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The Bahamas

Sailing Slow in The Bahamas

The Bahamas is primarily a sailing destination for me, so this destination entry will be a little unusual for me, since I don’t have accommodation or sightseeing recommendations. Instead, I’ll be sharing some of my photos and adventures here. A few to start…

Image shows an orange lifejacket hanging on a sailboat's rail. Behind the lifejacket, there is blue water, a sandy beach and a thicket of green trees.

The view from the boat.

Image shows Jez smiling at the camera while standing on a saiboat. She is wearing an aqua bikini and retro white sunglasses. Her hair is red and ppulled back into pigtails.

Sailing agrees with me, yes?

The Best Ride Ever…

Don’t you love him? He’s a 28-foot trimaran… we didn’t crash him once, though we did sail him up onto the beach to explore several times.

The image shows a picture of a sailboat anchored in the Bahamas. The boat is a small catamaran, painted blue, and the sails are up.

My Favorite Things: A Quickie Sailing Story!

Sailing in the Bahamas is wonderful but challenging because the water is shallow… really shallow. Navigating reefs and corals while making sure you’re not about to run aground is a harrowing experience, but the aquamarine waters and endless beaches to explore make the challenges worth it.

One stretch of the ocean isn’t so shallow, however: the Bahamas Canyon. The deepest part of this canyon is known as “The Tongue of The Ocean”, and this deep sea trench stretches 25 feet wide between Andros and New Providence Islands, and runs 124 miles long.

The Tongue of the Ocean is incredibly deep… about 6,000 feet deep. For context, light from the sun stops penetrating the water at around 1000 meters, or 3280 feet, and below that is what’s known as “the midnight zone”. That’s where the creatures that don’t need eyes live. A shark which has never been seen in situ was recently observed trolling the Tongue of the Ocean’s floor by a scientific recording device just a few month ago. It’s a weird, deep, mysterious spot, and no one’s really sure what’s down there.

Reader, I jumped into it.

I don’t know if I felt no fear because I didn’t think that hard about it, or because my stroke nuked some of the inhibition-regulating part of my brain (true story! It’s okay, I’ve learned to manage it with time.) But we laced two thick lines around me so I wouldn’t drift too far from the boat, and in I went.

Floating in that water that day, with no idea what was beneath me, I probably should’ve felt apprehensive, but instead I felt breathless at the mysteries the ocean still holds from humanity.

One of my favorite parts of traveling is that it reminds me each of us experience only a small part of what the world has on offer. There is so little we know, and yet, we get to experience so much, and learn more with each passing day. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so small or so grateful as I did that day, tied to a tiny boat and floating in that deep, dark ocean.

Image shows an overhead view of the Tongue of the Ocean, the depest water in the Bahamas. Light blue water surrounds a long channel of black-blue water between two islands.

The Tongue of the Ocean (reprinted with permission from NASA via Wikipedia)

Image shows Jezebel smiling in the middle of the ocean. She is tied to the back of the boat with a rope.

The Tongue of the Ocean is licking me!

One Tiny Helpful Tip If You Should Ever Find Yourself Sailing – If you get carsick, you are likely to get seasick! There are a number of remedies for this, from Dramamine to pressing on the right pressure point on your wrist (or buying a handy wristband that does it for you), but this is the best fix I’ve ever found: Stay aboveboard and concentrate on a fixed structure on short (or the horizon if you’re in the middle of the ocean with no land in sight!). This helps your brain recalibrate its predictive systems to the ship’s movement most quickly.

ADDITIONAL INFO

I’m going to fil in this guide in more detail as the blog develops, so check back in later. If you have questions about traveling in the Bahamas that you’d like me to answer, post a comment at the bottom of this page, and I’ll do my best to answer it ASAP!

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