JOE CHILBERG

PassageMaker Contributor Joe Chilberg's 'Last Blog'

I first cruised here in around 1958 with my parents and later returned with my own kids in 1986. Many of the boats are now bigger and homes more luxurious, but the charm of harbors is still the same.

There are plenty of old salts in my bloodline, but the coup de gras was when my dad “bought my mother;” a 1928 wooden double ended trawler that you had to put a pipe in the flywheel to start.

My favorite Crown Jewel on all the Chesapeake is St. Michaels. This charming village with a fabulous anchorage overlooking the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum is without peer.

I must confess that I was excited as the Chesapeake is one of the great cruising grounds in all the United States of America in my humble opinion.

It happened again. She stepped off and called him an “Animal.” He tossed her bag on the dock and accused her of being a “Dog.” They were both wrong. The problem was not that he was an animal or that she was a dog, but that they weren’t.

I am always amazed when I find a new place in the Bahamas, but this one is especially egregious. I have been cruising the Bahamas and the Abacos specifically since the 1980's, and have cruised past this place probably 50 or more times.

Our culture does not take kindly to nonconformity. It is the scorn of our peers probably more than anything else that hinders our living out of our unique center. The fear of others’ opinions—their ridicule—their cross examinations paralyzes us more effectively than flat-out opposition.

Well, I knew it would happen eventually. I hate it, but it has to be done. In order to avoid paying someone approximately the same amount as a Saudi Crown Prince’s monthly oil royalty, I had to do it.

This was my first time not going north over the bank to Abaco. There was a tiny pair of cays called Great and Little Bersus or Water Cay.

Life changes when you head down-island, and I think Robert Frost may have said it best: “In a world of fugitives, the one going in the right direction appears to be running away.”

Every time I set off on a long cruise I am anxious and, if I am honest, I’m somewhat panicked. What if something breaks? It will. What if plans don’t go as I thought? They won’t. So, Why go? Simple.

Trying to be a yachtsman without being rich is a challenge these days. BUT if money is power, the DIY boater reigns supreme.

As I sat on my flybridge on a quiet December evening, I realized that one must plan their cruise early or time just passes by and opportunity is lost. Here's to 2016.

With the annual Bahamas cruise coming to a close, Joe gets a reminder from the boating universe of the gravity that comes with the middle name Murphy.

Ah, the simple life. Could cruising be the way to realizing limitless happiness? When you lose some of the extras, other things do come into focus.

Forget what all those media news outlets have to say; we got an interesting tidbit from the only source that matters down here—a fishing charter captain.

So the battle continues as our dog Baci turns her attention from the dolphin (mammals) to the lobsters, and back to the dolphin (fish). But hey, at least the freezer is full!

We're preparing for the Bahamas departure in the next hour as we await our final diesel delivery by tanker. The final Florida leg was an adventure, with plenty on rain to spare.