Wavey's Words

Back in America

Date: June 17, 2019

Whew! Back in the USA already? I can't believe it!

We are right back where we started, Beaufort, North Carolina. It's strange going to the same showers, in the same bathrooms, in the same marina, eating at the same restaurants as we were almost six months ago. It feels almost like we never left. Like the Bahamas was a dream, or a fantasy. I'm excited to travel down to the Bahamas next year, but for now? We are back from the magical Bahamian waters, islands, and mellow life. Back to the crowded marinas, easy shopping, fast food, noisy streets, and murky water.

Back in America.

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Six Months Aboard S/V Wakataitea--Reflection Piece

Date: June 15th, 2019

Wow, its really been six months. Time really flies when you're on island time! In this blog I will explain pros and cons of living aboard, things I love, things I dislike, Bomeschool (boat homeschool), and all my favourite places we've travelled to with Wakataitea.

Pros and Cons About Living Aboard Wakataitea

Pros:

-Having my own room (there will be a pros and cons blog about having my own room in the near future)

-Great for down-wind sailing

-Big galley

-More than one device charging station!

-Easy-to-get-up stairs, for swimming off the back

Cons:

-Rough for up-wind sailing

-Not much protection from the wind on deck

-Not very maneuverable

Things I Love

There are so, so many things I love about life on Wakataitea. Meeting cruising friends is so much fun. Also, when we have the sun-awning up, it is lovely to sit out in the shade and breeze. So many people ask me what my favourite thing about cruising is. Below are the things I really love.

-Seeing wildlife, on shore, in the water, in the air.

-Watching the sunsets

-Seeing all the stars and the moon clearly while off shore

-Going to the beach, collecting shells, walking, swimming

-Exploring uninhabited islands

Things I Dislike

Here are the kind of things I dislike. I don't have a ton of stuff on this list, but, I think it's worth mentioning. Again, many people ask me my least favourite things, here are the first that come to mind.

-Being hot and sweaty in the sun

-Sun-burns

-Rough weather, strong winds

-Annoyingly close quarters

-Shark/crab infested water (that makes it creepy to swim in)

Bomeschool

You most likely know what Bomeschool is from older blogs... but moving on Wakataitea has forced us to change somethings about how we do it. First off, more work space options (ex. desks in our rooms, on beds, etc.), also, more storage for supplies. Work time hasn't really changed, we do two to five hours a day, and our school year goes from September to September. No Summer Break, but we get breaks during passages, usually. That really sums it up!

My Favourite Places I've Been on Wakataitea

Here is a list of my favourite places I've been on Wakataitea, and the reasons.

(they are not in any special order)

-GeorgeTown, Great Exuma Cay, Exumas, Bahamas.

When we went there, there were so many kid boats. We quickly made friends. Also, good shopping, water, gas, and taxi service. Very boater friendly.

-Shroud Cay, Exuma Parks, Exumas, Bahamas.

This is a beautifully natural island, part of the Exuma Parks. When we went here, it truly felt like coming home. Lovely swimming, snorkeling, hiking, and beaches.

-Vero Beach, Florida, United States. (Often called 'Velcro Beach' because boaters tend to stick there for awhile!)

Vero is a perfectly splendid place, from its cruiser friendly free bus system, to the GAMs (gathering and meeting) every Sunday night at Mr. Manatee's restaurant, to the amazing cruising community. Cheap mooring and docking, showers and a captins lounge, every boaters dream. We stayed here longer than we expected!

These places are the first I can think of, but there are many, many more.

So, there you are, my reflection piece for these past six months. Overall, I am loving the Waka-life!

More posts soon, but for now, Wavey, Over and Out!

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Iguana Island and Thunderball Grotto

Date: May 13^th 2019

Early in the morning we woke up to a calm, quiet anchorage in Black Point, Great Guana Cay. After a quick breakfast we sailed right off the anchor. We had a calm sail to our destination, Bitter Guana Cay. Earlier in the year, our friends on Vlaroda had gone there and said it was great. Apparently there were hundreds of iguanas there!

We arrived to the rolly anchorage and dropped our hook. By this time it was lunch and we ate a quick meal. We also had bananas at the end of lunch, and saved the peels to feed to the iguanas. Then, we all scrambled into the dinghy and motored over to the beach.

At first, the beach was empty and we walked around holding out the peels. Then, about twenty iguanas came flooding out of the bushes. Not all of them liked the peels. Some just licked them and then walked away. Most just sat and gobbled them up. Simon and I found the king of iguanas lounging in the shade. It never moved from that one spot, but ate lots of peels.

Me feeding iguana

Feeding them with a stick

Birds stealing the peels!

Iguana v.s. Dad... staring competition.

We were beginning to run out of peels and Mum and Dad were urging us to come and get in the dinghy, when a group of people on a family vacation came over and asked what we were feeding them. We told them, “banana peels.” After we talked to them for a bit, we gave their little kids the rest of the peels. It was fun watch them running around chasing the iguanas and feeding them.

After we had given the rest of the peels away we hopped back into the dinghy and drove back to the boat. We had thought about staying the night here, but it was way too rolly. Once we had pulled up the sail, we sailed off anchor once again. We had quite a rough passage to a nearby cay called Staniel Cay. Here we anchored yet again.

We had read that there was great snorkelling around Staniel Cay. So we geared up, and dinghied to a small island full of surprises. There is a little entrance on one shore of the island. This is the entrance to Thunderball Grotto.

Sign at the entrance

Me swimming around the rocks

We snorkelled in the tunnel until it opened up in to a cave swarming with fish. If you swim under the rock 'walls' there are air pockets that you can breathe in as you swim under. After following the air pockets, it opens up in to an enormous cave. The roof of the cave is as high as a cathedral and has small holes that let light in (Sadly, we didn't get any pictures of this majestic cave). This cave was pretty cool, but what was really awesome were the dark tunnels that branched off and wormed throughout the whole island.

Fish!

Absolutely swarming! 

We swam, fed fish, and explored. Eventually the tide started rushing in and it was hard to swim against it back to the entrance. As the current got even stronger it got harder to make it back to the dinghy. Most of the time, I just clung to the rocks and slowly pulled myself along. Once back in the dinghy, we went back to the boat. The water was beautifully clean, despite the vast number of boats in the anchorage. We swam off the boat and played on the bottom of the dinghy underwater. The funnest thing was to swim down to the anchor chain and walk along the bottom on sandy stretches. This was a wonderful end to an exciting day.

I enjoyed this snorkelling trip and feeding iguanas. I guess you could say we hit all the tourist places in one day! Dad says that Thunderball Grotto is the best snorkeling he's ever seen. I hope we go here again next season.

More posts soon, but for now, Wavey, over and out!

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Arrival In Bahamas

Date: March 7^th, 2019

On Thursday, February 29^th, 2019, we were all geared up and ready for the passage to the Bahamas from Lake Worth, Florida! Cans and jars of food filled every nook and cranny. We had granola bars, audio books, and barf bins in reach. We decided not to leave early in the morning as previously planned the day before, but to wait until that night for better weather. So, Thursday night around 11:30PM we left. There are old sailing superstitions that leaving for a voyage on a Friday is bad luck, so we decided to leave before Friday for better luck.

When Wakataitea left Florida, Simon and I were fast asleep because it was very late. We crossed the Gulf Stream early morning Friday, March 1st. This passage can be a bit tricky, because you have to time the passage when the winds are not against the current. Watching the weather and wind speeds are very important. If the northerly winds are strong, your boat can get flipped over from the wind against the north flowing current. Or, you could get knocked really far off course if the winds are coming from the south. Wakataitea was pushed off course a bit, but we had no major trouble. With minimal winds came minimal waves and we slept peacefully until morning. For half the passage we motored because of the light winds, but eventually they picked up and we sailed. This passage was uneventful, with the seas calm enough for me to read the entire time.

Later that day, we reached Bahamian waters. As we entered the Little Bahama Bank, bright turquoise water surrounded us. As it got more shallow we started catching fish! Tuna dinner for us!

It was nearing sunset and we didn't want to be anchoring at night. The thing was, we hadn't yet reached our destination. We were no where near an island, but we were on the Little Bahama Bank, which is shallow everywhere. After selecting a spot in the middle of no where we dropped our hook. Then we had our first swim.

When we swim after dropping the anchor, we check that the anchor is well dug in. We do this so that if there are strong winds in the night we don't drag off our anchor and drift away. Simon and I decided to go check it together. We put on our gear, jumped into the electric blue water and snorkelled over. While we looked at the anchor, Mum and Dad were moving the boat in reverse to set the anchor.

Just as we found the anchor snug in sand, a shiver of sharks came in to view! We later identified these as lemon sharks, because of the yellow lines on their sides. There were about six of them. Not having been near underwater wildlife for awhile, I forgot all things calm; swimming away was the last thing on my mind. I freaked out. I thrashed and kicked at them with my flippers trying to scare them away. Simon, after doing the same, swam away under the boat. While Mum and Dad were yelling at Simon to get out from under the boat (because he was going to get cut up by the propeller,) I was still trying to scare away the sharks. It took quite awhile for my brain to comprehend that I should get out of the water. The sharks must have understood, finally, that I had bigger flippers that them, and they departed. After all the chaos, we got back on board and began to get warm and dry.

The next morning, we left the middle of the Little Bahama Bank, headed for Great Sale Cay. 'Cay' is pronounced like 'key,' but spelled cay. A cay and an island are sort of the same thing, except a cay has no fresh water sources other than rain. Cays are coral islands.

Now we are on a small cay called Manjack Cay. Manjack is a beautiful little paradise in itself, with turtles, other wildlife, and a lovely beach. After being away from the Caribbean this feels like home!

I'll write new blogs soon, but for now, this is Wavey over and out!

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The Wild Flood Plains

Date: January 23rd, 2019

   “We're going on an airboat tour!!!” Simon yelled excitedly, running around the deck like a chicken with its head cut off. I was down below packing for an exciting day (as Mum had said.) Hearing the racket, I dashed on deck to see what was up. The scene was: Dad, grinning at Simon who was still dancing around.

   “What !?!?” I asked Dad. I know Simon gets excited with anything to do with boats, so I wasn't sure if this was a big deal or not. I also know that Simon is making an airboat model so I also wasn't sure if this had to do with that. (See Simon Says for more on airboats.)

   Dad smiled at my question and said: “We're going on an airboat tour, just like Simon said.” Then, Simon started talking about all the technical details of airboats.

   “Also, you'll need a windbreaker” Dad said. He was in a rather happy mood.

   From Simon's explanations prior to this, I knew that airboats use a strong fan at the stern. This fan is above water and doesn't have to be anything but strong (and somewhat splash-resistant, on model boats anyway). I had never so much as touched an air-boat so I was excited about this tour.

   For the few hours we had until the air boat tour we made a stop at an orange grove called, Butrico Orange Grove. There, we tasted delicious fresh Florida oranges. We bought a ½ bushel mixed of grapefruit, tangerines, honey-bell and navel oranges (they will probably keep until we finish them). After we had bought our fill of the sweet citruses, we left in search of a place to eat lunch for the time we had until our tour.

   The Jolly Gator was the restaurant we chose. It was conveniently located right beside the water and where the tour would start. As we entered the restaurant, we saw Bruce, the airboat driver relaxing at the bar.

   Just as we found our table, the heavens opened and rain poured down. We hoped that by the time of our tour the skies would clear. A few minutes into our meal, Bruce walked over and told us that everyone else had cancelled their tours and that if it cleared up, we could go any time. After we were finished our main course Simon, Dad, and I shared a ½ pound of fried alligator. They were called “Gator Bites”.

   Once we were prepared for our tour we got on the airboat itself. The airboat (also known as a fan-boat) is a rather small boat, nearly flat bottomed with three rows of seats. Bruce told us that the boat's motor/fan was about 500 horse power. I'll leave the rest of of the explanations of the airboat to Simon.

   After all the safety precautions had been discussed, we set off zooming along at incredible speeds. Through the floodplains bursting with wildlife we went. I learned that a floodplain is a mass of land adjacent to rivers or streams. It experiences frequent flooding.

   The first mesmerizing sight was beautiful, bald eagles. All birds, white pelicans, egrets, and herons were plentiful, and gracefully calling among themselves in a language unknown to us. To me these interactions are the pure beauty of nature.

   Then, we came to the alligators! These beasts are not how they are sometimes described in movies. Though frightened at first to come so close to one, I soon gathered that they are afraid of humans. We came quite close to one and it slipped in to the water hurriedly, obviously scared by us. Alligators also can grow up to nearly 12 feet long (3.5 metres.) After they are the length they will be for the rest of their lives, they get wider until they are enormous, scary looking things!

   We were Bruce's only customers after the rain, so he gave us extra time to talk and answer all our questions. Having lived in these parts all his life, he was very knowledgeable about the wild life. He also knew how to give a wicked boat ride!!!

   This fun experience was exciting, as well as educational. If you ever have the chance I would highly suggest doing an airboat tour. I found there is so, so much more to Florida than Disney World!

   More posts soon, but for now, Wavey out.

Photos

Beautiful Bald Eagle

Big Alligator!

Simon eating Gator Bites

Simon, Bruce, and I on the airboat

Ready for a fun ride!

Picking lessons!

Examining the oranges

Me... and oranges!

_______________________

October 18, 2017

(Sailing Camp was held in August 2017)

SAILING CAMP

“Wake up!” Mom said loudly. Simon and I woke up in a jump! We were used to sleeping in till 8:00, but why was she waking us now? Then it hit me. This was our first day of sailing camp!

When I say camp I don't literally mean camp, it's more of a school. You may not know but back at home in Canada we went to a sailing camp (or school) as well, so we knew the basics about sailing optimists (also known as optis). Optis are little sailing boats or dinghies . They have four sided sails . A single opti can hold up to four small children (age around 5-8) . They have flat bows (means front in nautical language) and slightly curved bottoms. There's your description of an opti.

I have to say our first day was pretty boring because we didn't go sailing, but the fun thing was we got to play around the whole day. The second day, Simon and I sailed everyone around the course . We seemed to be taking it easy. That's when the third day came. Almost no one paid attention to the second day so there were kids screaming, kids going in circles, and small kids crying for their parents. Simon and I had to go with mostly everyone again to teach. That was a very long day .

End of a chaotic day

No matter if its wet or dry!

At sailing school we had three coaches, two with that as their job and one volunteer . The two coaches were: Randy, a professional sailor, and Noah, a student. As for the volunteer, his name is Jock . He is a very knowledgeable man and knows a ton about sailing. He is also very kind. Jock also lives on a boat named Unleaded (meaning the boat does not have a lead keel). The 22 kids in the camp were mostly cruising kids. I wonder why there were only two Grenadian kids. 

Jock teaching a lesson

Something that's very funny is that in the room where we play and eat, there are two signs that say, “No children in this room,“ and an other says, “No eating in this room.” We break all of the rules !

Lunch time!

Boy's table

Some kids say its mean, some kids say its rude, but every morning we have to lift all the boats into the water. I just think, “if you wanna sail, you have got to help prepare.” 

Rigging the boats

Lifting the boats into the water

Riggin'

We were still doing Bomeschool at that time and guess what, we didn't do it at all after sailing camp. Another awesome thing about no school is that instead of working on school, we got to hang out at our and other kids' boats !

Playing with friends

This instead of school!

Deep in conversation 

Hanging around on Trismic

Sometime on our third week, Mom said, “The solar eclipse is tomorrow.” We had learned a little bit about it the day before . We found out that its when the moon covers the sun, so that night we watched video about how to make machines to see the sun out of simple cereal boxes . Finally, the day of the eclipse came! We went to sailing camp as usual. The only difference was we stayed later than usual and watched the eclipse. We didn't get a total because it only passed over Canada and the U.S but it was pretty cool to see the sun as a crescent !

Max projecting eclipse on deck

view from inside box

Web site for solar eclipse

Looking at eclipse with cereal boxes

I think that the last day was the funnest of all. We had three races. First, a single handed race, then a team race, then a relay race. After the awards ceremony, we got free: pizza, drinks, ice cream, and finally we had cake for Joshim's birthday .

Me sailing in race

Simon's team in relay race

My team in relay race

Award ceremony

In race

Simon coming in to dock

Joshim

Goodbye PARTY!

 I learned a lot at that sailing camp. I also made a LOT of new friends!

OVER and OUT !

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September 28, 2017 

One Year Living on Nahanni V

I love living on Nahanni V, and now I can say I have lived on board for an entire year!  I am now writing a composition to tell everyone why I like and dislike cruising.

One important thing in my life is Bomeschool. I know you're thinking, "What is Bomeschool?" Well, Bomeschool means homeschool. Except, we call the boat Bome. Therefore, we call it Bomeschool. I am in Grade 3 and Simon is in Grade 6. We do Bomeschool for usually 2-4 hours a day. We do things like a worksheet called, "Where Are You From?" It is basically a worksheet that we do when we meet new friends from different countries to learn about their country.  We did not take a summer break because we took many breaks during the school year. Bomeschool is very, very, very, very very fun!

Another important thing about cruising is provisioning and storing food.  We have many, many little nooks where we put: cans, jars, and bottles of food and drink.  We also do our best to find the cheapest stores and shops. The French islands are the cheapest to shop on. On some islands, we have to go to lots and lots of little shops or stands to get what we need. I like shopping with Mom on islands like that. I like having to got to lots of shops and compare prices and stuff. One harder thing is getting everything back to the boat without breaking it (eggs are the hardest.) Provisioning is fun!

One unpleasant thing about cruising is getting seasick. We don't always get sick. Mom and I usually take medication and don't get sick. Once I took meds and didn't need them. I went all loopy and Simon said I said some pretty weird things.  It's not a good feeling to be sick at sea. Once I was leaning over the side ready to toss my cookies when I saw a dolphin! I forgot all about being sick and never got sick again that passage! We use other ways to not get sick as well. Sometimes, we listen to audiobooks, so we only think about that. I really, really dislike getting seasick!

Another unpleasant thing about cruising is sleeping quarters. Simon and I share the V-berth, with our feet touching. (Simon has a bigger side than I do.) Mom and Dad share the huge aft cabin. When we have guests over, they get the huge salon. Every bed other than mine is huge! It's not fair! Well, I guess I am the smallest. Simon kicks me too! That just makes everything worse. Some people (example: Queen of England) would think Mom and Dad's bed is tiny!

One fun thing about living aboard is meeting other kid boats. Sometimes we play on the beach all afternoon together. Mom and Dad decide if we should be dropped off or not.  We also like to climb coconut trees. Sometimes we drink the water from the coconuts. We also swim, play games with beach balls, and other toys. A couple times we had sleepovers! We also go on hikes with our friends. We have playdates and saildates. We have lots and lots and lots of fun!


One bad thing about cruising is all the leaking hatches and holes. Before we left on this trip, we had a leak on the bottom of our boat. It turns out a previous owner crashed into something and made a leak. It took on water slowly. Luckily, we noticed and fixed it. We also have a couple of leaky hatches. On our passage to Bermuda we had so much water leak in. On that passage, we also had our computer screen broken because so much water got on it! Our bed also gets very wet, but we do not know where it came from. Our main salon hatch leaked and filled one of our lights with water.  Sometimes the windlass leaks and our cabin gets wet, but we fixed that with the...drum roll please..."bootie"!  The "bootie" is a cover for the windlass. Dad says, "the first month or two that you have it doesn't leak at all. Then after that, it leaks like crazy!

One thing I kind-of-like about cruising is when we get internet.  Whenever we do, Mom and Dad go all anti-social and if we ask questions they just grunt and mumble.  You would think we went on the boat to get away from it, but no, Mom and Dad are too much of iPad and computer freaks.  I do admit, I play on the iPad a bit myself, but not as much as Dad. He is on the computer and iPad the most. I have to say that Mom and Dad also look at weather.  Sometimes we try to get internet on the boat. There are goods and bads about internet.

I think living aboard is fun. I also think it is worth all the bad things for the good things.  I still say my favourite place is Tadoussac, Quebec. I hope to write another blog post soon.

Over and out! 

_____________________

May 11, 2017

My 9th Birthday

I woke up at the sound of paper rubbing. I saw Simon pulling out a piece of paper out of my paper holder. (I found out after that he was making me a paper wallet). When I saw him I asked him, "What are you doing?" He ran out of our room. When I got up to see what he was doing he said: "Uuuuuuu, ya , ummm, go back to bed!" So I went back to bed. About 5 minutes later I asked Simon if I could come out to wake up Mama and Daddy. He said, "Umm  in a second." So I waited a couple of seconds then I turned my back to him and walked past. 

I went in to Mama and Daddy's room, and they started singing "Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you...." Then Simon finished with the mean part, "you look like a monkey and you smell like some pooooooooo!"(that shocked me because I had  forgotten it was my B-day.) Mama scolded him for that. Then Mama asked me what I wanted for breakfast. I said eggs benedict and with that she went into the kitchen. We ate a yummy breakfast and got in the dinghy and left!

Finally, we arrived at the dinghy dock and got off the dinghy and onto a bus. After a short ride, the bus driver said, "The people who want to go to Loterie Farm walk up this road for a while then you will see a sign." Simon and I started to run until we reached a huge sign that read Loterie Farms. 

The gates were open and there was a view of a huge mountain across from where we were. We ran down a slope to the buildings and checked out the epic zip lines. We decided we would do the Fly Zone zip lines which was an hour of zip lining, tightrope walking, and a high ropes course. 

We walked over to get our gear on and met some Newfoundlanders who were going zipping as well. Our guide Raymond came over to us and helped us put on our gear. We followed him down the path that led to a big ladder. I thought it was weird that you had to put two safety lines on the rungs to climb the ladder, but now I realize he was teaching us to use the safety lines for when we got high above the ground.

My Mom was freaked out at first because she was so high off the ground and she had to go first. Simon got a little freaked too because he is afraid of heights. I was happy to be above the ground and in the trees. The first zip line that we went on was the highest in the course, and everyone except me and Raymond was freaking. When Mom got ready to zip across, Raymond was holding onto her. She let go of the line and said, "I'm not moving...something is wrong!" Then Raymond said, "You're not moving now, but you will be." And he pushed her off. Mama screamed the whole way across the line, but it turns out she was laughing at the end. Now it was my turn to go. I got ready, sat down, and pushed off before Raymond could hold onto my harness. I felt like I was Tarzan swinging from vine to vine. Finally, I saw the cushion ahead of me. I did not know what to do, so I put my feet up and Bam! I smacked into the cushion. (I found out later, I was supposed to put my hand behind on the line to slow myself down.) I was very excited to be able to do this. 

We zipped, tight roped, and high roped around for an hour. Finally, I found out the next one was the final zip line. On this one, I screamed at the top of my lungs, "Koo loo koo koo koo koo koo koo! Koo loo koo koo koo koo koo koo!" On my last koo loo koo koo, I hit the cushion. Bam! (Mama says other Canadians would have known this Bob and Doug call of the wild.) After we were done, Simon and I kept looking for things to clip on to, as were so used to clipping on with our safety line! We took our gear off and said thanks to Raymond and headed over to the Hidden Garden Cafe for lunch.

I had a lovely lunch and the waitress gave me a frozen passion fruit smoothie with pineapple, cherries and strawberries on it. It was a wonderful end to a wonderful day. We hung around in the bar for awhile and checking internet and calling family. As the sun was setting, we decided to go home. My day was awesome!

Over and out !

______________________________

How I feel about this trip 

A lot of people ask me, "Are you excited for your trip?" I just say "yeah" for a quick answer. But what I feel is a bit of fear because of the journey ahead of us, and excitement because of all the new things we are going to see. I also feel kind of sad because I am leaving all my friends back at home. I am feeling a lot of emotions all at the same moment.

What do you think about our adventure?