Guests on Board

Eleuthera and the Exumas
February 1 - 14

By guest bloggers Loren and Clairice Garborg, Keith’s parents, February 1-7:
The Bahamas! It’s like homecoming for us. Yes, Nassau has changed since we lived there in the early 70’s--more traffic, more development (several beaches that we had free access to are now lined with private homes and resorts), and The Christian Book Shop has closed—the Internet’s to blame, according to our taxi driver.

The Out Islands, however, seem to enjoy pretty much the same relaxed, laid-back lifestyle. Our contacts with the genuinely warm and welcoming Bahamian people made us feel like old friends, even though we were meeting for the first time.

Loren and Clairice on Harbour Island

Our first week aboard Pelican with Keith and Joanie was spent cruising the length of Eleuthera, a narrow, 110-mile-long island in the eastern Bahamas. It is populated with descendants of the Eleutheran Adventurers, religious refugees who fled from England and Bermuda in the late 1640s seeking religious freedom, and by British Loyalists who fled the Carolinas with their slaves during the Revolutionary War. Full emancipation was granted the slaves in 1834. The Adventurers gave the island its name, which is derived from the Greek word meaning “freedom.” Eleuthera remains well-churched, with predominantly Wesleyan Methodist and Anglican churches.

Anglican church at Governor's Harbour, Eleuthera

Wesleyan Methodist Church at Governor's Harbour

How to describe our week? Hmmm.
• Let’s start with water of impossibly beautiful shades of green and blue, and with crystal-like clarity.
Warm breezes. Cool moonlit nights. Cold Kalik (ka-LICK). Hot Junkanoo music. Sweet Goombay Punch. Bright sun. Tropical showers and vivid rainbows.

Storm cloud at Cape Eleuthera

Rainbow in Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park

• Fishing (trolling) while underway.

Cero Mackerel, a nice catch

• Savory food—stone crab claws, lobster, hogfish, mahi-mahi, whelk salad, conch fritters, conch chowder, jerk conch, cracked conch and conch salad—all fresh from Bahamian waters. Did we mention that we ate conch?

Conch fritters and Kalik

Colossal stone crab claws

• Comfortable accommodations in the v-berth. One of my favorite brothers showing up at the end of the week.
• Barefoot walks on miles of deserted beaches carpeted with fine sand in many shades of pink and cream. Two of the most beautiful beaches are at the far southern tip of the island of Eleuthera—on the west side, the Exuma Sound and on the east, the Atlantic Ocean. They can both be viewed from the hill where the remains stand of a small lighthouse.

Keith and Joanie at Crescent Bay Beach, Eleuthera

Lighthouse Beach East, Eleuthera

Lighthouse Beach West, Eleuthera (both pictures taken from the same vantage point)

• Finally, the joy of gliding over the waves under sail. It’s always a wonderful moment when the sails are unfurled, when the auxiliary diesel is shut down and gives way to the sounds of the wind and water, when the boat heels over gently as the sails fill. We had some of that kind of sailing, but also an exhilarating ride under full sail across the 5,000-foot-deep Exuma Sound in 20 knots of wind, gusting to 30, and quartering five-foot waves at an average speed of eight knots.

Sailing between Eleuthera and the Exumas

All of this with two of the people we love the most! Thanks, Keith and Joanie, for a wonderful and memorable time. Happy sailing for the rest of the winter!

Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God, the Maker of heaven and earth, the sea, and everything in them—the Lord, who remains faithful forever.

Psalm 146:5, 6 NIV

~~

From guest blogger Rolf Garborg, Keith’s uncle, February 7-14:
What a week! I have been looking forward to this week on Keith and Joanie’s boat since early May, 2002. Here’s why. I was a passenger on the inaugural voyage that Keith and Loren made after picking up their Jeanneau sailboat in the Detroit area. The plan was to ride with them back to Bayfield, Wisconsin. The weather was mid 30s and there was a fierce rain storm with gale force winds from the north. When we entered Lake Huron we encountered 8-10 foot swells. I had nothing to do but try to survive. Suffice it to say I fully understand the value and use of the “head” on their boat. After 24 hours of misery I felt like Jonah and was “cast out” of the boat in Alpena, Michigan. I caught a taxi to town and after two bus rides to Detroit and two flights to Minneapolis, I was happy to be back home.

I knew sailing had to be better than that. This week, nearly 13 years later, I discovered just how great it can be.

I arrived at Rock Sound, Eleuthera, and was greeted by Keith and Loren at the airport. After a brief stop for provisions and another to pick up a local who was walking home, we arrived at Pelican and met Joanie and Clairice, and the fun began. Pelican was tied up at Cape Eleuthera Marina. At 9:00 the next morning, we said goodbye to the Internet and sailed for four hours across open seas before arriving at Hawksbill Cay in the Exumas, where we anchored in a protected bay. For the next six days we sailed south through the Exumas, a chain of islands that run for about 100 miles through the middle of the Bahamas. Spectacular!!!

Keith on the beach at Hawksbill Cay

We have walked unspoiled deserted beaches, hiked trails to ruins from 250 years ago, explored “Pirate’s Lair,” where real pirates hung out between raids, saw the skeleton of a 52-foot sperm whale, and even revisited the place where Joanie crushed her thumb last year. That whole story still amazes me.

Rolf and the whale skeleton

We didn’t actually swim with the sharks but watched others do it. We did, however, get in the water at Big Majors Spot with the only “swimming pigs” in the world...that we know of. Now that’s something you don’t see every day! Keith even became “The Pig Whisperer.” No, really, he did. Check out the picture.

Swimming with nurse sharks at Compass Cay

The swimming pigs at Big Majors Spot

The Pig Whisperer

A piglet cannot live by bread alone

When we got to Compass Cay we indulged ourselves with huge, juicy hamburgers before we took a hike to the beach. Along the way there was a sign that said “Planetarium,” and we had to check it out. Here’s a picture of the planetarium. Pretty funny.

"Dave's Planetarium"

Mostly we hung out on the boat, reading, eating, playing games, and of course...sailing. We also dinghied lots of places in the small rubber boat that they tow behind Pelican. A sign inside the dinghy says, “4 people.660 pounds.” Well, we stretched those limits and know that it can handle 5 people and about 800 pounds just fine.

Over the limit

We were near some pretty impressive homes along the way. Johnny Depp has a big place here. Rumor has it that a cruiser stopped and knocked at his door and the next day that cruiser was kicked out of the Bahamas. We didn’t do that. We saw a small private island with three big windmills on it. There is a private home there that houses up to 30 guests and rents out for just $250,000 a day.

Maybe they purposely saved the best till last, but our final day was special. We motored to Staniel Cay the night before and in the morning, with a slack tide, snorkeled into Thunderball Grotto. It is a huge cave with a few holes in the top that let light in. To get in you have to go either at low tide or dive under the coral at high tide. Inside the cave it is magical. It is where part of the James Bond movie, “Thunderball,” was filmed.

Thunderball Grotto

I am so very grateful to Keith and Joanie for this week. What a great experience. Now it is back to Florida to be with my wife, Sweet Mary.

Nassau Connections

Nassau, New Providence
January 22-27, 2015

Nassau is always a good stop. Even if it’s only to re-provision at the best-stocked grocery store in all The Bahamas. Besides laundry, that was the only thing on our agenda as we sat out weather systems. Here on New Providence, we were open and available for a few serendipities.

There was one connection that didn’t materialize. We arrived here Thursday evening. Fellow Minnesota hockey parents from Sean’s high school days, Laurie (& Jeff) Saforek and Kathy & Tom Snouffer, spent the day here Friday on a cruise-ship stop. I saw their Facebook post Saturday, after their ship had sailed.

Close but not quite, unfortunately! But several other unexpected connections came together.

1) Dave and Alison on s/v Zingaro were in Nassau Harbour Club Marina when we pulled in. We’d enjoyed their company at St. Marys Boat Services in Georgia last spring, but this fall we left the boatyard before they arrived. It was fun to reconnect and go out with them and another couple for a delicious dinner at East Villa, a Chinese restaurant. Fun!

2) While seated at East Villa, a man came up behind us and said, “Hey, Keith!” It was Steve, a guy we’d met on Great Harbour Cay (whose primary home is in Nassau). What are the chances we’d run into him there? On one of our bike rides at Great Harbour we’d happened by his beautiful waterfront “cottage” while he was on the porch. He was very friendly and offered to show us around his unusual home built entirely from Brazilian hardwoods. The house was gorgeous inside and out. His wife, an interior designer, had added all the right finishing touches to make it a tropical beach haven. From the veranda, the turquoise view went on forever. Beautiful!

3) Allen and Lucie, a couple from Alaska, were assigned the slip behind us with their boat Trixie. We hit it off and chatted a couple times on the dock. (Somehow, we seem to gravitate to people from the northern US and Canada…maybe it’s because most people on boats are escaping cold weather!) They rented a car and asked if we wanted to drive around the island with them. Yes, please! When they found out Keith had lived here and was familiar with the island, that was a bonus…and an occasion for Allen to give him a ribbing for directing us to a few dead ends. We laughed so many times at Allen’s distracted driving. He couldn’t remember to drive on the left, didn’t notice huge potholes and speed bumps, and inadvertently used the windshield wipers to signal turns all day long. One highlight of the tour was Clifton Heritage Park, a place we’d read about on the south side of the island. Two renowned Bahamian sculptors, Antonius Roberts and Tyrone Ferguson, created a public work of art there called Sacred Space. They transformed the trunks of casuarina trees into figures of slave women. Though the faces are featureless, you can sense a powerful mixture of longing, desperation, and hope in the sculptures’ posture as they gaze over the ocean. All that from simple tree trunks. Amazing!

At Clifton Heritage Park with Allen and Lucie

Sacred Space

4) This one starts with Lindsey, a classmate of Keith when he attended St. Andrew’s School in Nassau. Keith, Sean, and I, along with Keith’s parents, went to Lindsey’s wedding in Toronto in the late 80s. She is one of the most remarkable people I know. Through the heartbreak of caring for a daughter with MLD, a degenerative neurological disease, she has beautifully articulated on Caring Bridge her deep faith and God’s loving care in the pain and struggle. Lindsey is also great at remembering birthdays and keeping in touch with old friends. I communicated with her on Facebook that we were thinking about her in her old stomping grounds, and soon she had put us in touch with another classmate, Penny. Penny had come back to Nassau after college and married Drew, who was a year ahead at St. Andrews. They and their son Ben took us out for dinner at East Villa. It was a trip highlight for Keith to be reunited with an old high school friend. We had a thoroughly delightful time and wonderful conversation with them. After dinner, they took us by their home to meet their eight-week-old puppy Dakota, an adorable mastiff like our Kia. On top of all that, we figured out that Steve, who had greeted us at the restaurant on our previous visit, is Penny’s brother-in-law! Her sister is the interior designer. Serendipity!

Ben, Drew, Penny, Keith, Joanie

Out here, far from home, those connections with special people nourish our souls as much as the beauty we see and adventure we experience. All of them are gifts from God that we treasure.

An Uncommon Day

Little Harbour Cay, Berry Islands
January 21, 2015

We thought our highlights in the Berrys were behind us. After such a great stay in Great Harbour Cay, we then anchored by the village and, the following night, dropped the hook father south in a gem of an anchorage at Fish Market Cays with two other boats. On our approach to that anchorage, at an inconvenient moment, Keith caught a Yellow Jack and decided to release it. When we checked our fish book later, we found out it would have provided an excellent dinner. Oh, well, brats on the grill were just fine. One more day, and then on to Nassau.

Market Fish Cay beach

Market Fish Cay

Market Fish Cay

You might think that there are no ordinary days in The Bahamas, but that’s not exactly true. However, the next day was uncommon. As we transited ten miles to the next anchoring spot, Keith was trolling, as usual, and caught a barracuda. Not good eating, so he was off the hook. No more than a minute after the lure went back in the water, the reel buzzed, line playing out fast. A bigger fish had taken the bait! As Keith brought it close to the swim platform, we could see yellow rather than barracuda silver. “It’s a huge grouper!” he exclaimed. This time we had our handy fish book in the cockpit and quickly researched its food value. Most groupers rate as very fine dining, but this was a Yellowfin Grouper and the book said bigger specimens could have ciguatera (a toxic poison that can build up in reef-feeding predators), and that one should seek local knowledge.

Yellowfin Grouper

 Conveniently, our planned anchorage was near Little Harbour Cay, the home of Flo’s Conch Bar. It’s a restaurant only accessible by boat, only patronized by cruisers. Once situated at anchor, we left the fish on a stringer behind the boat and dinghied to Flo’s to ask Chester, the proprietor, whether our catch was safe to eat. “Are you sure it’s a Yellowfin?” Looking at our camera screen, he agreed that it was, even though he hadn’t seen one caught in those waters for a long time. “There’s no problem eating them,” he said. “Why don’t you bring him in here and we’ll clean it for you if we can keep the carcass.” Deal!

Flo's Conch Bar - notice welcome sign on roof

Flo's Conch Bar sign inside

As we stood watching the big fish—estimated at twenty pounds—being cleaned, a couple guys who manage a private island came by. We struck up a conversation and they asked us to come to their island. How could we refuse that offer to go to a place we can only visit by invitation? That afternoon was the one possible time, so as soon as the fish was cleaned and half stowed in our fridge (the other half in the restaurant’s, since we didn’t think we could use all of it ourselves while it was fresh), we turned the dinghy toward the private island.

Twenty minutes later, we stepped ashore. Again, we were shown that open-door Bahamian welcome. We chatted while one of them showed Keith his method for cleaning conch, then the other man gave us a tour of the beach cottages. The perfect hosts, they served us drinks and insisted that we take six cleaned conch, a bag of whelks, and a fine bottle of wine with us when we left. It was such an unusual experience that we smiled all the way back to the boat, the whole bumpy, bone-rattling ride.

That night at Flo’s, we were served a fine dinner of grouper fingers—and the next morning, a delicious fish stew for breakfast. Both times, we were the only customers enjoying the gorgeous view and the unique character of the place. It’s an isolated outpost, yet there’s currency stapled to the wall from countries all over the world. In the nearby anchorage we were also the only boat, a rare occurrence that we always savor.

Interior of Flo's

The view from Flo's

Pelican at anchor by Little Harbour Cay

So many uncommon gifts came to us, all strung together into one of the most memorable days we’ve experienced in cruising The Bahamas. 

A Berry Warm Welcome

Great Harbour Cay, The Berry Islands
January 7-20, 2015

We could sail far and wide to find a more welcoming place than Great Harbour Cay [“key”] in the Berry Islands. Everyone is so friendly. Almost every driver waves, and if you’re walking, you’ll probably be offered a ride. Strangers stop us and ask if we’re enjoying our time on the island. They beam when we tell them we love it there, that it’s beautiful and the people are so nice. We’ve heard stories of other cruisers who were drawn in and spent much more time than planned at Great Harbour Cay.

A short walk across the island from the marina leads to a gorgeous long crescent of powder sand beach. You could walk all day and only see a few other people. We unfolded our bikes and toured from the north end of the island—where we could see Disney cruise ships, parasailers, and jet skiiers at a private island—to the south, where we walked out on sand bars exposed by low tide for hundreds of feet. We biked to several other beaches, including Bardot Beach (yes, named for Bridget, one of the beautiful people who, along with Frank Sinatra and Jack Nicklaus, owned vacation homes on the island in the 60s and 70s).

Mangroves near the village

Low tide sand bars at south end of cay

Driftwood at Lovers Beach

Bardot Beach taken from the dinghy

One of the island’s charms is its community of Bahamians. We enjoy talking to local, native people, getting to know them, seeing how they live. In the winter months, part-time residents add to the population and suddenly it’s high season.

Staying longer than last year allowed us to participate in several activities. The Beach Club outdoor restaurant had reopened on that long crescent beach. A tiny gallery on the premises, called the Art Shack, offered a craft class where we transformed coconuts into painted fish (ours turned out pretty cute). Proceeds from the class and art sales will provide computer equipment for the local school. At the grand opening of the Art Shack a few days later, we got acquainted with more residents. Third and fourth graders sang for us and displayed coconut fish they’d made (theirs were cuter).

The Beach Club

Craft class with Art Shack in background

Our coconut fish are very compatible

Kids's choir at grand opening

Each Friday night, we mingled with cruisers and residents at a “chill and grill” at the marina. Several evenings, Keith and I played a game called petanque (the French version of bocce) with locals and cruisers.

Marilyn and I at the "chill and grill"

On the last Sunday, we caught a ride in the church van to St. Bartholomew’s Anglican Church in the village. Formality and exuberance, liturgy from The Book of Common Prayer and piano-pounding hymns combined to form a purely Bahamian experience. The Spirit was definitely moving! The parishioners gave us an open-armed welcome: big hugs from almost everyone during “sharing the peace” time. The two hours (!) passed quickly. Raising our voices and our hearts in worship with a group of others, we felt God’s presence in a different way than we do when we worship by ourselves in the cathedral of creation most Sundays. Either way, He’s there.

St. Bartholomew's Anglican Church

Finally, it was time to leave. With a forecast for a few days of settled weather, we planned to anchor by a few cays on our way to Nassau. The Berry Islands have fast become one of our favorite places in The Bahamas, and we look forward to a return visit next year.

 

Sign by the airport. Okay, then!

A Marvelous Crossing

Lake Worth, FL to Great Harbour Cay, The Berry Islands
January 6-7, 2015

First sunrise in the Bahamas

What a marvelous night for a crossing! Every time is different, and we’ll probably never see another like this one. We arrived safely in Great Harbour Cay, the Berry Islands, after an unusually calm and gentle journey. At the beginning, leftover wind waves in the Gulf Stream had lasted  until around sunset. Then the wind and waves laid down and overnight the ocean turned to glass. The moonrise began like the haze of city lights on the horizon. Then it made its appearance as an orange ball behind lacy low-lying clouds. High in the sky, the full moon lit cloud edges and waves in soft, luminous shades of gray. Keith even saw multiple jumping gray

The cut into the very protected harbor

dolphins on one of his watches. The night might have felt eerie if it hadn't been so bright and alive, so full of God's presence. It was so still it felt otherworldly—which, in some way, it was.

Yesterday afternoon we walked on the beautiful beach on the east side of the island and took a swim in the ocean. The water was chilly at first, but refreshing!

Almost to the beach...

We're happy and relieved to have the big jump behind us and be in the Bahamas. Where it’s almost always better!

Mo, Carly, and George, our buddy-boaters for the crossing