First, Lee's additions to the last chapter: The most impressive sites are the French Catherdals. In Paris the Cathedral was restored, clean and polished, the statues and artwork went on forever. In Chartres theCathedral was probably as large, but not maintained. It gave an account of what happens if you don.t have a few million dollars to maintain these giant antique stone structures. Mold and moss grow on the outside, roofs leak causing plaster to fall on the inside. The statues and stained glass get a layer of black. It was still a beautiful landmark, there was a restoration project working on the front facade and the ceiling above the altar (not little at probably 10,000 sq ft, but less than 10% of total ceiling) was recently refurbished. It looks like a terriffic job to try to maintain these huge buildings, this one finished in 1260, the other side being the superb quality and engineering skills that created a structure that lasted this long. Trying to find dimensions in guide books, the Nave is 427' long,120' high. We visited St Pierre's Church, again finding much needed maintenance,with netting to protect people from falling plaster. I am not being critical of efforts to maintain these structures, but wonder where the millions of dollars eventually needed to keep them up will actually come from. Lee

Our first B &B in France was delightful. We sat with two French women at breakfast who helped us learn a few more phrases in French. Another couple from the south of France called ahead for our reservation for Sunday night in Amboise in the Loire Valley. Ming stopped by to share her recommendations for sightseeing in the Dordogne valley. We headed out with her for another morning of exploration. We lunched at a local restaurant crowded with families. I ordered salade Nicoise and Lee had rump steak. It was hard saying good-by to Ming, she felt like an old friend. She has traveled the world for over 20 years. Her long-time boyfriend is a professor of film in Bejing and doesn't like to travel. She is planning to write a guide for people in China who have just recently been able to travel. She loved practicing her English and I enjoyed hearing about her life.The drive to Amboise wasn't too difficult, we stayed on big roads with few towns, lots of fields of corn and sunflowers. Solitary hunters with guns could be seen walking across the distant fields. We couldn't find our hotel,not even the street. We parked and walked around the narrow cobblestoned streets of Amboise looking for 8 place Michel Debre. The GPS worked well to get us near, but can't deal with the maze of tiny streets. The owner had agreed to meet us at six to let us in. When we finally found him he spoke no English and our room turned out to be on the third floor above his tiny restaurant. He got in the car to help us drive there and deposited me and the luggage in front while he and Lee went to find a friend who would let us park the car where he could keep an eye on it. Since the only entry was through the restaurant, he gave us a key. We joked about putting out the sign board with an opening announcement for a new American Restaurant. Below are the entrance, the room and the view, not bad, just strange.

Even odder than making our way later through a darkened restaurant was the fact that there was another couple on the second floor, no locks on our room doors, no towels, no heat. Lee raided the kitchen for paper towels so we could shower. We weren't sure if our bathroom in the hall was shared. Our faith in Rick Steve's guidebook is waning. Monday morning we headed out to tour our first chateau, Chenonceau. Ifyou've ever seen pictures of a chateau with arches spanning a river, that's it. It took most of the day to tour the chateau with our audio-cassettes in English, then the two formal gardens, the maze, the wax museum, thevegetable garden.

One chateau a day is our limit. We got ready for our next challenge, getting to Chinon for the night. The learning curve for driving here is high. We both were stressed watching for signs, circles with numbers for speed limit, subtract 10 or 20 for rainy conditions, a slash through the number for end of limit, a town name in a circle with a slash for leaving the limits of the town, many symbols we still don't know. We have learned not to take yellow line roads with D#s, stick to red, and then there are the roundabouts, which replace crossroads in France. We've never heard the GPSsay the word "recalculating" quite so much. Once we were on the correct numbered road, but somehow suddenly going the wrong way. What else have we learned? Look for the name of the next town at each juncture, not the highway number which often isn't there. Let's hope it gets easier.

Lee: I finally went online and checked our guide books for "Driving in France". I think I have the street signs and speed limits sort of figured out. I had turned right on red after a French car began honking, but find this is NOT allowed. The speed limits may not be posted, if you pass a city entrance itis 50km (30mph) but may not be posted. Other limits depend on the color of the route sign (A "department road" is 90km, an "Auto Route" is 110 or 130)and if it is wet are reduced 10km. We tend to be going slower than others,but our guidebook says that tickets are given for ANY speed above the limit,and if 25km over the policeman will confiscate your license on the spot.There is an old rule allowing cars entering from the right to have right ofway, unless there is a diamond sign, then there are anti diamond signs too.France seems in the process of replacing all 4 way intersections with roundabouts. Cars here are all Diesel, we have a Peugeot 207, a 4 door hatch backsimilar to a Toyota Corrolla, it seems to get better than 50MPG, it will easily do any autoroute speed, but accelerates slowly and is standard shift.I am not sure why these are not sold in US, we are told we need a Hybrid carto get good mileage, but this is much simpler. Possibly they think Americans would not buy a car that accellerates slowly. Fuel here is about$6.50/gal for Diesel, $7.25 for gas.

Sherry: Our new plan for choosing hotels is to ask to see the room. The hotel AgnesSorel is so nice we're staying here two nights. Since arriving in Chinon yesterday we've walked all over town, toured the royal fortress, biked about20 miles to Saint Martin, and ordered real french food at a restaurant (coq au vin and duck parmienter). Tomorrow we start out for the Dordogne Valley.

Our second evening in Paris began with another long subway ride to another landmark we didn't want to miss. We emerged to the grandeur of the Arc deTriomphe.

The plan was to walk from there along the Champs-Elysees, the 5th Avenue of Paris with all the expensive shops, back toward the Louvre. Wewere surrounded by a very international affluent crowd, including veiled women hidden even by sunglasses although it was evening. The only establishment we ventured into was a futuristic Peugeot dealership with a light show highlighting the cars. By the time we reached Place de laConcorde, a huge open square circled by speeding traffic, the crowd had thinned and we were ready for the tourists again. We had imagined walking through the Tuileries Garden but the gates were closed. The street to the left was too deserted for us and we headed over to the Seine. It was drizzling and the picnic crowds were missing. We were starting to feel really lonely. We walked through the Lions entrance to the pyramid at theLouvre looking for a subway stop. The market area beyond here was the one area our bike tour guide had warned us about and we weren't sure we were supposed to be here late at night. Down onto the subway platform of ourfamiliar #9 subway and there were the missing crowds. At every stop more people managed to squeeze aboard, no wonder there was no one left on thestreets above. Again we stopped at our neighborhood grocery and took bread and cheese back to the room, too tired to eat out.

Friday morning, our last in Paris, we headed for the national Maritime Museum at Trocadero Square, Lee's choice for our one museum visit before leaving the city and a surprisingly good one. We left the subway for a close-up view of the Eiffel Tower before heading into the museum.

A special exhibit featured a famous explorer's three circumnavigations. The guide says "un voyage aucoeur des cultures maritimes du monde, a bord des bateaus traditionnels despeuples de la mer et des fleuves". I wish I knew his name so we could read more about his career. He was an artist and a collector of model boats fromevery country he visited (maybe that's what it says). We had an audiocassette in English and could have stayed hours longer.

But it was time to pack up and go find our rental car. We both agreed a taxi was the only way, due to the unmentionable luggage.

We enjoyed the ride through new streets and neighborhoods. Elegant stone buildings with black wrought iron balconies and windows boxes of redgeraniums was our final impression of Paris.yiy Then began the ordeal. Never pick up a rental car on the outskirts of Paris during Friday evening rush hour. It was beyond the logic of our brains, our GPS, our maps, we must have circled the area six or seven times before breaking free. We no longer cared where we went, Rouen, Giverny, Versailles,any route that would take us away from Paris. We stopped for gas and bought a Michelin atlas, found a route marked Chartres and went back to our original plan. Lee had skypped a hotel there so we had a destination. And it was a perfect one. Our hotel room was palacial. We were a block from the cobblestone streets that led to the cathedral, which we could see from our hotel window that night.

We still haven't mastered the art of ordering a sit-down dinner in a french restaurant and opted forIndian chicken korma and biryani, I know we have to get beyond this.Someone, please, tell us exactly what to order for a perfect French dinnerand we will. Back at the hotel the deskperson told us about a Brahms concertat the cathedral in an hour and we hurried back up the hill. The wholepopulace was converging along the drizzly streets. We learned it was an orchestra from Tours with several volunteer choirs performing. It was truly amazing to be in that space hearing that music.

Today we started our wandering to find a market in the central square with everything from rabbit to garlic and crowds with shopping carts. We next went to the tourist bureau to get the audiotour cassette for our walkabout. They were able to call and reserve a bed and breakfast where we are tonight. We were lucky to meet Ming, a fellow tourist and filmmaker from Bejing China who spent the day walking around with us.

Tomorrow morning she's bringing over her itinerary from the Dordogne valley to help us plan a future leg of the trip. We also happened upon a parade: seemed to have a harvest theme, oxen, horses,traditionally costumed people, speeches by politicians, it's all a mysteryto us, but very interesting.

The language deficiency hasn't been much of a problem, people are very friendly and we like being mystified. Tomorrow we'll head to the Loire Valley.

I left the boat at Oriental, NC, a sublet boat slip at a new condodevelopment. They SELL slips, just $80,000 or so. A friend at Orientalcheerfully offered to drive us around to find boat parking. I had expectedto haul the boat out of the water and park it on land, but Hurricane Earlhad just gone by and so many boats were pulled for safety that the boatyards were full.After arriving back to Ithaca with in a rental car, I was able to replacemy Bifocal glasses in 2 days with one trip tp Owego and 3 trips to Vestalwhere they promised lenses "while I waited". My original set of glasseswent to the bottom of the Hudson River and my spare set had some terribleprescription mistake from last year. I had been getting by with 2 sets ofdrugstore reading glasses that I was able to buy in Kingston, NY.(Lee)Next from Sherry:We're heading out again on our annual fall migration, this time by air andcar and cruise ship, rather than on S/V Alesto. We're finally going toEurope, first time for both of us. We fly to Paris tomorrow, which isthrilling, even to type. After three days in Paris we have a rental car for40 days to meander through southern France with a little Italy and Spain ateach end. We then get on a cruise ship in Barcelona for some guided travelto several ports, including Majorca, Madeira and the Canaries. We are onlyseasoned travelers when on our own boat. We know how to anchor and dingyashore for exploration all through the Caribbean. Whether we will do as wellon land is yet to be seen. The lack of French worries us more than a little.Continuing in Paris:The most difficult part of our trip so far had to do with luggage, too muchluggage. We lugged (lug must be the root word for luggage) it from the PortAuthority bus terminal in NYC 20 blocks to Michael's apartment in Manhatten.Then the next day we lugged it down the subway steps, bumping our our threesuitcases every step of the way. We lugged it all back to street level inBrooklyn to have lunch with Jill. At that point she took pity on us andaccompanied us from the C train to the A train. We managed on our own fromthe A train to the air train that took us to terminal 8 where we managed tocheck our bags and move freely again. Normal people would have taken a taxi.It's good we aimed to be there three hours early, since we had about an hourto spare when we finally reached our boarding area. I'm not a big fan of airtravel (those who know me know how much of an understatement that is), butthe seven hour flight was fine. They fed us dinner, we watched a movie,lights dimmed while normal people slept. The time zoomed ahead to accountfor the six hour time change so it was soon time for breakfast. The suncame up and there was Paris. We somehow found a bus outside the terminalwhich took us to another bus which took us to Gard du La Est which the mapshowed to be near our hotel. We were able to walk from there, again lugging.The hotel was a bit of a shock, along the lines of our usual Lonely Planetguide hotels. We left the luggage in a corner near the desk and went out toexplore until our room was ready. We came back and lugged it up one flightuntil we discovered a miniscule elevator up to our 5th floor roomette. Theluggage filled the area not covered by the bed. Three walls are school-busyellow and one is red. The bedspread is a spread of sunflowers and moons onblue, there is a casement window overlooking rooftops we can open forventilation. The lightswitch on the stairs stays on 4 1/2 flights out offive. You cannot turn around in the shower without bumping the faucet. Butthe price is right. I won't complain any more or mention the word luggageever again. Paris is wonderful. (Sherry)The room measures about 8X9, minus the bed, the bath is 4X4 plus a 2X2shower with a curtain that drains in the room. There is no A/C, or evenheat that I can see, but the ventilation is good. The room was very clean.(Lee)We walked until jet lag forced us to take a nap, mostly in Le Marais, ourneighborhood. The guidebook says it has more pre Revolutionary lanes andbuildings than anywhere else in town. After resting we headed out on thesubway for a nighttime boat ride on the Seine. After NYC, subways here areso easy. The map shows the lines by color and number with the endpointsnamed. That's all you have to know to board the correct train. They appearevery three or four minutes and stops are well marked. And the cost is oneEuro, much less than NYC's $2.25. The boatride showcased the "City ofLights" as we circled the two islands in the Seine with all the majorlandmarks and bridges glowing in the dark. Crowds of Parisians werepicnicing along the banks cheering and waving at the tourists. The EiffelTower's golden structure twinkled with white lights every hour and even thebirds overhead glowed golden from the boat"s lights. We got back to theroomette late and crashed. (Sherry)Actually, we walked until my feet hurt and I refused to go on. Thearchitecture and sculptures in Paris go on forever and make it allworthwhile. It is amazing the scale of it all, considering constructionthat started as early as 1100 AD and was done all by hand labor of thefinest quality. (Lee)This morning we enjoyed our hotel breakfast before heading out for a fourhour bike tour (Bikeabouttours). Our guide Pamela was from Chile, our fellowtravelers were from many countries and our folding bikes took us on bikelanes and cobblestone alleys around the inner circle of Paris, both rightand left banks. I hope to trace the route on our map before I forget toomuch. There are well-marked bike paths all over and a company called Velibhas 20,000 bikes all over which can be unlocked with a credit card. Wefollowed up the tour by exploring the Latin Quarter and hope to visit atleast one more neighborhood tomorrow. Then we pick up our rental car andtake whichever roads lead away from Paris with the least traffic.We had one whole day in Paris before the strike began, something to do withprotesting the government in power which wants to raise retirement age to62. Huge crowds with chanting and smoking flares snaked through every areawe visited today, peacefully enough though. (Sherry)I have no sympathy for strinking French. They work about 42 thirty fivehour weeks per year and retire at 60. All physical work here has beenreplaced with machinery, every delivery truck has a hydraulic gate on theback to lower and raise goods, every garbage truck is automated. Healthcare is free. Get this! They may get STRIKE PAY!!! Something likeunemployement insurance for strikes. We were in the French Islands 2 yearsago during a strike. Everything stopped, the money machine was not workingand we had no Euros, even the Customs office was not working. Local peoplewere stealing the gas tanks from sailor's dingies. We found one bakery thatwas selling bread, and every day they gave us change for $20 US in Euros.We will keep an eye on this and keep a full wallet and gas tank. (Lee)Since arriving yesterday we have eaten bagettes with ham and cheese andcrudites, croissants, crepes with pommes compote (which turned out to beapplesauce) , brie and bagettes, pastries, several tiny strong coffees whichmight account for our productivity and free tap water. (Sherry)Truthfully, restaurant food is expensive here, so we eat takeout or homemademostly, but cheese and baguettes are favorites for us anyway. (Lee)I had hoped to post pictures with this on my blog, but it seems to havedisappeared in France and all the directions to fix it are in French. Thismay be a problem. Sherry

We're heading out again on our annual fall migration, this time by air and car and cruise ship, rather than on S/V Alesto. We're finally going to Europe, first time for both of us. We fly to Paris tomorrow, which is thrilling, even to type. After three days in Paris we have a rental car for 40 days to meander through southern France with a little Italy and Spain at each end. We then get on a cruise ship in Barcelona for some guided travel to several ports, including Majorca, Madeira and the Canaries. We are only seasoned travelers when on our own boat. We know how to anchor and dingy ashore for exploration all through the Caribbean. Whether we will do as well on land is yet to be seen. The lack of French worries us more than a little. One incident on Saint Martin remains a nagging doubt. We went with boater friends to a festival in Grand Case. We dingied from our anchorage in the lagoon to Marigot where we boarded a bus to the festival. We'd heard there might be a problem with buses late at night for the return trip. But at ten we spotted a small bus with Marigot on the front and other English speaking tourists boarding. We happily regaled the others with stories of our savior faire sailing down the island chain. The bubble burst when the bus stopped in a lonely parking lot and all the others departed for their cars. Left alone with the driver and no French other than desperate "Marigot, Marigot" we finally managed to persuade him to continue. We recognized huit (eight) Euro, but had to idea if that was per person or trip. Luckily is was per trip and the evening ended well for us back in Marigot. We will probably have similar scrapes in France. If we become to lonely for English, we'll just make a U turn and head for England.

Homeward bound: The Abacos to Florida

We've been moving too fast for much reporting-if it's Thursday, it must be Daytona Beach. We thought we would spend a leisurely two or three weeks in the Abacos, but got a weather window to rush across the gulf stream and cut it short. We love the Abacos and usually start our Bahamas travels there at the beginning of the season. The sea of Abaco is like a big lake bordered by many islands which we can visit without weather worries. But the weather there is definitely colder and windier, so the southern route through the Exumas was the right choice this year. Most cruisers said it was the worst weather they could remember, no surprise to most Floridians, I'm sure.Once we arrived from Eleuthera at the southernmost cut into the sea of Abaco at Little Harbor, we hurried through all our favorite anchorages: one night at Lynyard Cay, one at Little Harbor looking for sea glass, on to Hope Town to visit with several boater friends who spend the season there. There was a festival that afternoon, a walk through town, ice cream!!, sundowners on a friend's boat, a real homecoming. We had to hurry over to Guana Cay for the dish-to-pass the next night (homeowners with kitchens as well as cruisers make this a real feast). Then we had to rush to Marsh Harbor for a cruiser's get-together, then on to Man O War Cay for an overnight with dinner out and a hike, back to Hopetown for a long bike ride down to Tahiti Beach and friends over for lasagna on Easter Sunday. Back to anchor at Guana and the weather report that had us sailing west all day on the first of the three days to Florida. It might have been weeks before another weather window as good, so once I calmed down at the prospect of racing through the next three days I was resigned to go. Usually I can only take one passage at a time and don't trust that the weather could behave for three days in a row.

At the end of day one, we anchored at Great Sale Cay just at sunset. , a deserted island (in more ways than one, since I made a pie to take over to a buddy boat "Te Amor" for dinner). Phil on Falcons Nest also came. It is so comforting when you're that far from anywhere to have a feast with neighbors. The next day we stopped for a few hours at Mangrove Cay where Lee scrubbed the boat bottom, just long enough for hundreds of flies to move aboard-they must have been shipwrecked there a long time and swatting them became our entertainment for the next few days. That night we anchored at Old Bahama Bay, Grand Bahama, at the edge of the gulf stream, ready to up the anchor at 5:30 for the crossing to Fort Pierce, FL. It was a little lumpy, after all it is the infamous gulf stream we're dealing with, but a good sail. Only one wave made it into the cockpit as we neared the inlet. Lee finally managed to catch a large Mahimahi on the crossing.

It went into the fridge in a plastic bag to be dealt with the next day when we were safely anchored at Fort Pierce. Notice the harness he's attached to and the gaff, no falling off the back deck for him. That happened to him once, thankfully not while I was crew.

We anchored and met our crossing buddies, who have a car at the marina where they keep their boat, and drove to a restaurant for PIZZA! It was too late for customs, so they gave us another ride the next morning to customs at the airport. This car thing is addictive.

On to Vero Beach for two nights with a crusier's party and free bus rides and walks to the beach.

We had a guest on board the next day who refused to leave until we gently approached him with a boat hook. He would have been welcome except for the problem of not being housebroken. He worked hard to stay balanced on the lifeline and then nestled into an even better space. It's a pelican!

Then another day brought us to Doris's dock where we made Doris dinner with our Mahimahi.

We can always recognize her house from the street.

Then on to New Smyrna, where we found a great Mexican restaurant and then Daytona, still on the Intracoastal Waterway with no weather worries, to visit my aunt and uncle. The view from their sunroom is a little different from what we're used to.

So today I catch a train to NYC to visit kids and Lee takes off with his crew to head north. Another cruising season is almost over.

Lee's turn: Just spoke with my on air shortwave radio weatherman. We were advised the ocean is uncomfortable seas today, we should motor to St Augustine and leave from there Friday early for a 2-3 day passage north to somewhere between Savannah, GA or Beaufort, NC. Wayne is here and he brought his friend Larry Bivens from Owensboro KY along as crew. He should be very helpful with the night passages.

Homeward bound:Eleuthera

Position of Alesto 2: Anchored off Lynyard Cay, near Great Abaco. N 26:22, W 76:59. (Degrees and Minutes)We just bounced over to the Abacos from Eleuthera for the last seven hours, full strength Atlantic Ocean. Lee says the waves were 6-8 feet, I tried not to look out. Our weather man doesn't work Sundays and conditions seemed worse than reported in yesterday's report. He probably would have said "some people might enjoy these conditions" which is my cue not to go. I'm adding never start a voyage on a Sunday to my checklist. Lee got the fishing out of the way early, with a ten pound something in the tuna mackerel family-they never quite match the pictures in our fish book.

A week ago we had a calm trip across the Exuma Sound from Staniel Cay, Exuma to Rock Sound, Eleuthera. The only mishap was discovering I had left my backpack under the table at the Staniel Cay yacht club, only when it was 50 miles away. Thus began a saga involving some twenty boats on the VHF radio discussing who could pick up my bag and deliver it to some unknown destination in either Eleuthera or the Abacos. Bill on Long Winded had it for awhile, only he was headed to Nassau. Some more frantic communications got it transferred to Finnesterre, who finally pulled into our anchorage last night. For the rest of my cruising days, I'll probably be known for this little mishap.There's a cruise ship stop at the southern end of Eleuthera and we just happened to get to a restaurant last Sunday in time to see a couple of buses from the ship bringing in tourists for lunch on their island tour. We had fun being local color (scruffy cruisers) and watched the entertainment: preparation of conch salad and a little Junkanoo parade. On Monday we shared a car with new friends and toured southern Eleuthera. We revisited the Island School, where mostly American high school students can spend a semester doing academics as well as ocean related projects. It was interesting to see the tanks of farm raised cobia and tilapia, as well as lettuces raised on the tank runoff. They're trying for self sufficiency with cars running on fryer oil from the cruise ship stop and local restaurants, pigs eating table scraps, wind mills, solar, gardens mulched with seaweed, poopoo gardens from sewage. We had a great tour this year, the guide being a technical person. On our way back we spotted a giant pile of perfect red tomatoes in a back yard and stopped to see if we could buy some. The lady insisted on giving some to us and showed us her beautiful garden. It's surprising what seems to grow out of rock and sand. Linda showed us a beach a local lady had taken her to the day before and we got in an hour of shelling before returning the car.We headed up to Governor's Harbor and spent an afternoon finding the bakery (for Lee) and a shelling beach (for Sherry). We met a family from Rhinebeck, NY on the walk back and discovered a mutual acquaintance. This was not a good anchorage for west winds, so we had to move on the next morning up to Spanish Wells. This village fills up its own little island with streets numbered 1 through 31, 2000 -3000 inhabitants, all with the same nine last names, all blond and efficient, descendents of an English vessel that crashed here in 1648. Lobstering is the main industry, now that refrigerated boats can deliver 1,000,000 pounds a year that they catch. The local museum explained that prior to the late 50s, all freight to and from Bahamas was by sail. Fish and lobsters would not keep that long and at the time lobsters were $.10 and the locals used them for bait. Now, they have a new method of lobster farming, "Lobster Motels". They build a 4'X 4' piece of tin roof on 2 2X6 boards and place them in 20-60' of water, the lobsters like to stay under them. One large boat may tend 15,000 of these twice a year. Their location is recorded on their GPS and kept secret. They dive on them with a compressed air hose, just lift the box and sort eligible lobsters. The alternative, Finding and removing lobsters from coral holes is slow, difficult work. Recently they discovered a needed motel renovation: a second set of legs on top. It seems that dolphins wait for the divers to catch the fish that swim out as the diver collects lobsters. The dolphins then learned to tip the motel over on their own, thus the need for legs on both sides. Cruisers Jean and Tom bought a house here in 1996 and welcome visitors to a Happy Hour on their porch every evening, complete with a book exchange and lots of local knowledge. We found out why collections of people were grouped on the docks every day, always with someone standing in the water. Seems a pregnant Florida manatee, now named Rita, has taken up residency. The vet from Nassau did an ultrasound on her Thursday and thinks birth is immanent. Meanwhile she is being hand fed the recommended diet of lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, and not too much celery (it binds her up). We were glad to find out why fully clothed women were standing in the water up to their necks. Golf carts are the primary transportation and we felt safe biking. We made it all the way over the bridge and out to the end of Russell Island, the new suburbs of Spanish Wells. We could have spent a few more days admiring all the gardens, but our supposed weather window came along and we took the leap. Every detail of this cruising life is weather dependent, so different from land travels. We positioned at Royal Island for our ocean crossing to the Abacos and had dinner aboard Finnesterre. They delivered my missing backpack, which still contained my camera and money: always our experience in the Bahamas. The crossing was bouncy, as usual for this year, and Lee asked at one point if I wanted to turn back. But I just stayed below and tried to ignore it: better the devil you know. The biggest worry was the cut at Little Harbor. It's always a worry that the waves might be breaking all the way across, then where do we go? But as usual, nothing bad happened. To misquote Will Rogers "I must be a very effective worrier, because nothing I worry about ever happens. Note there are no pictures of Eleuthera because my camera was travelling separately. I thought it should have been sending me postcards of its adventures, but nothing!

Exuma Banks from Georgetown to Staniel

The locals are advertising St Patrick Day specials on the VHF radio, so it must be. We didn't exactly leave Georgetown as promised in the last report. We debated, talked to the weatherman, debated some more and then decided to wait for slightly better weather the next day. That didn't happen and Lee lamented about the bird in hand. So we had a few more beach sundowner parties and one last dance party with rake and scrape music. It's always intriguing to find out where the non-boaters at these gatherings come from. One large group flew in on two planes from their runway community in Texas. They were curious about the boating life and we marveled that they arrived from Texas that day at about 30 times our speed. It took them about two minutes to start dancing, with their teenaged daughter finally noticing and yelling "MOM!" in a scandalized voice. Another couple described taking an around-the-world cruise of 114 days and deciding to buy a house in Georgetown, the best place in the world. It must have been the fact that we were leaving the next day or else the beer, but we became incredible dancers on our last night there, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Rake and scrape, with a saw, wash tub, several guitars and drums, will get anyone dancing. I'm hoping we can find a CD to take home with us.

We headed north up the Exuma Chain of islands in Exuma Sound with 13 knots of wind on the nose and porpoised our way north for about six hours, heading into Adderly Cut to anchor near Lee Stocking Island. Once we got through the cut, it was peaceful banks water, seen above, a picture postcard setting with only our boat on the west side of Norman's Cay...except for the large barge and workboat (no picture included). We launched the dingy for our beach walk and noted other footprints on an otherwise uninhabited island. We tracked them for a mile or so and found four ocean kayaks, tents, beach kitchen, lounging people: more tourists off the beaten path. Seems you can get outfitted and kayak your way up the banks from Georgetown, who knew? In this uninhabited area, there are thousands of young Conch (Live) lying along the beach. It is said that in years past the whole Bahamas was covered with conch like this. The conch somehow migrate to deeper waters as they age, not sure how, we have never actually seen one move, we have seen trails left by them, but possibly only 50 feet per day may be their rate of travel, they are a huge snail like critter with one finger claw. Try a web search for "Queen Conch" for details.
In the interest of research, we decided to take the shallow banks route up the chain, rather than go back out into Exuma Sound. Another boat with our depth said they had done it several times. I marked the depth at each section from the guidebook and we left at high tide. It was still nervewracking with the depth sounder beeping and some concern that we might have to anchor and wait for the next high tide. Most of the tiny islands between Georgetown and Farmer's Cay are private and we've heard stories about over zealous caretakers who ward off cruisers. David Copperfield and country music stars are said to have enclaves on several of these islets. We didn't know where we could go ashore and had time/tide constraints, so we made no landfalls. But the pictures show what a paradise this area is.

So here we are at Little Farmer's with no damage to the bottom, ready to go out and eat corned beef and cabbage (not)! Later..an hour of walking took us to every corner of the island and we were ready for dinner at Ocean Cabin. Terry Bain, the proprietor, served us the most expensive dinner in memorable history, but it was worth it with his one-man comedy hour which followed, most of the jokes involving clergy. The rays were still eating the remains of our freshly caught dinner when we walked back down to the dock following dinner.

Lee's additions: Georgetown has a VHF marine radio net, 8AM every morning there is business, community and then general announcements. For my announcement, I advertised my lost Teva sandal, which fortunately floats, and it was found immediately, saved by another boat.

We have been motoring against the winds lately, which are at least moderate, but the sea motion is quite BAD, fuel use is worse than average at probably 1.2 gal/hour, as we need to use both engines to power against the wind and waves. Tomorrow (Sat) we intend to head for Rock Sound Eleuthera, light winds are predicted, but on the beam (side) which will provide a nicer ride, but will probably require a small amount of engine power added to the sails to do the 50 miles in daylight. Anytime the sails can be kept filled with wind, the ride is MUCH better, fuel use motorsailing is less, .5 Gal/Hour or less. Today (Fri)we are at Staniel Cay, we will be doing a circumnavigation of this small island by foot this morning. We bought a book about the history of the island written by a woman who came here with her husband in the early 70s. He disappeared from the narrative without another mention and we want to know the details. We will research that ashore today.

Above is the view over the shallow lagoon with the airport runway visible behind it, taken on our walk. We never solved the mystery of the missing husband. We stayed a few days longer than planned waiting for weather, but had dinner with friends on Salsa and had a calm ride to Eleuthera, so all was well.

Off to Long Island Bahamas

We got wind, pun intended, of a group of boats headed for Long Island and decided to go along, always happy to have a buddy boat or two. We had easy downwind sails both ways to and from Long Island, traveling with some 20 boats on our way south to Thompson Bay, LI. Twenty buddy boats is usually a good indicator of really mild weather. We arranged a car rental share with friends and toured the island going south to Clarence Town on Saturday and north to the Columbus monument on Sunday. Father Jerome's churches in Clarencetown continue to intrigue us. We climbed to the top of one tower, barely able to turn around at the top.

The blue hole on the way to Clarencetown was as impressive as the first time we saw it. This time we had the added entertainment of fearless young tourists cliff jumping. The water depth goes from knee deep to 600 feet deep in a matter of steps.

The dirt road up to the Columbus monument was a challenge to the little rental car, but the view was worth it. The monument is not that impressive, but the view of the reef from the top certainly was, so visible we wondered how Columbus had lost a ship on them as is rumored.

Tryphena cooked up a buffet for 40 and we feasted on ribs, conch, fish and sides at her restaurant Saturday night, all arranged over the trusty VHF radio. We joined a campfire on the beach Sunday night after a long ocean beach walk. Monday we moved with another parade of boats up to Calabash Bay at the northern end of LI, where the swell wrapped around and rocked us to sleep. The sail back to Georgetown just happened to coincide with the around-the-island race, so we had company approaching the harbor. One boat was dismasted in the race, a sight that puzzled us until we got near enough to see what had happened.

There are still 255 boats in the Georgetown harbors, with the cruiser's regatta ending Saturday. We pretended not to be here last night by anchoring in Red Shanks, an isolated harbor boaters flee to in strong winds. It was beautiful with only a few other boats, but the dingy ride to the grocery was about two miles long. We stocked up for the trip up the Exuma chain where groceries are hard to come by. What a pair we are: Lee always has to know where his next meal and I where my next harbor is coming from. Wonder we ever go anywhere. This morning we moved back over to our spot off volleyball beach for our last day of summer camp. There's socializing and games under the trees, Trivial Pursuit tonight. Below is the sand sculpture competetion, followed by the coconut carry competetion. We missed the only event we had signed up for, the scavenger hunt, while we were at Long Island.

Tomorrow, wind willing, we hope to head some 20 miles up to Lee Stocking island and slowly island hop up the Exuma chain, visiting the islands we missed on the way down.

We have a new microwave chocolate cake for two recipe you might like to try: In a 2 cup measuring cup mix:3 TBS flour, 3 TBS sugar, 2 TBS cocoa, 1 TBS chocolate chips, 1 egg, 3 TBS milk, 3 TBS oil, 2 TBS nuts, dash of vanilla.Mix well. Microwave 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 minutes. No need to butter the cup.

Lee's commentary: Not much to report from my end, the wind is still blowing 15-20 and the harbor is rough. I am about to make a trip 1 mile across to town by dingy for distilled water for our house batteries and 40 gallons of fresh water for our tanks. There is a spigot on the dingy dock, free from the supermarket here, so I only need to lift and carry from the dingy to the front of the boat, I have 8) 5 gallon jugs, the water here is excellent, other places it may be salty. Sherry likes that there is an experienced couple in another boat "Salsa" that will travel with us tomorrow. Some of the cruisers at Long Island were making plans that were impossible or uncomfortable due to the winds and seas, they will find out, and we will probably hear stories when we meet again.

Georgetown, Bahamas

We are in Georgetown at "adult summer camp" and guilty of not writing home very often. Most boaters love or hate Georgetown. We have mixed feelings. The weather down here is not something we can complain about to the frozen people up north, the wind chill is not part of our daily weather report. But...the fronts have been coming through with such frequency that we haven't found a great window to visit other islands. The morning after we arrived, many boats left for a race to Long Island, the next island south. It's good that we had heard or we would have wondered about the mass exodus. It was extremely windy and one team told us they weren't speaking by the end of the day, some argument about how much sail they had up.

We've had guests for the past few weeks and have to be sure we can get them back to the airport, so here we've stayed. First came Barb and Jack, Carolyn and Lizzie from Rochester.

Our daily routine is to listen on single sideband radio to the Chris Parker weather report at 6:30 and then to the local cruiser's net on VHF 68 at eight. The cruiser community now has around 260 boats and is quite organized. Volunteers manage the morning net on the marine VHF radio, with boaters calling in to get on the list with their agenda. We all sit on our boats with pen in hand to write down the activities we'd like to join; anything from volleyball, bocce, dominoes, Scrabble, dances, seminars, dinners, ARG (alcohol research group), book exchanges, doggie get-togethers, trivial pursuit, poker, baseball. Local business make their announcements followed by the boater exchange requests. Lee often has parts and knowledge to help with boat problems. Most boats anchor in the three harbors at Stocking Island and dingy across the mile to Georgetown village for shopping, library, laundry, internet and baked goods. Stocking Island has a beach bar, a restaurant, and the beach with shade and picnic tables for all the activities. A short walk leads across the skinny island to the ocean beach where we walk. We were the first to arrive after an announcement for a lobster sale and got a very large one. We had to ask on the radio for cooking instructions. He sat in a five gallon bucket on the galley floor all day and I felt very sorry for him.

Another morning's radio announcement was the offer of a sourdough bread starter. Lee dingied right over and brought back the container and three pages of directions, complete with colored pictures. We're been in bread heaven ever since, with variations of southwest cheese sourdough, breakfast cinnamon/raisin sourdough, etc. The only problem has been the lack of a large enough bowl for the overnight rise.

Take a look at look at the oceanswatch.org website if you have time. They have a boat here awaiting a weather window to carry supplies to Haiti and are encouraging cruisers to join the flotilla. The smaller boats can enter harbors on the south west shore away from the bottleneck where supplies don't get transferred to the people who need them. One cruiser is definitely going and we are all donating supplies and money to buy more. Lee later was able to keep in touch with them by single sideband and report that they arrived safely and distributed the goods to an orphanage, a fishing village, and a work for food program.

Lee's news: We did have one sailboat race, we came in second of 3 catamarans, I placed Sherry and Carolyn on shore first and took the other guests as crew. I was expecting times compared to all the single hull boats that I was able to pass, but was only given the placement between one super fast home built cat and one that seemed to have stretched out sails. I heard one single hull boat complaining they could not go up wind enough, that is supposed to be a catamaran problem. My sister Tracy is aboard for a week, there may be another race this week that she can crew for. This time I am letting the water tanks go down and leave the dingy behind to save weight. Tracy's week aboard was notable for the cool windy weather and the race was cancelled. She mostly had to be happy with hikes and land events.

Last night we had Rake and Scrape music at a local bar/restaurant, watching the dancing is quite interesting. There are about 5 Bahamian men that show up and dance, we were there last week with guests Barb, Jack, Carolyn & Lizzy. Carolyn, age 17 kept getting dance requests from age 30-50 Bahamians. I told them to go find a Bahamian under 20 and they said that anyone that young would have no rhythm. Otherwise, the Cruising American/Canadian men don't seem to dance much, and there is just this one wild young Bahamian woman that comes, so there is a group of wild eyed 60ish American women, dancing with Bahamian men, great people watching! We actually stayed out until 10 PM!

Cruising down the Exumas, Warderick Wells and Black Point

From Normans we headed down to Warderick Wells, center of a large area (8 by 22 miles) designated a land and sea park. Our boat is on the right. You can see the narrow dark blue channel through the anchorage, bordered by light blue water so shallow you can walk through it.


It is a no take area with patrol boats enforcing it. There are mooring balls to prevent anchors from damaging the coral. You reserve one by calling in on the VHF radio. You can earn a free day (value $15) for each day you volunteer. Lee worked three days and earned a $45 credit, only a good deal if you love the work. He certainly did, since they let him work on the patrol boats. I was surprised on day when he came home in one to get more parts. It looked very impressive behind our boat.





They got a good deal, since he had many parts on board to do the repairs and went beyond their basic requests. One that he worked on had been stolen by drug runners and taken as far as the Dominican Republic. Another had been sunk. Beside working we took many hikes over the marked limestone and sand trails, all the way down to the Hog Cay anchorage and pirates lair where the pirates anchored to fill their water tanks. The trail required careful attention to foot placement, but the views over Exuma Sound were worth it.






There was a cruiser gathering under the tiki hut one night, books to exchange, movies to rent, dingy drift snorkels (you hold onto a line behind the dingy while it drifts with the current over the coral. I ran up to the Memento Pile on Booboo Hill several times to read the boat names and see the view.Somehow six days went by and it was time to move on.

The day before we left another boat requested that any boat going to Staniel Cay please take their guests to the airport there. We had met the guests, Maddie and Aaron, a young couple hitchhiking their way south on boats, and were happy to take them. They had begun their journey on bikes in Maine and planned to tour South America. Hitchhiking on boats seemed to be a good way to get there. Except their rides kept deadending. So they planned to fly to Equador, but first had to get to the nearest airport. You can see the beginnings of their trip at Mustachetravelers.

Only the very young and carefree could tell the stories they had to tell and we were entertained the whole way. They had no reservations to fly out of Staniel and we weren't sure how many days we might have them aboard. Getting a ticket on Flamingo Air requires finding Samantha. The terminal consists of a gazebo next to the runway, but Samantha is only there when planes are arriving. We were told we could find her at the general store and set out walking. Aaron asked every female golf cart driver "are you Samantha" until one finally gave us a ride to the store. There were seats available and tickets were purchased. We had just enough time for lunch at the yacht club. It runs on island time and we wondered if we'd have to eat while running to the airport, but we finally got served. Aaron admitted he hates to fly and was getting a little flustered. He heard a plane engine and began to run, overloaded with backpack and dangling shoes. The waitress had laughed at our worries, saying the plane is never on time and she was right. Another boater was at the gazebo with his guests, their luggage finally arriving two days after them. He had met the kids in the states and was so relieved that they were doing well. Small world. Like the previous two islands we explored every corner of Staniel Cay on foot. We did get a golf cart ride, but gave more than we got, having to push it up every hill. The driver knew what he was doing when he picked us up.





We found a new trail that let us hike the entire perimeter of the island with beautiful view down over our anchorage next to Thunderball Cavern, where a James Bond movie was filmed.

Late in the day we sailed the 12 miles down to Black Point, our very favorite stop in the Exumas. There's a settlement of a few hundred very friendly industrious people. First stop is always Lorraine's cafe.

She has a new baby boy and a lively two year old granddaughter. Picture an outgoing toddler sitting on a barstool chugging vita malt. She's notorious for going table to table mooching food. I stopped over at Lorraine's mom's house for a loaf of coconut bread and got a quick lesson in weaving palm plaits. She told me to come back with a fathom done the next day. Lee cut me lots of supplies on our walk, now I just have to get to work. Everywhere we walked small groups of women sat under trees plaiting away. They send the rolls to Nassau to be made into bags. The world's most beautiful laudromat is the next stop and she just happens to make conch fritters, six for a dollar. We had to check out our favorite sea glass beaches where it washed up by the handfuls around our ankles two year ago. The tide must have been right, we got very little this year, but collected lots of coral fans and my paperweights of stippled coral. My pockets were so full I would have sunk if I fell out of the dingy. There were over 30 boats in the harbor and we finally got to socialize to our hearts content. This morning we dropped off school supplies at the tutoring center and were enveloped in a group hug from all the kids. We got to hear about the building of the newest sloop, almost ready to enter the next race.

To all appearances it's an ideal life here, but of course we only see it from the outside. We left reluctantly this afternoon to head down the banks and position the boat at Cave Cut for an early morning exit into the sound and on down to Georgetown. There may not be another weather window for quite some time and lots of boats are ready to make the move. The sound side of the Exuma chain is real Ocean, unlike the calm shallow banks and most boaters take it seriously. We know slack tide is at eight in the morning and the cut won't be raging. Almost everyone has had the experience of going through a cut at the wrong time and descriptions like disney ride and washing machine apply. Tomorrow in Georgetown!

Lee's comments: Not sure what I have to add, weather and water are finally quite warm. I actually was sunburned through my shirt! Working on the Exuma Park patrol boats was interesting, they have no mechanic, and simple things such as wire splices and fuel leaks needed fixing. I changed out the hydraulic steering system on one boat with one borrowed from a boat in long term repair. I think when I came, there was only 1 of about 5 boats still working, and it had a bad gasoline leak that was dissolving plastic parts in the bilge. They buy the best Yamaha 225 horsepower outboards, for probably $20,000 each. They last about 2 years, 2000 hours of use, consuming 14,000 gallons of gas, that is worth around $60,000. Fuel is a bigger expense than all their payroll, with the bigger boat with two 225 HP motors costing nearly $100/hour to run. The park also needs to make their own electricity with a Diesel generator, much of the power then goes to making fresh water from seawater by R/O process. We really do enjoy Black Point, the people there are so welcoming. We had a tour of a Bahamian racing sloop under construction, complete with the ancient art of finding crooked and "Y" tree branches that fit the new boat. We met another couple that we knew from 2 years ago and traveled to Cave Cay, our jumping off spot, with them. We went snorkeling, talking of finding LOBSTER. Such a dream. I did see a Lion Fish that I was cautioned to keep a safe distance from. I had my spear and then came across a 40 pound unidentified monster, but since I could not identify it as edible, I let it be. It had no fear, I tapped it once with my spear and it paid no attention. Checking 3 fish ID books, still no match. It had a wide face like a catfish, but no barbells, was speckled and and big bulging eyes. I think it may have been a Puffer Fish, with possibly poisonous meat. Cave Cay is just that, the Island is ringed with undercut limestone, some real caves. I noticed nice fish in the caves with no air at the top. It was low tide and there was a surge that wanted to rake you across the coral if you were not careful. Water temp about 76F. Our GPS coordinates: N 23:54, W 076:16.