post, I am also enjoying the fact that there isn’t another sole within some 50 miles of our position.  The VHF radio is silent and there are no lights on the horizon in any direction except a gentle glow to the west, I guess from St Augustine.  The radar and AIS confirm that there isn’t a ship anywhere near us.  As we were leaving the Bahamas yesterday and were near Miami and Ft Lauderdale, there were dozens of ships to contend with and some were on a course that would cross our path so keeping a careful watch was critical and often stressful.   Twice, on our first night out, I had to contact nearby ships to confirm that they saw us and confirm what they’d like me to do to avoid getting into trouble.

Now that the three of us, me Jim and Rich, have settled in to a routine aboard, I am less concerned about keeping two on deck for each watch which is making things easier and allowing us to get more rest.  On our first night out, as is customary for me the first night when making passage, I wanted two on deck at all times.  Given the fact that we were in pretty congested waters and both Jim and Rich were not familiar with Pandora, I wasn’t comfortable having just one of them on deck while I was down below.  As a result, none of us got much sleep.  Me, perhaps an hour all night.    That’s in marked contrast to tonight, when I slept from shortly after dinner till I woke up for watch around 02:00 this morning.  If feel very well rested.  That’s nice.

Now that we are in a less busy shipping area and everyone is better acquainted with the boat, I am comfortable with having only one on deck at a time.  The watch schedule is pretty easy with Jim on deck from 20:00 (8:00pm) to 23:00, Rich from 23:00 to 02:00 and me for three hours till 05:00 when Jim takes over again.

At 06:00, each day, I listen to Chris Parker’s forecast and talk to him to get an updated forecasts for my area.  At 08:30 I check in with Cruiseheimers, the SSB Net, to give my position as well as with the Do-Da net at 17:00.  I have also been speaking with Bill on Kalunamoo in the morning and evening to see how they are doing.  It’s nice to know that we are able to communicate with others in spite of being so far out in the ocean.  We are very aware that we are truly on our own out here but it’s nice to be in touch with others.

I also check e-mail several times a day to get news from home as well as my evening weather update from Chris Parker.

All of these activities along with cooking and keeping the boat in shape keep me pretty busy but still allows for plenty of down time to catch up on my reading.

All in all this run is shaping up to be the best one for me in nearly 40 years of sailing and at 1,300 miles non stop, the longest yet.

So, what next?  While Brenda and I have talked about what we will do next winter, I have to say that making the run to the Caribbean, a trip I have wanted to do for years, is sounding very appealing.

Well, I guess that’s about it for now.  Alas, still no pictures.  I could send a shot of water but while it’s a lovely shade of cobalt blue, well, it’s just blue.    I guess I’ll just have to see how many more meteors I can count before the day begins.
Wish me luck for continued smooth sailing aboard Pandora.  Signing off…

It’s Wednesday morning and the beginning of our second day heading north in the middle of the Gulf Stream off of Florida, toward CT and home.  With the exception of a few hours yesterday morning after leaving Nassau, we have been blessed with favorable winds and have been able to sail much of the way.

A few minutes ago, it’s 10:00, I turned on the engine as the winds have gone a bit light and I also needed to be sure that I was able to get a good charge on the batteries.   While the solar panels keep things in good shape during the day, the batteries get quite a bit of user overnight.  Between the navigation equipment and radar, combined with the drain from the autopilot, the batteries were in need of a good charge today.  Yes, the solar panels would likely bring things up to snuff, I wanted to be sure that we have the batteries well topped up prior to evening and sunset. While the sun is adequate for keeping Pandora when we are on the go during the day and anchored at night, keeping her moving 24 hours a day is definitely a challenge to the batteries.

The winds are forecasted to be somewhat light, if from a favorable east/east southeast direction for the next few days, but today and Thursday will likely be a bit too light to really make time toward home.   Good thing we have a reliable engine.  However, we are expecting stronger winds overnight and tomorrow as well as strengthening winds on Thursday to keep us moving along, engine or not.
We are now in the middle of the Gulf Stream and this massive “salt water river” is giving us a three knot boost.  Imagine the amount of water being moved northward when you consider that the stream is miles wide and at least a mile deep.  That’s a massive amount of water and it’s moving north at the speed of a good energetic walk.

I have been given coordinates for the center of the stream by Chris Parker, our weather router, and will go from one waypoint to the next as we move northward.  With luck, we will be able to stay in the center of the stream where the current is strongest until we exit around Cape Hatteras.

In our first 24 hours the winds weren’t that strong but good enough to keep us moving well with only a few hours of motoring.  The log shows a total distance traveled as about 140 nautical miles.  When I took a ruler to the chart it showed nearly 160 miles but that doesn’t take into account favorable currents which put miles under our keel that the log doesn’t capture.   Whatever the distance covered, I’ll take it as we are making good time.

Last night boasted a half moon that stayed with us till around 03:00 and set dramatically, dark orange to the west.  In spite of the bright moon, we were treated to a wonderful display of stars capped off by quite a few meteors.  It takes several hours for your eyes to totally adapt to the dark and spending time aboard a darkened boat all night allows you to see things that you’d normally miss when exposed to artificial light at night.

From a wildlife standpoint, we have seen a few seabirds and plenty of flying fish skittering away from us as we moved along north, but little else.

I am hopeful that we will begin seeing dolphins as watching them dance around the boat is endlessly fascinating to me.
“Ok so you are now into day two.  So, how long is this run going to take Bob?”  Good question.  Thanks for asking.  So far, we have gone about 180 nautical miles out of a total of about 1,300 miles.   And, if we are able to go about 170 miles per day that suggests that we will be home by Tuesday or Wednesday after a week underway.

We had thought about stopping but opted to continue along as it will delay us by at least two days if we stop and spend a night somewhere.

Happily, the three of us, Jim, Rich and me, are getting along well and the trip is enjoyable.  They are both doing well in managing Pandora as we keep her moving day and night and happily, no bouts of seasickness so far.

Let’s hope that the favorable winds hold and even strengthen a bit to speed our trip.  Here’s to no broken gear too on our Pandora, our little island in the stream.

So far, so good and it’s a beautiful day.   Only about six more to go.  Fingers crossed.

It’s nearly noon on Tuesday and we are underway and about 15 miles out from Nassau.  It was unclear to me as I looked at the GRIB files this morning if it make more sense to leave today or to wait a day till the winds were a bit fresher.  Yes, the wind direction was favorable but not that strong today and yet I hate to just sit around in Nassau.  Besides, it’s entirely possible that we will actually run into unfavorable conditions later in the week up north if we wait in Nassau.  It’s very hard to get a good weather window that lasts an entire week.  So, with this in mind, we opted to leave.

Pandora needs about 10kts of apparent wind to move along at a respectable rate of speed and to wallow around with too little wind isn’t my cup of tea.  BTW, GRIBs are computer derived wind predictions overlaid on a chart that suggest the wind direction and strength for a few days out.  I can get these via my long range SSB radio or by cell when I am within range.  Of course, once we are more than 5 miles from shore there isn’t any cell coverage.  I also spoke with Chris Parker, our weather router, this morning and he agreed that while sailing, beginning on Wednesday, would likely be better, leaving a day later might lead to other weather problems later in the week.

It was my preference to get going today verses to wait another day and in spite of wind forecasts that suggested a bit better conditions on Wednesday.  I am hopeful that we will get a bit more wind later today but for now we are motor sailing with the engine ticking along at a low RPM along with the sails.  Fingers crossed that more wind will come soon.  If I have to motor for a few days we will be forced to stop for fuel instead of going the entire way without stopping.

Yesterday my crew, Rick and Jim joined me in Nassau. It took much of the day to get the boat ready including fuel and water along with laundry and grocery shopping.  I also took the dink off of the stern and stowed it on deck.  I don’t like to have the dink on the davits off shore as there is too much risk that it might come loose if the wind kicks up.  To have 250lbs of dink and motor thrashing around on the back of the boat could get dangerous.  Better safe than sorry.  Dink on board and tied down securely now.  Check!

I will be posting most every day as we make our way up the coast and will send perhaps one small photo along with the text to Brenda so she can put it to my blog.   We will also be “pushing the button” on our GPS transponder every four hours 24/7 so you can follow us on the site as we make our way north.   Just go to the “where’s Pandora” button on the site’s homepage to see our most recent position.

The big question is if we will have good wind to make the entire run without stopping or if we will have to duck in somewhere to wait for more favorable conditions or to wait for a front to pass.  So far, the winds seem to be barely adequate so it’s hard to say if we will stop or not. Of course, if the run were to take more than a week, we’d likely want to stop somewhere just to get a good night’s rest and perhaps pick up more fresh food.

Well, that’s about all I have to day for now.  Alas, no photo worth sharing so I guess that 1,000 words will have to make up for that.

Here’s looking forward to fair winds.  So far, fair but not enough.  Oh well…

It’s Monday morning early and I woke up early to the sound of wind in the rigging.  We have been anchored here in Nassau harbor for a few days and enjoying the local sights.  A front came though yesterday, complete with squalls and clocking winds.  Fortunately, Nassau harbor is well protected so we were comfortable, rain and all.  It’s been fun being here with Brenda, Rob and Kandice as we enjoy our last few days together prior to their heading out and my run back to CT aboard Pandora.

Today I will get a car and drive them to the airport and pick up my crew, Jim and Rich, who are flying in to accompany me for the run north.

We don’t yet know if we will do he entire run in a single leg or if we will stop along the way.  Last spring we had a good weather window that lasted long enough to make the 1,000+ mile run back non-stop, and did it in six days.  That was quite fast, with near perfect conditions.  I doubt that I will be able to do it again that quickly.  Who knows, perhaps I’ll be lucky again.

I’ll speak with Chris Parker shortly and will have a better idea of when we should leave to catch the best winds to get us out of the Bahamas and into the Gulf Stream, the river of water that runs northeast along the east coast.  The strong current will give us a boost in speed as we make our way north.

While I am looking forward to the trip, I am always a bit nervous before a long run as when we are making a “blue water” trip and we will really on our own and far from land.  As you can imagine,  there is plenty that can go wrong so we have to be very well prepared.  Yes, we have all sorts of safety gear but being hundreds of miles from land carries risk so it’s best to be careful and even a bit worried.   To be casual is dangerous.  Best to be prepared.

I have done a lot over the years to be sure that Pandora is up to snuf and prepared for long voyages.  We have spares for a lot of our equipment and our safety gear is up to date.  We have an offshore liferaft as well as two different systems that we can use to summon help via sattelite from the Coastguard if needed.  Of course, that isn’t something to be taken lightly.

Well, enough of the “worry stuff” for now as there will be some terrific sailing ahead for the next week or so.  The winds are forecasted to be favorable beginning….

My plan is to keep this blog up to date with perhaps one photo each day via my SSB long distance radio.  Sending photos and text vis the SSB is very s-l-o-w, glacial actually so the files have to be small.  I’ll send the post materials to Brenda who will put them on my blog.  The SSB radio will also allow me to talk to the weather router each day and stay in touch with others through two SSB “nets”, one at 08:30 and the other at 17:00 each day.  I will check in and give position reports twice a day so other cruisers will know where we are.

I will also “push the button” every four hours on my SPOT GPS transponder, at the change of the watch, for the entire run so that you can “follow” along and see where we are at any given time, 24 hours a day.

When I say “watch” that means that there will be someone on deck at all times as we make our way north.  Customarily, we have one on deck at all times, two if it’s particularly windy or rough, with the remaining crew down below catching a bit of sleep.

Sleep is tough for me for the first day or so as I get used to the constant motion of the boat.  Yes, I have been aboard for the last four months but it’s very different to be “under way” around the clock verses being anchored knowing that we are safe and settled each night.  Obviously, being on the open ocean is a bit less “simple” and that takes a bit of getting used to.

Anyway, I am looking forward to getting underway.  However, before that happens, I have to get current crew safetly on their way home and new crew aboard as well as be sure that everything is ready aboard Pandora for the long run.

This morning we will move Pandora to a nearby marina so I can take on fuel and water as well as have convenient access to groceries etc.  As I write this it’s pretty windy so the idea of moving into a marina slip in this wind isn’t too exciting to me.  If Chris says that we should delay our departure a day or so, I’ll just stay here anchored and move to the marina when it’s more settled.

I don’t have any new photos to include here to illustrate this post, besides, I put something like 15 into yesterday’s post so I guess I’ll pull  something fitting from my photos from earlier in the year.

Yes, this one will do.   A rainbow that we saw the day we checked into the Bahamas in early February?  Yes, that seems appropriate as I make my way toward home and our own “pot of gold”.Here’s to a safe and speedy voyage.  Wish me luck.