First Bahamas charter and engine fails

There are no words to describe the emotions I felt from December 28 to January 10. To start this entry, I have to say when I realized I could do this lifestyle, it was because of the community and support I had around me. The amount of support and community I experienced these two weeks was something I could have never imagined needing and I am beyond appreciative. I am so grateful for every single person (complete strangers and friends) that helped; I wouldn’t have been able to do this without the support from both friends and complete strangers. 

My best friend from high school, Anna, flew into the Exumas a few days before the rest of our friends were joining us to catch up and get everything ready. The night before she came (December 27) I dinghied over to a friend’s boat for dinner and noticed something was off about my outboard. They offered to help me look at it the next day and also let me use their dinghy to pick Anna up at the airport. 

After a 9 am airport pick-up, pancakes were made, and boat projects started. David worked on the dinghy engine while Anna and I started putting away and organizing the boxes I had loaded onto the boat but did not have time to put away yet. By lunchtime, we did not find an issue with the dinghy and I spent the afternoon taking the bottom unit off to look at the impeller, which was also fine. 

Sunset is when I stop doing boat projects unless I’m close to finishing. Anna and I made a cocktail and jumped in the water to watch the sunset and take ocean showers then finished the night making stir fry with the tuna I caught on the way over. The following day was spent very similar; more organizing, enjoying the beautiful Exuma water, organized my bow locker, and commenced with champagne as I had removed the boat’s old name and placed ‘Soul de La Mar’ on the boat.

On December 30, we finalized the guest rooms, deep cleaned the entire boat, and had a sunset spearing mission with friends. My dinghy engine still wasn’t working properly and everyone else was flying in the next morning, but I figured I could still get to and from places, just at a slower pace.

New Year’s Eve day I was on my way to the airport at 9 am to pick everyone up when my engine stopped about a quarter of the way to the airport and a local towed me back to my boat. David ended up taking me to the airport to pick everyone up. Back at the boat we had breakfast and started the day. We began with visiting the infamous swimming pigs. We quickly made this day a game of how long the dinghy was going to last. 

After the pigs I moved the main boat closer to the grotto to snorkel; we dinghied to the grotto and then to see the nurse sharks in the marina. About 20 feet from the marina, the engine stopped; oars came out and I put my fins on and kicked at the back. While everyone was swimming with the nurse sharks, I ran into a local my family has known for a while; he offered to tow us back to the main boat… this was the second time I was being towed in one day, and the beginning of many in the upcoming week.

The rest of the afternoon was spent back at the anchorage catching up, swimming, getting drone footage, and simply enjoying where we were and the people we were with. New Years Eve festivities started with my friend Nate picking us up to go to their boat for drinks and appetizers before heading to the yacht club. We spent about 5 hours at the yacht club; listening to music, chatting, playing games, and dancing. The night ended with fireworks and we headed back to the boat. One of my favorite things about anchoring in Big Major is coming into the cove and seeing all the anchor lights and boats lit up; it always looks so magical and was the perfect ending to the night.

The New Year started with a big breakfast then we headed out to do some shark diving. I got to put the sails out for about 30 minutes until we changed heading and had to motor the remaining 3 hours. We tied up to a mooring ball in about 2 feet seas around 1 pm and I did my briefing. Anna had swum with sharks with me before, however, the other three had not. They did not want to get in and I told them they had to swim to the dinghy and back at least, but they would probably get out due to cold, not the sharks. In the end, they all absolutely loved it; wanted to watch them feed and even come back with me for the hammerhead and tiger shark dives. This is one of the things I absolutely love about this lifestyle and what I do; I get to show people an entirely different world and change perceptions.

I got out of the water while Gaby was still getting some drone shots, took a quick shower, and prepared the boat for the next 2 hour trip to anchorage. Around 2:30 I went to start the engine and got nothing. I opened the engine compartment and found 2 inches of water under the engine. I had about 100 hours on the engine and had had no complications. I had no internet in this location, so I checked everything, but everything looked fine except I found a hose coming out of my antisiphon that didn’t connect to anywhere. I had a feeling the water was coming out of this, but didn’t know the purpose of this hose or if it had come unconnected from something. 

After about 30 minutes of troubleshooting, I text David, who was still in Staniel, on my Garmin Inreach, to see if he had any suggestions. I didn’t receive anything from him for the next hour so I hoisted my hotspot to the top of the mast hoping that I could get a little bit of wifi to my phone to message him. I got ahold of him briefly, then the wifi turned off. I went to bring it down and realized I didn’t put a weight in the bag or tied it back off to the deck with a different line… my only option was to climb the mast to get the hotspot down.

I had never gone up a mast before, and now my first time was going to be in 2-4 foot seas, after sunset, and with friends who had never operated a winch before. I got the wifi, plugged it in, and we decided to enjoy the night. As the sun went down every night on this trip we relaxed, drank, and played dominos telling jokes and stories. I was stressed and felt bad about the engine being down, batteries being low, and now in 2-4 foot seas all night, but this trip couldn’t have gone better. 

I was up all night that night. First, the wind shifted and the waves got messy. Then I was worried about how we were tied to the mooring ball. I had tied to it for temporary use (2 hours max) and did not use two lines as I should have and I kept waking up checking the line to make sure we weren’t chafing. My anchor alarm went off around 3 am a little bit after the wind shifted and we were 160 feet from our starting position, and being paranoid, it felt that the mooring had come loose (although I knew this wasn’t the case). One of the times that I stuck my head out of the hatch, I saw that a barge had just come by as well. I think I slept about 2 hours this night and stuck my head out about every 20 minutes. And, on top of this stress, I had to make sure Mako wasn’t jumping out of the window, as he does some nights when he gets bored, because we were rocking so much and if he fell off, there were about 10 sharks right below the boat that come to the surface every time something splashes in. 

Sunrise came and I hoisted the hotspot to the mast, after tying it off to another line to use to pull it directly down, and David responded and said he would come by with Nate. We took the morning very slow; coffee, a quiche, and naps. I had sent David my location via the Garmin Inreach, but he thought I was somewhere else and it took an extra hour to get to me. I had already bled the fuel line and tried some other stuff with the engine, but he came on and we changed the Racor fuel filter, bled it, combined battery banks, and the engine eventually started. 

My concern was still the water under the engine. I wanted to know why it was there because the main issue was obviously associated with this. There was water coming out of the exhaust, which is always one of the first things I check, obviously more so now. But there was also water still coming out of this random hose. David pinched the hose, water still came out of the exhaust, so David put a clamp on this hose and left. This hose was free hanging, there was exhaust coming out, and there had never been water in the engine bilge before.. I obviously had research to do, but for now the problem seemed solved and we moved on to the next location.

We sailed in through the channel for about 30-45 minutes then motored the main 2 hours to our next spot, the infamous Pablo Escobar plane wreck in the northern Exumas. We anchored around 3 pm, swam around, took some drone footage, and moved to the next anchorage by sunset. We pulled into Allen Cay around 6 pm, right at sunset.

The anchorage was the busiest I have ever seen, with at least 7-10 boats anchored. I wasn’t sure we were going to fit, but I was really hoping we would since it is one of my favorite anchorages as far as views and water color.  We squeezed in between 4 boats and began our night. Nicole made margaritas, I made tacos with mango salsa, we turned on the spreader lights, started the music, and had a fun night dancing on the deck. While we were sitting on deck and eating some brownies, I heard something hit the paddleboard and then no other sounds. Immediately, I knew Mako had just fallen in. I taught him how to swim just days ago with Anna, and he apparently learned well because I ran to the back of the boat immediately and there he was swimming to me with a little chirp to let me know where he was. I lifted him up, rinsed him off, and wrapped him up in a towel. He was being a monster prior that night, going on the bow side of the forestay, going into the anchor locker, and running around on the bimini top. He would have been fine, but the paddle board had been angled going to sea versus into the boat, which is why he fell in. We were all happy he was okay and surprised he seemed to bounce right back, until he didn’t go outside again for 3 days (he is back to normal now).

The next day we planned to leave around 12:30 to head back to Nassau, spend the night in Nassau (January 4) and everyone would catch their flights on January 5. The day started with a great beach workout, swim to rinse off, then we headed back to the boat to make pancakes for breakfast. As I was finishing up with the pancakes, I went to turn the engine on to get it warmed up and it wouldn’t start. I tried combining the battery banks, and still nothing. The batteries were at about 11.8V, too low, but I later found out the engine would have started if they were even lower. 

I called David, he said to let it charge a bit and try about every hour. At 3 pm the engine still wouldn’t start so we went to the beach to do a little hike to a ruin and some more fun drone shots. After, the engine still wouldn’t start so I took the dinghy around the anchorage asking if people had a portable generator. The sweetest people had a lithium battery starter pack and a portable generator they had never used. Around 7 pm, the engine eventually started. I was so excited. I went to turn the generator off and saw the exhaust and immediately turned the engine off. Something was really wrong. 

I just saw white.. I had no light but I knew it was wrong. I ran downstairs, grabbed a flashlight, and saw white in the water. I ran down and opened the engine up and saw white leaking out of the air filter. I took a picture, sent to David, and his response was “your engine is f*****”. A phone call to him and somehow oil and water had mixed in my engine, it was not the batteries causing the engine not to start. A call to my parents immediately after resulted in my second breakdown since owning the boat (first was the windlass mishap in Puerto Rico). I took the portable generator back to Don, of course, my dinghy engine died on the way there, but I had the current with me and rowed to his boat. He towed me back and told me he would help me get out in the morning. 

The next morning, Don and another cruiser, Patrick, helped me get out. Patrick suggested maybe an oil change would do it. It may have, but I didn’t have enough oil on the boat at the time (I was getting the rest in Nassau). They tied their dinghies to each side of my stern and pushed me out of the cove. We sailed to Nassau, the wind was 15-20 knots the first half of the day and I got to teach everyone how to use the winches and had a fun time sailing. 

10 miles from the anchorage in Nassau, the defense force came by to question us, I should have asked for a tow, the wind had died down to about 7 knots and we were cruising at about 2 knots. We made it to one of the entrances to this bay around 5 pm. Stephanie and Laurent came out in the dinghy to help, but the wind was directly in my face and there was no way to get into the bay before dark. I tacked out then back in trying to get to the shallowest and safest spot I could until I could be towed the next day. 

We anchored by 7 pm and I took Steph and Laurent back to her boat, said hi to everyone, then enjoyed the last night with friends on my boat; playing dominos and drinking wine. Everyone had rebooked their flights and the first beach run for the taxi was at 4:45 am. I felt so bad about everything that had happened; waves, no engine, rebooking flights, etc, but we had a great time and it was so much fun. 

I spent the morning catching up with Stephanie and her crew, then talked with the technicians about my engine while I waited for Andre to tow me into the bay. The technicians said I need to come back to Florida ASAP and gave me a to-do list with the engine to preserve as much of it as I could. Meanwhile, I also had someone flying in the next day for a month-long ‘rent’. I had informed him of the situation, and his response was ‘do you need a hand sailing back’. 

Andre towed me into the bay that evening, I took an ocean shower, rafted up with Steph, poured a drink, and reflected on everything. This first charter had been so chaotic but so perfect at the same time; the struggles and the lows made the highs and fun so much sweeter. I didn’t know what I had coming up, but I knew that even with everything that had gone wrong, I wouldn’t change a thing about this life I grow to love a little bit more every single day. I am still in awe at the amount of help everyone has so willingly given. It would have made everything a million times harder without the help I received and my biggest wish is that I can repay or pay it forward one day.