Tory Story

Tory full grown at 2 years.

Tory at 8 weeks.

So her story begins in 2018, when a deal was struck between Bill and me that I would do the Great Loop, a 6,000-mile boat trip around the Eastern United States and parts of Canada, if we got a puppy when we returned. After all, our boat was named Salty Paws. Bill jumped at this, as he had tried every angle to get me to agree to this trip. You can read about this trip in early entries to our blog. BTW, I loved the trip!

Any boat named Salty Paws has to have a dog.

Before we left for that trip, we had done our research, had decided on a Portuguese Water Dog (we live on the water) and had found a good breeder in Maine. We made arrangements to buy one of the puppies that was born on 2/29, a Leapster.  Covid hit hard in early March, 2020.  We were in Eleuthera, Bahamas, with plans to visit the Abacos, but figured we needed to hightail it home.  We arrived in Fort Lauderdale on March 13, with spring break in full swing. We sped toward home, having to leave our boat in Maryland before Bill and an intrepid friend could retrieve it later in the spring. 

We picked up Tory on in April 2020, just 3 weeks after we got home.

Tory is the lookout on our dinghy.

Tory eagerly comes on any
snowshoe or X-country ski trip.

I swear that Tory is not a “covid” puppy, but she sure made those early days more fun. We were able to participate in a dog training class (outside, masked and spaced-apart) and even some zoom training. Tory is a joyful dog who loves all things. People, other dogs, hiking in the woods, chasing balls nonstop, and snow.   Even though we live on the beach, she has never really loved swimming, but she certainly loves the water, often going up to her chest to cool down after chasing balls, even in the winter. 

Tory was quick to adapt to being on Salty Paws and has already done multiple overnight trips.  She is an expert at jumping into and out of our dinghy or kayak and getting off to boat to a dock.  When underway, she usually curls up in our v-berth or sofa to await the arrival at our destination.She likes rocking and rolling as much as I do!

Tory was a welcome guest as we parked in front of friends'
and relatives' houses on the way down to Florida.

With Tory on board, I agreed to Bill's latest plan to trailer the boat to Florida and spend several weeks in the Bahamas, our third trip there.  Bill spent much of November 2021 preparing Salty Paws for our end of February departure to Florida.  He found a few things to reduce weight offset the 75 pounds of dog food and the new dog stairs to our bow that are now on board.  We finally departed Maine on February 27th.  

It took more than a week to trailer Salty Paws down to Daytona Beach for our launching.   Maybe you read about our road trip in the first blog.  Tory did great.  Apparently, being with us, even stuck in the back seat of a truck all day, day after day, and spending the night with strangers (to her), is reward enough for this loyal pup.

Tory swam from the boat
to join everyone.

Tory loves chasing balls into the water.

We finally made it to the warm, crystal-clear waters of the Bahamas on 3/17. The spectacular Sand Cay was Tory’s first experience in these waters. Bill was able to coax her to swim by throwing a ball in the water.   She learned to jump through crashing waves to get the ball.  As the trip wore on, it got hotter and hotter. We took some long walks on hot marl (coral) and she would often beat us to the beach where we would find her swimming around to cool off.  Not too excited about jumping off the boat, Bill threw her in a couple of times, and she had to swim to the beach.

We began the trip with 5 balls, two of each
Tory destroyed, and three got lost on the boat,
assuming she didn't drop them overboard.
Fortunately, Tory found a tennis ball, which
she is always inviting someone to throw.

As our trip wears on, the weather heats up and Tory’s hair continues to grow, she is clearly hot and tired.  We will be back on the road in 1 ½ weeks and home in 4.  We have loved having Tory along and have earned our name, Salty Paws.

At two years old, Tory has earned her own name as a Portuguese Water Dog. We’ll see how she does in the frigid, murky waters of the Maine waters.

Tory will often sleep with a ball in her mouth.

Bill tried to get Tory to jump in the water on her own, but in the end had to throw her in to swim to shore.

Charlotte and Tory became buddies in the Bahamas.

We had many walks on the Pink Sand Beach on Harbour Island, and Tory would frequently get in the the water to cool off.

One of our many walks in the Bahamas.

Tory ran ahead and jumped in the water after one of our long walks.

Tory joined us on the bow for our daily cocktails.

Tory also serves as lookout on our kayak.

Here Tory was mesmerized by the two dolphins swimming near Salty Paws.

The Devil’s Backbone and Goodbye Bahamas

 

Molly and Tory on the Pink Sand Beach of Harbour Island.

The Devil’s Backbone is a 6-mile passage that we needed to cross in going from Spanish Wells to Harbour Island.  All the guidebooks and chart descriptions strongly recommend hiring a local pilot to steer your boat through the passage that is lined with reefs, coral heads that rise close to the surface and often crashing surf on both sides of the narrow channel.   The recommendation also includes the need for flat seas and a high sun in the sky in order to see the coral heads.

We had 4 days in Spanish Wells, plenty of time to mull this over.  Molly was inclined to pay the $150-$200 for a pilot, but I wanted to do more investigation.  All the locals we talked to second the advice to hire a pilot, but I did read one blog post that suggested otherwise.  The blogger noted that his pilot followed the magenta line on the navigational charts and that depths were never less than 8 feet.  He speculated that the guidebooks were just supporting the local economy and that one was really paying for the chance to talk with a local on your boat.

The boat in the background left is one of the several
large fishing boats in Spanish Wells.

As I dithered on the pilot decision, we enjoyed our time in Spanish Wells, a bustling community of Bahamians and the fishing capital of the Bahamas.  We were told that 75% of the lobster tails used by Red Lobster restaurants comes from here.  [Bahamian lobsters do not have claws.]  The town also has a large American-style grocery store, which we put to good use.  Everyone was very friendly and the dock owner where we stayed even introduced me to his mother so I could sit on her porch and use the Internet.

This yacht did have a pilot lead it through the Backbone.
The inflatable slide might have cost as much as our boat!

In the back of my mind, I was thinking that boats up to 150 feet long, 30 feet wide and 7-foot draft take the Devil’s Backbone, and here we are on a 25-foot with 8.5-foot beam and 2-foot draft.  I finally spoke with a Canadian who lives part-time in Spanish Wells and has a center console fishing boat similar in size to Salty Paws.  He stated that we will have no problem doing the Backbone on our own.  That settled it for me, and I plotted our course on two separate chartplotters to have redundancy.

This is our route
through the Devil's
Backbone.  Green indicates
cruising at less than 10 mph;
red less than 5 mph.

We departed shortly after dawn on Saturday (April 9th) in less-than-ideal conditions but with the plan to turn around if it gets dicey.  Both engines were running in case one fails, and I turned on our 3^rd chartplotter to add another depth sounder that Molly can easily monitor.  We were both super alert as we entered the Devil’s Backbone.   The water was too choppy to make out any coral heads, but the depths were a comfortable 10 feet, and in an hour, we were through the Backbone without incident.

Here Salty Paws is anchored off the beach on Man Island.

The next five days we anchored in three different spots in the sound off Harbour Island.  We found a great beach on Man Island to take Liz and family to for a day and also got to do some extensive walking from Harbour Bottom to the Glass Window, a bridge that separates the deep blue ocean from the aquamarine, shallow bank and which we had visited two years ago just before COVID cut short our last trip to the Bahamas.

The Lighthouse at Ocean Tally with the best looking bar in the world, but, alas, it is no
longer open to the public except as a B & B.

Here is the natural pool below the Lighthouse at Ocean Tally.

The Glass Window bridge used to be a natural arch between Eleuthera and North Eleuthera.  On the left are the deep blue
waters of the Atlantic Ocean, and on the right on the Bahamian waters on the Eleuthera Bank.

View from near the Glass Window Bridge.

We hiked another mile past the Glass Window Bridge to the Queen's Bathes.  Tory was first in.  We didn't see any royalty,
but the main road on each island is called the Queen's Highway.  Kate and William had been in the Bahamas the week before.

Molly, Liz, Matt, Charlotte and Bill.

On Thursday (April 14th) we pulled in to Romora Bay Resort and Marina for our 4-day stay, only two long blocks from the inn where Liz and family would be staying.  We walked to the inn to drop off the pail and shovel set we bought for Charlotte and picked up their golf cart.  That afternoon Matt, Liz and Charlotte landed at the North Eleuthera airport, a direct flight from Atlanta, took a short taxi ride to the ferry dock opposite Harbour Island, and crossed the sound on the ferry.  Their ferry dropped them off right next to our boat, and their Harbour Island adventure began.

We repeatedly heard that Harbour Island is called the Nantucket of the Bahamas.  That may not be the best analogy, but it is a bustling place, with hundreds, if not thousands, of tourists and golf carts everywhere.  There are numerous restaurants, three major marinas, many resorts and a beautiful, pink-hewed sand beach on the ocean side of the 3.5-mile island.  Much of the island caters to revelers, and we were fortunate to be south of the hustle bustle.  Romora Bay has a beautiful pool along with easy beach access on the oceanside.  We made extensive use of both and also made two trips on our boat to Man Island.  It was a great time with Liz and family.

We walked right off Salty Paws to the beach on Man Island.

Matt and Liz in the surf on Pink Sand Beach.

Charlotte seemed to spent more time in the pool at Romora than sleeping. The first boat
on the background right is the top of Salty Paws.  

The Miles family did a lot of smiling.

Charlotte discovered Shirley Temples on Harbour Island and particularly liked the cherries.

We had our own dock space, where we could hang out.  Charlotte and Tory became buddies.

We frequently monitoring the weather forecasts, and Monday, April 18^th, was the only day over the next 10 days with light winds predicted.  I didn’t want us to be stuck in a harbor or anchorage that could jeopardize our plan to fly out to San Francisco from Atlanta for our nephew Max Webster’s graduation from Berkeley on May 14^th.  We decided to go from Harbour Island to West Palm in one day, 245 miles in all.

This shows our route from Harbour Island
to West Palm Beach.  The lines in white
indicate a speed over 20 mph.

Our departure routine began before dawn.  I prepared the boat, while Molly walked Tory.   Unfortunately, during her walk she tripped on a speed bump and fell on her wrist, which she thought might be broken.  She wrapped her arm and wrist, and I helped her with a makeshift sling.  She was still game for departure, but in some pain. 

We departed shortly after dawn.  The Devil’s Backbone passage was uneventful and soon we were in open ocean with a few thousand feet below our keel.  The 5-foot swells and southeast wind are off our starboard stern.  We were able to cruise at 20-25 mph, which we needed to do if we were to reach Florida by nightfall, but we had an uncomfortable 30-mile crossing until we get partially in the lee of Great Abaco Island.  The seas then began to flatten and the winds lessen. 

Going WOT (wide open throttle) keeps us around 25 mph, but eats up our gas, and after 150 miles we limped into Lucaya, Grand Bahama, with our tank indicator blinking near empty.  We refueled and checked out of Bahamian Customs, which is a new procedure imposed upon the Bahamas by the US Government so that there is a record of departure.  In an hour we were back on course for Florida.

Salty Paws anchored off Peanut Island,
a great island park.

Photos don't adequately
capture the rich blue of the
Bahamian ocean waters.

We had less than 100 miles to go.  We could tell when Salty Paws entered the Gulf Stream as the water temperature increased from 78 to 82 degrees.  The conditions were ideal.  At 5:30 pm we saw the condos of West Palm.  Then, 6 miles from the Lake Worth Inlet, our low oil alarm went off on the main motor, no doubt the result of 11 hours at WOT.  This forced us to slow down and putter into the Lake Worth inlet on our small kicker motor. As we were approaching the inlet we got a weather alert of severe thunderstorms with winds of 60mph and half dollar sized hail. We could see the lightening nearby, but fortunately the storm moved south.  At 7 pm we anchored off Peanut Island in West Palm.  All is well, except for Molly’s wrist.

Molly was given a choice of cast colors.  Her
selection goes well with the boat!

The next two days involved two medical visits for Molly.  She does, indeed, have a broken wrist, but is in great spirits and glad to be back in the States.  Tomorrow we will slowly begin our trek north.

Depths of 10,000 Feet

The candy cane lighthouse at the mouth to
Hope Town Harbour has greeted sailors for
over 150 years.

There is quite a view from the top of the Hope Town Lighthouse.
Salty Paws is, perhaps, the smallest boat in the harbor.

 

Our last two days on Green Turtle Cay included Friday night dancing at Pineapples (with a rum drink or two) and a golf cart tour of the entire island.  We then continued our cruise south, entering the well-protected Sea of Abaco where we anchored or moored off Great Guana Cay, Hope Town (Elbow Cay) and Little Harbour.  We enjoyed food and the specialty Bahamian rum drinks at great places on each cay including the floating bar anchored off Tahiti Beach on Elbow Cay, perhaps, the most famous beach in the Abacos.

Tahiti Beach is very large at low tide.  In the background is the floating bar that offers food and drink to beachgoers.

Di Hunter, our 92-year old inspiration.

One cruiser in Hope Town Harbour who motored over to our boat to say hi was Di Hunter.  Di is 92, and against the advice of most of her friends and relatives bought a sailing catamaran when she was 75.  She has been taking her boat from Duxbury, MA to Hopetown for 4-5 months every year since.  Most of those friends and relatives have now died, and Di’s biggest problem is finding crew to go with her.  We had a great chat, and were in awe as she easily pulled the starter cord on her dinghy motor, which fired up right up.  I remarked to Molly the next day, not even thinking that it was April 1^st, that I had three more years to scout out my first catamaran!

Now it is time to leave the Abacos, and I am not sure that we will return to these waters.  The highlight of our first two trips to the Bahamas were the Exumas, and one can not help but compare the Exumas and the Abacos, both revered by countless cruisers from the US and Canada.  In the end they are very different.  In general, the Abacos are more populated, have more resources, but with far fewer islands.  The Bahamians in the Exumas are majority black, the descendants of former slaves, while the Abacos are more white, the descendants of English loyalists, except for Great Abaco, where many black Bahamians and recent Haitian refugees live and commute by simple speedboat ferries to work on the more wealthy outer cays.  Cruisers in the Abacos are much more likely to spend weeks, if not months, in one marina or mooring field.  In the Exumas that only happens in Georgetown, on Great Exuma.

We hiked to the ocean-side beach
from Little Harbour.

On the morning of our planned departure from Little Harbour I wake and check my illuminated L.L. Bean watch.  It is just before 5 am, my typical waking hour.  I can do Wordle and attempt to reach the Genius Level in Spelling Bee before checking the weather and preparing for our 55 nautical mile open water crossing from the Abacos to Eleuthera.  Molly is already awake and exclaims that the weather report has gotten worse and asks me to check it as maybe we shouldn’t depart today (Monday, April 4^th).

I look at my two go-to apps, Windy and Predict Wind, as well as Weather Radar and Garmin InReach weather.  They don’t seem any different that what was forecast yesterday, but I double check and look at the detail of the wind and wave forecast by the hour.   Everything seems to confirm that today is a good crossing day, and Molly accepts my conclusion.  Molly is by nature apprehensive of open water crossings as bad conditions can toss our boat pretty violently.  Plus, she won't let me forget the time we broached and took on water on our last Bahamian trip.

We then both go back to our word games, each of us reaching the Genius Level before comparing words.  At 6 am I rise, prepare the coffee, and start preparing the boat for departure.  Sunrise isn’t until 7:20 am, but it is light enough by 6:45 am for me to dinghy Tory ashore.  The goal this morning is not exercise but just to get her business done before our departure.  At 7:05 am, back on the boat, Molly and I review our Open Water Crossing Checklist, and I quiz her on the three separate ways we can send out distress signals.  She has them all down to memory.

This shows our 55 mile route from
the Abacos to Eleuthera.  The white
indicates speeds over 20 knots and
improving conditions as we crossed.

We depart the Little Harbour mooring field at sunrise and after just two miles or so are in the open ocean.  The 3-foot swells and light winds are off our aft port side, a little rolly, but not too bad.  As we venture more offshore, the seas flatten further and soon we are at WOT (wide open throttle), cruising at roughly 20 knots.  The crossing proves uneventful, except for noticing the deepest ocean waters I have seen, almost 10,000 feet down.

Our depth sounder only goes to 1,000 feet, and it starts blinking when it can no longer register.  Sun light can not penetrate more than a few hundred feet in the oceans, and early on Molly told me that she doesn't want to know how deep the waters get.  It really shouldn't make much safety difference whether we crossing water 100 feet deep or a few thousand, but there is something daunting about realizing there is 10,000 feet below us! 

In three hours, we reach a beautiful anchorage off Egg Island, Eleuthera.  The only other boat in the anchorage is named Laurel, a 240-foot luxury yacht.  On the beach we met Bradley, one of the crew, setting up 6 beach chairs and umbrellas and standing by for the 6 guests on board to be ferried to the beach. Two hours later Bradley was relieved by another crew member, and in time it seems that the guests had found something else to do on the giant yacht. 

We learn that the yacht has 24 crew, 7 of whom are from South Africa.  Bradley waited 2 years to get his H1B1 Visa from the US, and within two days of receipt had a job offer and plane ticket to Miami to work on the Laurel.  Evidently, there is a crew shortage in the States, but not in Europe where he has a friend still looking for work on a yacht.   In addition, sanctions on the Russian oligarchs probably aren’t helping the European job market for crewing on a yacht.  Bradley mentioned that those mega-yachts have crews of 70, and he is so glad to be on the Laurel where duties are rotated, whereas responsibilities for crew on the mega-yachts are fixed and narrow.

Our anchorage off Egg Island.  Salty Paws may not even be large enough to be the tender for the 240-foot Laurel.

Changing weather conditions had us making a hasty late afternoon departure from Egg Island to what seemed a better anchorage off Meeks Patch, now home to 15-20 pigs for the tourists who take tour boats from nearby Spanish Wells.  Here, too, conditions changed in the middle of the night, and sleep proved to be intermittent as the boat swung frequently from side to side.  We were quick to depart after sunup and pleased to reach the protected harbor of Spanish Wells.  We will spend the next three days here before taking the dangerous Devil’s Backbone to Harbour Island, where we will meet daughter Elizabeth and family.

We all enjoyed watching the dolphins in Hope Town Harbour.  We don't have pictures to show for it, but other sea creatures
that have come near our boat are turtles, sharks, sting rays and assorted fish.

This sign captures much of the attitude of the Bahamas.

Bougainvillea lines many of the quaint streets of Hope Town.

We had the cheapest mooring in Hope Town Harbour, but it gave us access to the marina and its beautiful pool.

I made stairs to give Tory access to our bow, where we have often have our nightly cocktail. 

One of favorite spots was Nippers on Great Guana Cay.

Tory was a big hit with most people we met including these two school girls on Green Turtle Cay.

On Da Beach on Elbow Cay was another great stop.

These are some of the remains of the lighthouse that used to stand at Little Harbour, but mostly destroyed in Hurricane Floyd.

The family members who founded Little Harbour in the 1950s are now 3rd generation operators of
Pete's Pub and a foundry where they create artwork that is often priced in the thousands
of dollars.