E-COURSE: Cruise the Bahamas!
For many East Coast sailors, the Bahamas serves as their first foreign port as cruisers. This relatively short leap (from South Florida, anyway) has many first-timers making list after list and studying weather patterns and Gulf Stream conditions for weeks ahead of time, yet still thinking they might be missing something. If you are planning your first voyage to the Bahamas, relax—frequent CW author and creator of The Boat Galley (theboatgalley.com) Carolyn Shearlock has developed a digital course just for you.
In Get Ready to Cruise the Bahamas! ($39; resources .theboatgalley.com) Shearlock will take you through step-by-step all you need to know, from the paperwork and legalities, to where to get weather info, how to keep in touch, provisioning and more. Included in the course are downloadable forms, checklists and spreadsheets, plus plenty of links to recommended guides, charts and gear.
I found the course easy to navigate, and I appreciate that I can go back anytime to revisit the information. The course has recently been updated to reflect changes due to both last year’s Hurricane Dorian’s devastation to the Abacos and the current COVID-19 pandemic.