Getting ready…. B.O.A.T (break out another thousand)

The last wave of the pandemic has been the worst of all of the waves this far. The omicron variant was far easier to catch and spread more quickly throughout. At our hospital, surgery was cancelled for most of the month of January and February and it was not possible to come down to the Bahamas for fear of getting stuck with a positive covid test, and not being able to get back. All of the countries were demanding testing of Covid-19 coming into and out of the country. It was not possible for me to get down to the Bahamas until March. I needed to make sure that everything was working before executing my plan to spend the month of April in the Bahamas and then sail the boat back to Toronto in May.

Perhaps it is only a sailor that will understand that stuff breaks on a sailboat….. even when you’re not using it. I wanted to spend time on the boat make sure everything was working before going further south. I flew into Nassau on March 15, 2022 and then took a commuter flight to Freeport. When I arrived at the sailboat, the batteries were totally dead. There was a terrible storm that occurred in February and it blew the solar panels off the boat and they were flapping in the breeze. Someone had strapped it to the boat so it wouldn’t get blown away completely. As a result, the batteries did not get charged and were completely drained. I was not able to start the engine. Fortunately, I was able to plug the boat into the 50 amp power source and after a period of time the batteries would charge but would not hold the charge. I was thinking that it is a lucky thing I came down ahead of time. I replaced the engine battery.

When I sailed the boat from Annapolis, the auto helm was broken. It’s difficult to steer the boat at night without a functioning auto helm and the tendency is to go in circles when it is cloudy as there are no visual clues such as stars to aim for. There were three of us that took turns at the helm but we found we could only manage about two hours at a time before we would start to run into problems. The issue was a broken computer that drove the auto helm, and Ricardo from Bradford Marine in Freeport was able to get a new one and installed it in early January. To make sure the auto helm was fuctioning properly it needed a sea trial in the open ocean. Ricardo was up to the task and agreed to meet me at the boat. However, a mega-yacht pulled up in front of me and partially blocked me in. There were no flags on the boat and as there had been a lot in the media about these kind of boats and the link to Russians, I did not want to take the chance of starting a war by asking the boat to backup or dock somewhere else…..

There might have been enough space for me to get out of my slip and onto the ocean to test my auto helm, but I would need to use my bow thruster. When I lowered the bow thruster, the lights started flashing and I was unable to push the bow thruster back up. I jumped into the water with my fins and mask and inspected the bow thruster. I wanted to make sure that the hinge was not jammed with a piece of rope or fishing line. I have always found it interesting that random thoughts come to your mind at the most inopportune times. One thought that slipped into mind was that very morning, one of the fishermen had caught a 40 pound beautiful tuna right off of the very dock on which I was moored. About 1/4 of the tuna was missing as a shark had taken a chunk of it while the fisherman was pulling it in. Why I would start thinking of this at the very moment when I was more than 50 feet from my swim platform, and totally immersed in the water I have no idea. It is said that sharks have very poor vision and I could not escape from the thought that one of my thighs or my butt might be mistaken for delicious tuna. I must’ve walked on the water with my fins to the swim platform in less than three or four seconds….

Ricardo arrived at around 1 PM for the 9 AM appointment. This is pretty typical in the islands. I felt lucky that he would even arrive…… It is sometimes very difficult finding good help so I gave him a beer and let him get to work. Unfortunately for him, I found a number of other problems. The testing of the auto helm was the least of the issues, and to test it meant leaving the dock. By this time I was very nervous about colliding with the megayacht (that in my mind I was certain was Russian), so I did not want to take a chance leaving the dock without my bow thruster to keep me clear.

The Bow thruster is at the very front of the boat at the bottom of the sail locker. Ricardo offered to go down there. It was very hot and stuffy

Ricardo spent most of the day at the bottom of the sail locker trying to figure out the problem. We connected with the support team of the bow thruster and after many hours, we were unable to correct the problem. It was still blinking and we could not get the bow thruster to work. Ultimately, we decided to fix the bowthruster door in the closed position and when I get back to Toronto, I’ll pull the boat out and have it repaired. I never did take the boat for the sea trial but the support team for the autohelm convinced me that it is going to work perfectly and nothing can possibly go wrong……

Ileana and Lauren were arriving later in the week and were planning on staying several days after I left to go back to Toronto. Lauren is Ileana’s God daughter, and she is very close to us. Lauren is finishing a one year maternity leave and needs to go back to teaching so this was her last chance for an escape before the rigours of life set in. I met them at the airport and the next day we went exploring.

Have you ever wondered where the idea of solo sailor came from? I recently finished a book about the first solo nonstop circumnavigation in a sailboat that was done in 1968 by Robin Knox-Johnson. You must remember that in those days, there were no GPS satellites. All navigation was done using a sextant and dead reckoning and, in those days, when there was lousy weather and you could not get a reading, there was no way of knowing where the heck you were. You were at the total mercy of the wind and the waves. Robin talks about the challenge, he talks about the glory of being the first sailor to do such a thing and the pride of Great Britain and so forth. His story is titled “A world of my own”. I have a different theory of where the solo sailor came from. I learned at a very early stage in life that you must never leave a woman stranded anywhere without running water……. especially a sailboat. I headed back to Toronto two days before Ileana and Lauren were leaving so I filled up the water tanks. Things seem to be going well but the day before they were leaving, when I called them to see how they were doing, there was no running water. The bilges were full of water and the water tanks were empty. Clearly there was a leak in our water system. Although they were leaving the next day, they could not wash their hair or have a shower and how is it possible something like this could happen….

Once again, after an urgent call, Ricardo came to the rescue. He identified there was a leak at the hot water tank and was able to fix it. Although this is another example of B.O.A.T, in my view it is money well spent as I’m not yet ready to do a solo sailing circumnavigation of the planet.

Do you believe in coincidences? Are some things just meant to be? Perhaps it means nothing? Most sailors believe in folklore and won’t leave on a long voyage on a Friday…. or bring bananas on board…and would never eat an albatross. How is it possible that a boat named Lauren is moored right next to Ileana?

On my way home checking into Air Canada in Nassau, I heard “hey John”. It was Carol Anne Moulton one of the loveliest surgeons at UHN. She had just finished a 10 day charter on a catamaran with her three teenage sons, her sister and brother in law, and Steve Gallinger, one of the most famous hepatobiliary surgeons in the country. Steve is also an accomplished sailor and we often connect on Lake Ontario in the summertime. I was discussing my plans on going to the Exumas in April. They had just come from there and felt that I was unlikely to find a more beautiful place on the earth. The warm waters are crystal clear. The seas are gentle. Many of the islands are deserted. The beaches are spectacular. They said you could throw an anchor and stay there for weeks or months and be perfectly satisfied. They were sad they were on their way home but encouraged me to make my way down there.

My job as chief of staff finishes on March 31, 2022 and my flight leaves at 10:00 o’clock in the morning on April 1, 2022. My plan will be to sail to Chubb Cay in the Berry islands on April 2nd and Nassau on April 3rd. Then to the Exumas from there, ending up in Georgetown. Keep in mind, that the most dangerous thing on a sailboat is a schedule so everything will depend on the weather……