mission: to make all the way to south america without flying via drive from detroit to miami and sailboat hitchhike down to colombia. ok i can do this. no problem right
. i left the port of miami with john and che (27 year old from south africa) on january 13. first stop was to check into port of customs in the bahamas. which means 2 straight days chugging along at a whopping 6 knots (8mph) which meant i spent the better part of those first couple days expelling anything i had consumed the prior 72 hours in a greenish yellow liquid form. we arrive in south andros island and stay offshore cause we were under the impression that you 36 hours to check into customs before consequences occur. wrong. the bahemians (is that what theyre called) were not pleased and we were awoken at 8am (28 hours after arriving) with the BDF bahemian defense forces knocking on our door and ushering us to check into customs asap. no problemo mahn. got that taken care of.
after checking into customs we depart for the east side of andros where there is some incredible diving. che is a master diver and john has 2 hookah rigs set up on the boat that allows diving up to about 30 feet using breathing through a hose connected to an air compressor on the boat. we did some diving off a vertical wall. one of the steepest vertical walls in the entire bahamas. the depth goes from 15 feet deep to 350 feet deep within 100 horizontal feet. vertical walls are optimum breeding grounds for all sorts of sea life. the deep, cold, nutrient rich water is forced up the wall allowing all types of coral reefs to grow which is the basis for entire marine ecosystems. The sheer drop off is a spectacle for everyone to see.
On the 2nd day of diving we decided to do a little spear fishing. short on dry food, with an endless ocean of fish, we headed to the waters with our spears and diving knives. before entering the water, i was given a few tips and pointers by john that went something as such:
"ok, 1st of all take off your necklace and any shiny objects cause barracuda and reef sharks are attracted to that. 2nd, if you speer a tuna (like i know what the fuck a tuna looks like) make sure to let out alot of line cause that thing will take you for a ride. 3rd, if you catch mahi or grouper, keep it away from your body cause predator fish will come at it and you dont want them biting at your chest. and 4th, dont catch anything bigger then 3 feet or 30lbs."
gotchya john.
jump in the water and start flopping around like a helpless single finned seal swimming in whatever direction the current takes me. not 5 minutes later i spot my dinner. Set the trigger, and creep slowly closer to the fish. BANG (not really bang, not much sound under water but you get the point) spear enters the gill of unknown giant fish. perfect shot. Then this thing took me for a the ride my life. appearantly im not michael phelps and i cant outswim a 35lb white fin tuna. i was helpless. The big fish dragged me about 50 feet before pulling my knife out and cutting the line. looks like another night of macaroni and cheese for dinner.
Next onward we go to Georgetown. the next biggest city in the bahamas next to nassau. this city makes ferndale look like paris. john and che are heading to remote islands after this port so time that i arrange for my next ride. i met a guy named steve heading to turks and caicos and then dominican republic. a step in the right direction. we stop over night in turks and do some night diving for lobster. incredible. grab a spear, dive in the shallow 10 ft water, spear the lobster, rip off its tail and return with fresh lobster tail for dinner. sure beats the mac n cheese.
we dove over a blue hole which is an underground volcano that comes up to about 30ft below the surface and is about 1000 ft wide in the middleof the ocean and the water above it is as calm as glass. not a single ripple. its pretty amazing.
we arrive in dominican republic so that steve can refuel. its a 48 ft custom made severson sailboat but needs to fuel up cause i guess deizel is cheap there. steve is leaving the DR and heading to smaller islands in the British virgin islands. so i must arrange for my next ride here or run the risk of being stranded in the BVI´S and pay an arm and leg for a flight out. Ill roll the dice and try to hitch my next ride. steve offers to stay an extra night to give me some time to search. 2nd day there and stil nothing and steve must leave. and so leaves me stranded on dominican republic with nowhere to go and nothing to do. i wander aimlessly till 3am and find a park and decide to bunker down till at least sunrise. i tie my bag to my arm and use clothes as pillows and sleep in this park. not recommended.
not the safest neighborhood but hey, im here. wake after 3 hours of sleep and head to the marina to beg for a ride anywhere. find a french canadian couple heading to peurto rico. DONE. FUCK YEAH. i dont care as long as i have a place to sleep. spent a few nights in perto rico till meeting vince. vince recently retired from pratt and whitney after 30 years and is sailing solo. im in. leave peurto rico headed for dominca. This little portion of ocean is referred to as the oceans tongue. Not sure why but i can say this, we got hit with the ugliest storm hes seen in years.
It was a 4 day shot to Dominica. so avoiding some kind of bad weather was impossible. I've been into endurance sports within the last few years or so and long term sailing taught me something I thought I already knew- how not to quit. If you're running and it hurts, you quit. If you're biking and it hurts, you take a break. When you're sailing and your boat is overpowered, its 3am, the wind is whipping at 35knots, its raining bullets, your sails are out of control, your keel is out of the water and you have absolutely no choice but to pull through it - quitting is not an option.
I quickly became obsessed with this concept and gained an even greater respect for the age old transportation method of sailing. Just when you think you're the only one crazy enough to be out doing this, you pull into a harbor in the middle of nowhere and there are 50 other boats swaying on their anchor lines.
life on the ocean really comes to a screeching hault. traveling at 7-8 knots for days on end is a disciplining journey. you end up spending alot of time reading, doing nothing or just in your head. which may or may not be a good thing. with the exception of the few short spurts of exhilaration and intense work. my ipod was my savior more times then i couldve counted. album of the sailing excursion: Pilate-sell control for lifes speed.
so finally make it to Dominica. vince was staying put for a while before heading back north. this leaves me stranded again. I spent the next couple days exhausting all resources and speaking to probably every english speaking person with a boat before i said fuck it and accepted my failure. Flight from dominica to cartagena colombia $600. ouch. oh well. it was one hell of a ride. now get me off this boat and onto solid land. colombia here i come.
. i left the port of miami with john and che (27 year old from south africa) on january 13. first stop was to check into port of customs in the bahamas. which means 2 straight days chugging along at a whopping 6 knots (8mph) which meant i spent the better part of those first couple days expelling anything i had consumed the prior 72 hours in a greenish yellow liquid form. we arrive in south andros island and stay offshore cause we were under the impression that you 36 hours to check into customs before consequences occur. wrong. the bahemians (is that what theyre called) were not pleased and we were awoken at 8am (28 hours after arriving) with the BDF bahemian defense forces knocking on our door and ushering us to check into customs asap. no problemo mahn. got that taken care of.after checking into customs we depart for the east side of andros where there is some incredible diving. che is a master diver and john has 2 hookah rigs set up on the boat that allows diving up to about 30 feet using breathing through a hose connected to an air compressor on the boat. we did some diving off a vertical wall. one of the steepest vertical walls in the entire bahamas. the depth goes from 15 feet deep to 350 feet deep within 100 horizontal feet. vertical walls are optimum breeding grounds for all sorts of sea life. the deep, cold, nutrient rich water is forced up the wall allowing all types of coral reefs to grow which is the basis for entire marine ecosystems. The sheer drop off is a spectacle for everyone to see.
On the 2nd day of diving we decided to do a little spear fishing. short on dry food, with an endless ocean of fish, we headed to the waters with our spears and diving knives. before entering the water, i was given a few tips and pointers by john that went something as such:
"ok, 1st of all take off your necklace and any shiny objects cause barracuda and reef sharks are attracted to that. 2nd, if you speer a tuna (like i know what the fuck a tuna looks like) make sure to let out alot of line cause that thing will take you for a ride. 3rd, if you catch mahi or grouper, keep it away from your body cause predator fish will come at it and you dont want them biting at your chest. and 4th, dont catch anything bigger then 3 feet or 30lbs."
gotchya john.
jump in the water and start flopping around like a helpless single finned seal swimming in whatever direction the current takes me. not 5 minutes later i spot my dinner. Set the trigger, and creep slowly closer to the fish. BANG (not really bang, not much sound under water but you get the point) spear enters the gill of unknown giant fish. perfect shot. Then this thing took me for a the ride my life. appearantly im not michael phelps and i cant outswim a 35lb white fin tuna. i was helpless. The big fish dragged me about 50 feet before pulling my knife out and cutting the line. looks like another night of macaroni and cheese for dinner.
Next onward we go to Georgetown. the next biggest city in the bahamas next to nassau. this city makes ferndale look like paris. john and che are heading to remote islands after this port so time that i arrange for my next ride. i met a guy named steve heading to turks and caicos and then dominican republic. a step in the right direction. we stop over night in turks and do some night diving for lobster. incredible. grab a spear, dive in the shallow 10 ft water, spear the lobster, rip off its tail and return with fresh lobster tail for dinner. sure beats the mac n cheese.
we dove over a blue hole which is an underground volcano that comes up to about 30ft below the surface and is about 1000 ft wide in the middleof the ocean and the water above it is as calm as glass. not a single ripple. its pretty amazing.
we arrive in dominican republic so that steve can refuel. its a 48 ft custom made severson sailboat but needs to fuel up cause i guess deizel is cheap there. steve is leaving the DR and heading to smaller islands in the British virgin islands. so i must arrange for my next ride here or run the risk of being stranded in the BVI´S and pay an arm and leg for a flight out. Ill roll the dice and try to hitch my next ride. steve offers to stay an extra night to give me some time to search. 2nd day there and stil nothing and steve must leave. and so leaves me stranded on dominican republic with nowhere to go and nothing to do. i wander aimlessly till 3am and find a park and decide to bunker down till at least sunrise. i tie my bag to my arm and use clothes as pillows and sleep in this park. not recommended.
not the safest neighborhood but hey, im here. wake after 3 hours of sleep and head to the marina to beg for a ride anywhere. find a french canadian couple heading to peurto rico. DONE. FUCK YEAH. i dont care as long as i have a place to sleep. spent a few nights in perto rico till meeting vince. vince recently retired from pratt and whitney after 30 years and is sailing solo. im in. leave peurto rico headed for dominca. This little portion of ocean is referred to as the oceans tongue. Not sure why but i can say this, we got hit with the ugliest storm hes seen in years.
It was a 4 day shot to Dominica. so avoiding some kind of bad weather was impossible. I've been into endurance sports within the last few years or so and long term sailing taught me something I thought I already knew- how not to quit. If you're running and it hurts, you quit. If you're biking and it hurts, you take a break. When you're sailing and your boat is overpowered, its 3am, the wind is whipping at 35knots, its raining bullets, your sails are out of control, your keel is out of the water and you have absolutely no choice but to pull through it - quitting is not an option.
I quickly became obsessed with this concept and gained an even greater respect for the age old transportation method of sailing. Just when you think you're the only one crazy enough to be out doing this, you pull into a harbor in the middle of nowhere and there are 50 other boats swaying on their anchor lines.
life on the ocean really comes to a screeching hault. traveling at 7-8 knots for days on end is a disciplining journey. you end up spending alot of time reading, doing nothing or just in your head. which may or may not be a good thing. with the exception of the few short spurts of exhilaration and intense work. my ipod was my savior more times then i couldve counted. album of the sailing excursion: Pilate-sell control for lifes speed.
so finally make it to Dominica. vince was staying put for a while before heading back north. this leaves me stranded again. I spent the next couple days exhausting all resources and speaking to probably every english speaking person with a boat before i said fuck it and accepted my failure. Flight from dominica to cartagena colombia $600. ouch. oh well. it was one hell of a ride. now get me off this boat and onto solid land. colombia here i come.
shaker thats awesome, way to make it down safe
ReplyDeletewish you would have told me! my aunt and uncle sail around the carribbean all winter. perhaps they could have helped :) sounds fantastic buddy, i am beyond envious. keep living the dream! have fun and be safe! xox - whit
ReplyDeleteShake that’s an amazing life adventure thus far (get a job). This reminds me of that family guy where Peter has theme music playing in every situation. First, floating out of the port it was Free Bird, then when that squall came rolling in it turned to Slipknot. Score big in Colombia for me and tell Amar Da Jesus needs a couple of 8 year olds dude.
ReplyDeleteShakes!!!!!!! Sounds like an amazing Journey. I almost feel like I'm there. Can't wait to her the story in person. I'll bring the brew!!!!
ReplyDelete