At Meeks Patch our crew finally had a chance to put faces to the voices heard on Our White Magic during the passage. Carter and Paul boarded Our White Magic to trade sea stories with the family and their crew. We all enjoyed returning to a normal sleep pattern, having a good night's sleep on a boat with a lot less motion!

On Monday morning we departed Meeks Patch Island on a short course of a couple of miles to the "skinny" shoaled entry to Spanish Wells . Our approach was interrupted by a satellite phone call from the electronics geek trying to help with the issues we were having. Dave took the call and, due to its length, had to leave navigating the skinny cut in Carter’s capable hands. Carter was adept at guiding the boat (in continuing strong winds) through the narrow cut as some of us held our breath. Our White Magic followed close behind. We pulled over to the government dock in a U-turn challenged by current and winds to tie up for clearing Customs and Immigration at the dockside office.

Clearing Customs was uneventful but we did get levied a “transportation charge” on top of the $300 cruising fee which we understood from our reading was not legitimate. The literature invites you to complain to the Nassau Customs office, but we certainly weren’t in the mood to complain to the officer who levied it. That might have motivated him to be inclined to board and inspect our vessel and levy duty on the excess alcohol we had in our possession!

While at the government dock, Bob had received permission to use the fresh water tap to wash down his boat and Dave did as well. John, Paul and Carter took a jaunt around the small town and returned with a bag of ice and a plumber’s snake to work on the clogged port side head. Those who wanted some lunch went into a dockside restaurant for a quick bite. After several hours we moved to rental mooring balls a short distance further up the channel and continued our settlement into island life. Our three crew members had been busily making phone calls via the available cell phone coverage to arrange their travel return together to Norfolk, which was successfully arranged for the following day Tuesday, November 10.   Carter and Paul began to troubleshoot the port side head and attempted the use of the snake they purchased but quickly found it was too large to be inserted. Fortunately they were able to return it to the store where they bought it for a full refund. Nonetheless they were able to unclog portions of the hoses and some functionality (but not full) was restored.

It was a busy morning Tuesday wrapping up some of the equipment issues before Carter, John and Paul had to depart for a late morning ferry and taxi to the airport. Following the advice Dave had received by telephone, Carter helped him perform a “master reset” of the large Furuno chart plotter. This restored full system functions but Dave remained concerned that nothing had been “fixed”, suggesting that the whole episode could recur in the future. Apparently, as a software-based system, there may be a software “bug” that needs to be worked out.

Following this, Dave took advantage of his capable helpers on board to replace the B&G NMEA full-function display at the nav station. You may recall this was the component part that arrived in Norfolk too late to be replaced before our departure. The replacement was successful, with Paul performing the difficult task of reconnecting the nine tiny multiple-colored wires to the existing system and making sure they all connected to the correct point. With this accomplished, the Furuno system and auto-pilot could now receive data involving wind speed and direction, water depth, and vessel speed through the water, for display at the chart plotters.

We didn’t have much time left to say thank you to everyone for being of such great assistance for this maiden passage of ours. Carter’s wife Ellen had been thoughtful enough to send with Carter several pounds of homemade chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies to provide energy throughout the voyage. John’s wife Joan made sure he had his favorite chocolate chip cookies along with a huge bag of peanut M&Ms. Many thanks as well to Paul for contributing the fishing tackle, advice, and his perpetual energy. It was an indescribable benefit to us to have along three very experienced and resourceful guys who could help with any imaginable problem.

Dave shuttled them to the government dock in time for the local ferry that would transport them to the main island of Eleuthera where they could pick up a taxi for the airport.

That afternoon we had a chance to explore the small town and locate an Internet connection at a dockside business where we could use Skype to call to the US and catch up on some email.

We were now on our own to manage our Pas de Deux!