Sailing Vessel Banksy

Lucaya Lucaya is a lovely spot to be “stuck” in, and the Grand Bahama Yacht Club is clean, friendly, protected, with beautiful clear water and interesting bird songs and sea life, a nice pool and poolside hangout area.  There’s one restaurant nearby, across the protected channel, that was good enough to go twice—The Flying Fish—though dishes can vary from delicious, perfectly-prepared tapas to normal/fine bar food.  Denizens of the Dock There are lots of fish here at the dock, and pretty clear water. There’s a huge Tarpon that hangs out. Ryan caught a cool picture of a spotted ray! There are turtles and lots of fish. Sometimes, when our neighbors go out and catch Wahoo--and clean their catch at the fish cleaning station--there are also other visitors. Ghost Beaches There are nearby-ish simply stunning beaches and gorgeous clear-water coves to swim in. I would gladly come back either by boat or for a short beach-resort vacation, though the waves/breaks are nonexistent for body ...

Meditation and Sailing When the sailing gets a little rough (or really, more than just very gentle) I’ve had to deal with nausea. When this starts, I feel my body tense up, like trying to protect itself against the motion. To keep it at bay, I find myself using breathing techniques I’ve acquired through mindfulness and meditation practice. I appreciate the beautiful horizon. I breathe in fully, and calm my body, try to reduce the response. It doesn’t make the nausea go away, but it helps. Fortunately, I've had less nausea on the last few sails, and haven’t needed any medication…only breathing and lovely horizons. Meditation Dog I haven’t really meditated since Banksy died. I’m mindful in my appreciations of the moments, of appreciation for the amazing world we live in and amazing humans I’m lucky enough to know. But I haven’t sat down to meditate. Actually, I tried once a couple of months ago... I sobbed instead.  Banksy was my meditation partner. He loved this job. He would come u...

Three Month Retro It’s been three months since we got SV Banksy. We are finally at gorgeous beaches where we can paddle, play, and take long walks along the beach. I’ve been longing for turquoise water and white sand beaches… Now that we have those, it feels so much better. Lying on the beach, listening to the waves, my head feels more clear than it has in awhile. Walking miles along the beach, in and out of the shallow water, feeling the soft white sand underfoot, swimming in gentle waves… this is what I needed. I have really (really, really, really) needed a beach vacation. Taino Beach at Lucaya is a gorgeous beach. In terms of the sailing sabbatical, looking back at these past three months… We loved having friends Livia and Carol visit, and getting a brief visit with Heidi and Kurt. We’ve loved making a few new friends and acquaintances. The sailing community is really lovely, always jumping in to help each other. I really love the actual sailing part… when I can do it without nause...

Hello Lucaya Right now, we are in Lucaya, near Freeport on Grand Bahama Island. It is a bit more lively area than West End, which is great. We had a delicious dinner out last night at The Flying Fish, a little restaurant we can easily drive our dinghy to. Lucaya also has beautiful white sand beaches, one of which we visited yesterday. Taino Beach had white sand out stretching out far enough into the waves for me to want to go for a real swim. Lovely. Today and tomorrow are forecasted to be super windy, so lots of boats have come to the docks, and I’m sitting on SV Banksy in the growing wind, writing this... We hadn’t planned to come down towards Freeport next, but we were antsy in West End, waiting for a weather window that was long enough to get us safely onto the Little Bahama Bank, headed towards Spanish and Green Turtle Cays.  We really need two days to get to get from West End to Great Sale Cay with our speed and style, but we would have settled for one very long day. We avera...

Bahamas-Bound We spent a few more days in the Palm Beach area, moving to a different marina on the 5th. Riviera Beach City Marina was closer to the Lake Worth inlet that we would use to access the ocean (to cross the Florida Gap and head to the Bahamas!). We were only at Riviera Beach for a night, but the people were amazing and friendly and helpful. Facilities weren't great, though, as they were the ones for the whole public beach and waterfront area. A decent weather window opened up on the 6th, and we decided to take it. After lots of crazy actions to make sure we had the right covid tests (RT-PCR) within the right timeframe that we could apply for and get our health visas and clear immigration into the Bahamas (less than 72 hours from test to clearing customs in the Bahamas), we were ready to go. We left Riviera Beach pre-dawn, in new moon darkness. It was our second un-assisted dock leave and our first ever nighttime undocking. It was helpful that the marina was well-lit, and ...

Christmas at Sea Soooo.... we got our halyard! We were able to sail as of Christmas Eve, and so we spent Christmas at sea. Unstuck. We got to talk to a few of you amazing humans even as we cruised down the coast. <3 Lovely. The unsticking: The broker who sold us SV Banksy came through (again!) from Annapolis with a supplier for the (right/technical) rope for our main halyard. And thanks to the wonderful St. Augustine cruising community on FB, we found an awesome local rigger who could help us in the days before Christmas. Thank you again, Charles! (We had tried to go with a different local rigger and supplier the week prior but were let down at the last and very inconvenient moment…see last post.) Once we had our halyard (the “line" that raises our main sail and allows us to sail at all), it was time to move on from St. Augustine…and our overstayed welcome! We headed south to Fort Pierce, FL on an easy overnight. Ryan and I did two-hour shifts this time, and that was better tha...