Ending my very last charter on sweet Bella!

Spent the morning exploring Bald Head Island by golf cart, then left the marina and sailed out the inlet. Beautiful conditions for a nice relaxing sail. Turned around and came on in to anchor for the night.

Day one of my last little charter on Bella! Got some lovely repeat customers onboard for a 2 night trip.

Fullll circle indeed! Two seasons of WB-USVI complete. Felt pretty wild bringing Bella back in the inlet to Wrightsville today. And with 3 other young crew with me! Also multiple dolphin visits this morning!! We made incredible time for the first 36 hours - beautiful 18kt winds that pushed us along at 8-10kts. Thennn it died, but the glassy calm ocean was beautiful in its own way. Ate good food, played lots of hangman, slapped each other with tortillas, and journaled a lot. Gotta have a good mix of laughs and introspection out there. I also got to explore some new spots in the Bahamas this time around - the beautiful Abacos! Our final anchorage before this leg was my favorite for sure. Moraine Cay was definitely the best way to end my island season.

Easy sail over to our snorkel spot! One last stop before we head home! During this sail I made little key lime pies!

Very excited to jump in the water and check out this reef! Got the place all to ourselves :)

Motor-sailed up to Powell Cay after our little pit stop in Hope Town. So so so beautiful here. Going to enjoy this one last night on anchor before starting the trek up to NC! Also excited to wake up and see this anchorage in the daylight :) Repped our Goombay punch shirts 😎 we scored (free) at the regatta in Georgetown. Just lookin like a bunch of goons

Got an earlyyy start north to Warderick Wells for a nice hike before our long sail! Just as gorgeous as I remember. Then we spent the day sailing up and across the banks. Made it past the shallows/rocks before dark and thennnn our autopilot went completely dark. Lost depth, AIS, and wind speed too. Not so great for nighttime sailing in the Bahamas! We fiddled with some wires (which we had found seemed to be causing the autopilot to go dark momentarily whenever we hit a big wave and then kick back on) for a while with no luck. So hand steering it was! At least it was just one night with 4 people. I slept like a rock all cozy on the floor of the helm! Morning came aaaand just like that, it all came back on! Caroline says it was afraid of the dark. Now we’re anchored safely in Hope Town and it’s time to investigate further. Also idk why the track stopped and made it look like I sailed over an island…

New crew! Day sail from Georgetown to Staniel Cay. 2/4 crew were feeling seasick, but it was a good sail and nice to arrive at the beautiful Staniel Cay with good daylight left.

Stocking Island to Staniel Cay! Beautiful day! Perfect wind and lots of flying fish! Missed the storms that were all around us! Yummy Lima beans for lunch!

Staniel Cay to Hope Town! With a stop at wardwick wells to hike. (I probably spelled that wrong) Great wind and weather. Barracuda count is at 3. All fun until the autopilot that has been finicky when crashing on big waves went out right before nightfall and this time I couldn’t bring it back to life. (Im autopilot cpr certified) Nothing I haven’t done before :/ hand steering! The autopilot decide to come back on and act like nothing happened around 8:30am this morning. Always an adventure aboard SV Bella! Oh and as we were coming into hope town we passed by a sport fisher in the inlet which was BB a sport fish from wrightsville beach… small small world!

Sailed under the Caicos Bank and up to the Crooked Islands. Found an epic anchorage that we had all to ourselves (except for a couple sharks). Oh and a pair of dolphins guided us in the cut, right to where we dropped anchor! We explored for a day and just enjoyed the solitude in nature. Next stop was the north end of Long Island, Calabash Bay. Just a little pit stop for some calm water, banana pancakes, and a swim before making the final stretch across to Georgetown. A good mix of sailing and stopping over the past few days!

400nm on the dot! Found a sandy little spit of land to tuck behind last night at 2am for some good sleep and a nice morning swim/shower. It’s been quite windy and swelly out there - taking waves over the deck and covering ourselves and Bella in salt. Planning to cross the bottom bit of the Caicos Bank today and then head into the Bahamas!

Came to the realization this morning that today is my last day in St John! Crazy to think I’ll be leaving these islands in just a few short days. Much love to STJ and all the beautiful spots I’ve called home this season!

Very bittersweet to be making this final lap around STJ… I do love lameshure!

Hit two snorkel spots between a couple slow and easy sails. Even accidentally power napped for about 15 min! (not while sailing)

A beautiful day for some cave snorkeling and hiking!

A wee motor to our next stop on charter! More SES gear in action :)

Got the whole crew working for this one! Braden and I went into instructor mode teaching our parents.

This one is bittersweet for sure. Closing out the season with a nostalgic group of family and friends (we all bareboated in SVIs together 8 years ago).

Woke up and bopped over to the Indians before breakfast. Snorkeled and munched, then sailed over to hurricane hole to snorkel the mangroves. Beautiful and peaceful as always! Then cruised the south side of STJ to Caneel for the night. A rainbow followed us most of the way! And the squalls it came from barely touched us :)

Nice little downwinder to Norman for snorkeling and hiking! Very fun to have someone else driving the boat for a change!

Just cruised over from Virgin Gorda to Marina Cay.

Made it to Saba! Lol not quite but still had a great evening at Bitter End and Saba Rock.

Definitely not the best weather for it, but we gave it a shot! First the starboard lazy jack snapped, then the port engine stopped. Two strikes and I wasn’t about to have a third. Tacked and sailed north to Virgin Gorda. Got the generator charging the batteries and the port engine started right up after we sat on anchor a couple hours. Change of plans, but it all worked out for the better. Now enjoying BVI for a few days. I’ll get to the real Saba one day!

Secretly baked an almond flour bday cake for one of my gf guests while everyone was swimming. Anna had the bright idea to hide it up top to cool :))

Girls are fully acclimated to boat life now. Waited out the rain at Francis, then snorkeled Waterlemon, had lunch and sailed back towards town to the tune of good ol 2016 vibes

Sailed to Solomon Bay/Cruz Bay to grab some things from town. Then the girls just enjoyed the sun while Anna and I set new personal bests freediving :)) I also landed square on top of the dinghy line when jumping in…

Repping some Sea Earth Sail merch :)) Loaded up 4 gals onboard (plus Anna and I) and headed east! Started the charter with a nice evening snorkel at Christmas cove.

After some yummy pancakes on Xander’s boat and a good scrub on Bella (in prep for charter pick up), we buddy sailed over to the ledges for a nice freedive. Then scooped another friend from Red Hook and continued on our way back to STT. Ended the evening with the most lovely Greek dinner party - homemade tofu pita, hummus, cucumber salad, lentil soup, and pasta salad! Also including a flick from the next morning’s dinghy ride to yoga with the same crew (in the rain..)

Sailed over to St John to meet up with some friends for dinner in town and of course a skinny dip after :)

Another flat calm day out there. Just anchored back at the home base and dropped charter. Now to devour the best veggie burgers on the island!! Gotta stick to my little post-charter tradition 😎

Started our day with a nice hike up the mountain from Cinnamon Bay. Then got underway with light winds, but had a gentle little squall come through that gave us a good push!

Veryyyy little wind all day but I tried sailing anyways. Went a whopping 2kts in 4-5kts of wind :) but the calm water has been great for freediving! Also Anna chopped my hair off a little bit.

After this morning’s 20-25kt wind out of absolutely nowhere, this was a nice calm one.

Spring break is definitely causing some traffic around here! So many moorings full! Had to change up the plans a bit, but it all worked out. Snorkeled Booby Rock - sooo pretty with fun rock formations for freediving! Then the wind picked up to 20-25kts! From nothing! Coral Bay had whitecaps!

Starting off another charter! First had to get the anchor untangled from an old mooring (wasn’t me that anchored there…) but that little dive/freedive mission was eventually a success and we got on our way.