The Mighty Gulf Stream & Halloween on Bimini

Cobalt Blue Waters of Gulf Stream

I made the call to leave at 5 am on Wednesday with a NE wind at 15 knots that would be on our port beam as we cruised SE to Alice Town in North Bimini.  The sun rose to Top Shelf being surrounded by the coolest blue color in the world.  What I call the "Cobalt Blue Water" of the Gulf Stream.  When you go to the beach anywhere on the east coast, you look at blue water.  But compared to the Gulf Stream water, our coastal water is a green-blue color.  I spent a good part of the 12 hour cruise staring at this water.  It is something special to me. 

The Gulf Stream runs north between the Great Bahama Bank and Florida.  It's a massive amount of water that originates from the North Equatorial Current which splits north and south of the Hispaniola and Cuba.  When these currents join again, it is called the Gulf Stream which runs north at 3.5 knots.

Top Shelf is a trawler that cruises most efficiently at hull speed.  Hull speed is a function of boat length.  For Top Shelf which has a waterline length of 55 feet, the hull speed is 9.7 knots.  With our Cummins 450 diesels, this speed is achieved at 1450 rpm.

Cruising at 6.2 knots

Palm Beach to Bimini is 76 nautical miles basically southeast.  Cruising at 9.7 knots, we were directly taking on the Gulf Stream's 3.5 knots.  This left a forward speed of 6.2 knots...  It took forever, actually 12 hours, to cross the Gulf Stream.  If it wasn't for the cobalt blue water, that would have been one miserable passage.

Entering Bimini Harbor

We got into Bimini just before 5 pm.  It took and hour to clear customs, then we went out for dinner.  Bimini is true Bahamas, not the 5 star marinas we will stay in the next two stops.  The streets are narrow with building right up to the edge of the street.  If you were in the States, you would be scared walking down these streets at night.  But this is the Bahamas, and folks are just plain nice.  To make it even scarier, it was Halloween and the kids were all out trick or treating!

We had dinner with two Bahamian commercial fishermen from Spanish Wells.  You have the image of a salty USA fisherman.  These guys looked like GQ models from Miami.  I couldn't believe they earned a living fishing!  They dove for lobster using compressed air.  We had dinner talking about free diving, harvesting lobster, growing up in Spanish Wells, and one of the guys getting the "bends" from diving.  Interesting evening.  We were in bed early as we were leaving at first light for the next 80 nm leg of the journey.

Next Stop, the Private Island of Chub Cay....