We pulled up anchor at early light, about 7 a.m. on Friday and headed across the shallow Little Bahama Bank towards the Gulf Stream and ultimately, Florida. We sailed (yes sailed) for the first 60 miles across the clear relatively shallow (15 to 25 ft) waters before we reached the Atlantic Ocean abyss (1000's of ft) and turned NW towards the Gulf Stream.
The flow of the Gulf Stream is shown in the chart below, the red "line" that starts near the FL coast and goes almost due north until it reaches the SC border. The color code of speeds is shown on the scale on the right, with the red being 3.5 kts or more.
Riding the Gulf Stream was pretty interesting. From the chart below, we knew the approximate location of the maximum speeds of the current. We left the Little Bahama Bank at a latitude of about 27N and a longitude of about 79W, angling NW toward stream. We were motor sailing with just the main sail at about 6.5 kts in diminishing winds and light at about 7:00 PM. There was a 5-6 ft swell from the NE with a 5 to 6 second period left over from stronger northerly winds, that had given us the nice 60 mile sail on the banks, which now made the boat motion a bit "tedious". Over the next 30 or 40 miles, we watched the moon rise at about 10:15 PM and our speed over ground (from the GPS) slowly creep up through 8.9 knots at about 2:00 AM. We turned north, edging slightly east to see if we could find more speed. We did indeed, and by hunting slightly east and then slightly west of north, stayed "in the stream" for the next ten hours, with speeds between 9 and 10 kts, a "free" extra speed of 3 to 3.5 kts. We did about 95 miles in about 10 hours, effectively a 40 mile bonus from the Gulf Stream. We turned NW at about 30 deg N and headed NW toward St Mary's inlet, at the FL-GA border, about 85 miles to go. Fortunately, the wind picked up a bit, and we were able to sail most of that distance on a beam reach in 12 to 15 kt winds, doing about 5.5. to 6.5 kts. With Luke trying to sleep below, Bobbie "tweaked" things bit and got us up to 7 kts. The seas settled down, and we had a nice, quiet, efficient sail through the remainder of the moonlit night.
Finally, 320 nm and 46 tired hours later, we navigated Latitudes up the 5 mile St. Mary's channel (into a 3 kt ebb current) from the Atlantic into Fernandina Beach, FL. At anchor, a little breakfast, and to bed by 6 a.m., slept until almost noon.
Fernandina Beach is a cute little tourist town, perched on the edge of a major paper mill. The view of the mill and the smell sort of overtake everything else. You should see this place lit up at night! No dark sky here!
Fishing is another large industry in the area, shrimping in particular.
The water was a surprise, too. Remember the clear, aqua water of the Bahamas? The water where you can watch the bottom, and see our anchor chain, at 30 feet?
Not here --- crayon brown water, clean but impossible to see through.
Our plan is to take Latitudes to Oriental, NC and leave her there for the summer. She will have some maintenance done and be "on the hard" instead of sitting in the water, growing scum on her bottom. The hope was to dash up there as soon as we arrived in the US. However, Mother Nature has other plans. The weather through Friday blows either straight onto our bow (not pleasant sailing) or very hard straight onto our bow (even less pleasant sailing). So, we have opted to stay here through Friday unless there is a major weather change. In addition to Fernandina Beach, the Georgia side of the St. Mary's channel has the cute little town of St. Mary's. We may move the boat over there for a few of the days that we are recouping here. We are not complaining!!!
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