April 5-10, 2009 - Waiting for a weather window

After an interesting 225 mile trip from Sarasota on the west coast of Florida across Lake Okeechobee to Stuart on the east coast, we picked up a mooring at the Sunset Bay Anchorage in Stuart and settled in to await a "weather window".

The next leg of our trip will take us from the east coast of Florida across the Gulf Stream to Grand Bahama Island-- Pathfinder's first trip to another country! While the actual distance from Lake Worth Inlet to West End is only 54 miles, in the wrong weather the seas can kick up to waves over 12 feet! The rules are fairly simple-- one wants 2 days of 10-15 mph winds (or less) from the south before the crossing. The worst case is strong winds from the north because they "bump" against the Gulf Stream moving from the south and the waves get big.

We studied several different websites for wind forecasts-- SailFlow, Weather Underground, and NOAA. We also subscribed to a private weather service from Chris Parker-- everyone morning he gives forecasts over Single Sideband Radio from the Virgin Islands. His sponsoring vessels can call him on the radio and ask for wind and wave conditions on their day's passage. It is fun just to listen to the boaters-- today I heard requests for information for passages from as far north as the Chesapeake and as far south as Grand Cayman.


We had arrived in Stuart on Saturday April 4 too late for the weather window on Sunday April 5. All the websites agreed that the next weather window would be Saturday April 11. No problem-- we purposefully planned this trip without schedules so we would never feel pressure to move when the weather was poor.



So we settled in for a great week around Stuart and Palm Beach. We had four days in Stuart-- two of them in calm seas and two with high winds and bouncy waves. During the calm days we spent most of the time onboard reading and relaxing. During the windy days we took long walks and saw two good movies (Duplicity and I Love You Man). We found some great restaurants within a short walk-- The Ashley (in the 1920s the building was the local bank robbed by the Ashley gang) serves a delicious 3 course early bird dinner for $15.95, the Osceola Cafe has great sandwiches and salads, and Dos Amigos is known as the best Mexican restaurant on the coast. Then back to the boat for the beautiful sunsets! The marina loaned us bikes to ride to Palm Sunday Mass and to ride to the grocery store for a few supplies.

On Thursday we cruised 30 miles south on the Intracoastal Waterway to position ourselves at the Lake Worth Inlet for the crossing to the Bahamas. We topped up the fuel (we used 184 gallons in the 255 mile trip from Sarasota), pumped out, and gave the boat a good scrubbing.

If the weather holds we'll leave early Saturday morning for the Bahamas and should clear customs and be tied safely at the Old Bahama marina at the west end of Grand Bahama island by mid-afternoon. We'll keep you posted!