It's A Blessing

Grace and we lie snug on the south side of Rose Island, just east of New Providence’s Nassau harbor, after a two-part 110-mile sail from Bimini.  We left Wednesday at noon or so, after a morning of final errands and preparations.  After spending a few days acclimating ourselves to life outside the US, it became clear that we had a few too much of a few items, and Jennifer walked to the laundry to give Melinda several rolls of large, clear plastic bags.  Boats are, by their nurture and nature, damp environments, and plastic bags serve a vital purpose in keeping things dry (or drier).  We had overstocked.  Melinda was grateful for the gift, and reminded us of the conservative and religious foundation of these islands’ peoples when she said: “It’s a blessing.”

We offered some spare items to some of our fellow cruisers, let loose the dock lines, and headed north of Bimini harbor into a moderate easterly breeze and deep blue waters, intending to turn the corner and head southeast across the Grand Bahama Bank.  The Bank is a geologic wonder, a huge uplifting of the earth’s surface lying between the Gulf Stream, the Tongue of the Ocean, and set of deep-water channels.  Its average depth might approach 10 feet , with crystalline waters revealing every starfish, coral, and grassy bank below.  To a Chesapeake and blue-water sailor, it’s more than a bit disconcerting to be so sublimely aware of the only thing that really threatens a boat:  a hard, unforgiving bottom.

Turning north, and well before we entered the bank, the boat’s starboard engine shuddered, slowed, and then stopped.  This was a problem of a very different nature:  limited power and limited steerage in open waters.  Thankfully, it had not happened as we passed the rusty Bimini inter-island freighter in the narrow passage out of the harbor.  One lock astern revealed the problem:  a long tangle of discarded thick polypropylene  towing line had ensnared itself around the prop.  Out comes the mask and snorkel, over the side we go, and with a few shakes and turns, the line comes free and, thankfully – blessfully --  the engine starts back up and we round North Rock for the Bank. 

Twelve hours later, under a near-full moon and after a fast, gentle ESE sail across the Bank, we arrive at the NW Channel light marking the narrow gap between the Bank and the Tongue of the Ocean.  Rather than risk running aground in the narrow channel flanked by reefs and shoals, we anchored on the Bank for about 5 hours, waiting for first light.  To pass safely through Nassaus’s entrance channels, with its even shallower waters, we needed to pass the Channel light at first light; a few hours of sleep and an early morning call to arms, and we were back in deep waters, headed for Nassau.

By early afternoon, the huge hotels of Paradise Island were clearly visible on the southeastern horizon, rising like faintly-gothic towers atop a blue desert of ocean.  We were motor-sailing to assure a timely arrival before the sun got too low to reveal any lurking coral heads lying below the shallow eastern entrance channels of Nassau.  We made Salt Cay, just east of the Nassau entrance at 3:30 or so, and dropped sail and began to creep into the channels.  Making landfall in a new port is inevitably an anxious experience, and this proved no exception. The Bahamians are not known for laying clear markers (if any!), and with Guita reading off our coordinates and position, and Jennifer and Stephen keeping a keen watch from the boat, we crept south then east then north then west.  In eight feet of water, nestled on the south side of Rose Island, facing a faintly white rising moon, we dropped anchor.  A quick jump  overboard to check the anchor’s grip on the bottom revealed a scattering of starfish and small clumps of sea grass.  Dinner soon followed – an Iranian chicken and rice dish, with cucumber and yogurt (Guita is Iranian), and then a collective review of our next days’ passages.  As the moon brightened with the lights of Nassau behind us twinkling white, green, blue and green, Melinda’s words came back:  It’s a blessing.