I want to tell y'all about our first offshore "big adventure".  I think y'all might find it interesting (and comical in a way).  Up until this trip all of our sailing had been up and down the west coast of Florida.  Pretty routine.

Last May, Frank and I headed to the Bahamas.  We left Burnt Store mid-afternoon and by dark we were several miles offshore.  The wind (what little there was) was on our nose so we were motoring.  The moon was almost full and the sky was clear so it was a beautiful night and we were all excited about finally heading out on our adventure.  We planned to take 3 hour shifts and I was to begin at 1:00a.m.  It was hard to go to sleep since I was so excited but I did.  Then about 10:45p I woke up because the boat was bouncing pretty hard.  I went up to see what was going on.  We had entered an unpredicted wind and wave event.  As time went on, the wind and the waves increased (no rain or lightning). The current was behind us and the winds became steady at 30knts with gusts up to 36knts.  The waves grew to approximately 6 feet with every fourth wave about 8 feet (I was counting).  With those 8 footers the bow would plow through the water and go completely over the entire length of the boat.  The first time it happened the reflection of the running lights on the bow spread about 3 feet to each side of the boat.  My comment was "Shoot, it broke our lights".  I wasn't worried about our situation; I was worried that it hurt our boat.  Quickly I learned it was just the light shimmering through the water.  All of us were harnessed and tethered to the cockpit.  We never felt scared - just a little queasy.  The boat handled beautifully!  It was as if it was on a joy ride! Although at times the power of the waves would slow us down to 1.5knts, our boat kept plugging along.  What a GREAT boat!  This lasted 7+ hours.  It started to calm down around dawn.  Whew!!! What a night!  To add a little insult to injury, Frank had not completely closed the forward hatch so you can imagine how everything in the forward stateroom was drenched, including all the linens under the bed.  I had asked him before we left if all the hatches were secure and in an "impatient tone" he said yes.  Well as we arrived in Marathon and discovered the "water issue" he looked so green I didn't have the heart to say anything - in fact nobody said a word, we just cleaned it up.  No harm.

What a way to experience our first overnighter.  But, after that, everything was a "piece of cake".  We absolutely loved the outer islands of the Bahamas (Exumas).  It was more than we ever expected.  We're looking forward to going back and with more time we plan to head further south, maybe the Turks and Caicos.