Starry Night - the perfect name

Greetings from Long Island, Bahamas!

Steve and I spent Christmas Eve and Christmas Day on a two-day sail from the Dominican Republic to the Bahamas.  Although this was an unconventional way to spend the holiday, we decided it made sense since most places were closed during the holidays anyway and we would be on the boat in any case. 

We left for Mayaguana - one of the "out" islands of the Bahamas. We had very light winds and calm seas, and pretty much had the whole ocean to ourselves for two days.  

We had a waning gibbous moon for our two nights of sailing that was not visible for most of the night, which made for a gorgeous canopy of stars. When we named "Starry Night", we imagined being anchored and lying up top and star-gazing.  What we've found, though, is that we spend a lot of time looking at the stars during our night sails.  (Eventually I'd like to learn about celestial navigation, but we'll stick to GPS for now). Now that I'm looking at the night sky a lot, I see shooting stars fairly often but on this last sail there was particularly spectacular meteor that was very bright and glowed green. It turns out that when a meteor enters the earth's atmosphere it is heated to the point of vaporization and the color indicates the meteor's composition...green indicating the presence of nickel. Cool stuff!

Anyway, what I can say is that observing the heavens and singing Christmas hymns and carols during my turn at the helm on Christmas Eve is a peaceful and reverent way to celebrate.  

For Christmas dinner, Steve and I opted for a traditional meal of roasted pork and beans and rice, which is common to both Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. 

On the day after Christmas, we arrived in Mayaguana which had been listed as a port of entry on all of the official Bahamian websites (e.g. customs/immigration and health). Unfortunately, when Steve went to the dock to clear in, there was a sign that said it wasn't an official port of entry. A man that happened to be there said that the customs officials are sometimes there on Monday or Friday.  Since we also learned that Monday was an official holiday in the Bahamas (Boxing Day), we decided to leave the next morning for another 24 hour sail and make our way to Long Island.

Once again, we had smooth sailing conditions and are feeling good enough about our sailing skills to put a trolling line behind the boat when the conditions are right.  So when the line went "zing!", I furled the head sail to slow down the boat, while Steve reeled in (a lot!) of line.  The hard work paid off though in the form of fresh caught tuna steaks for dinner :-)

We've spent two days anchored off of Clarence Town, Long Island. The total population here is about 3000 (which is large compared to the 200 at Mayaguana). 

We did a bit of snorkeling, enjoyed conch fritters at the Flying Fish Marina restaurant and got to see some reef and lemon sharks feast on the scraps thrown in the water by some fisherman at the cleaning station on the dock.  I have to admit that seeing that many sharks all in one place was a bit intimidating, especially when they started fighting over the scraps! We definitely did our snorkeling well away from the docks!

Tomorrow, we're heading to Conception Island, a national park which reportedly has some of the best snorkeling in the Bahamas.  I'll let you know what we find there in a few days, at the next stop after Conception Island since we are not expecting cell service to be available. 

Until then, all the best to you and your families and Happy New Year!!