We were quite determined to get going today if we possibly could but we were afraid the weather may not be with us when we were woken by strong prolonged winds in the early hours of the morning. Invincible was snatching sharply at her lines as the howling gusts blew through the marina and we were really pleased of the very substantial concrete slips at the Grand Bahama Yacht Club. The duration of the stronger winds and lack of rain, suggested it wasn’t a squall and we were quite concerned that this wasn’t forecast. The strong current (up to 5 knots) of the north bound Gulf Stream on our next passage which will carry us up the coast of Florida can be vicious with any north in the wind to oppose it so it is important to get the weather right for the crossing.
Squall of Florida coast
We eventually got to sleep but were a little later up that we’d hoped. It looked much calmer again and I ran round to the office to pay our bill (again) and get some photos before we set off again. We still managed to get the lines off the dock by 7.15 am and this time our passage across the channel to deeper water was pretty smooth. What was not so inviting was the line of huge ships hanging just offshore. We took bearings and tried to work out which were moving and which weren’t. It seemed that they were all just hanging offshore and as we got to Freeport there were even more. We must have passed 12 ships along the coastline. We were just beginning to leave the restricted area of Freeport Harbour passing shoreside of one large containership when a huge squall approached. We had radar running all the way along the coast but once the squall comes in it is all blocked out by the rain. That would not make it a good time for a large ship to manoeuvre through the area to closer into shore. The squall cause a complete whiteout, we couldn’t even see the containership we were passing. We were even more startled to look up and see another one approaching up the blind side of the containership as it cleared, I think he was even more surprised than us to see us appear and the other inshore supply ship beside us. It was a bit of a heart stopping moment to see a ship looming out of the gloom so close. He changed course and so did we and we passed well clear. Quite why he came up within yards of the containership to then just stop at the shore we don’t know.
Approaching a squall of Florida coast
When the next squall approached us on the radar, I was taking no chances and called on the radio a large ship I had been tracking. I had to use the radar / GPS combination on the plotter to be able to give a fairly accurate position in my call as “Vessel south of Freeport” would have given many responses. The vessel, Venturer I think, responded quickly and when we’d established we were talking to who we thought we were, he responded with “We are a British ship too!”. I still don’t know whether it was my accent or our red ensign which caused that response, but it was nice to greet them all the same. We agreed to stay out of each other’s way as the next squall came through.
We must have been hit by a dozen squalls in the course of our journey and they say that Americans build things big, well that certainly counts for the squalls. We thought we had done squalls until we got to Florida in the summer. The last one which hit us just off the coast was the worse either of us has ever encountered. The cloud was just above sea level and the rain was literally blinding as it went through. Again we were frantically looking out for the three other vessels in the vicinity but visibility was barely beyond the bow of the boat.
The Gulf Stream in the end was fairly calm and swell reduced from the fairly short seas as we came along the south coast of Grand Bahama to smooth out as we headed out offshore. The afternoon was actually fairly blue skies but with squalls in between. We didn’t quite see land in daylight I think partly due to the hideously large squalls hanging over the area. The radio was busy all afternoon with the US Coastguard leading rescues up and down the coast. Kevin had quite a task with the position of the wind and the strong Gulf Stream pressing us North to get Invincible to the Lake Worth inlet. We were mightily relieved to enter the Intercoastal canal at about 1am. It was well marked and we managed to put our anchor down without incident in a small anchorage just off Peanut Island.
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