Back to the GOM
This past summer in Bavaria was filled with pleasant walks and bike rides around corn fields, a visit to a beer museum, and my continuing search for street art. The summer was also consumed with anxiety over the 2016 US presidential election campaign and its aftermath. It was the first time in two decades that I felt embarrassed for my country. Listening to the election results from across the Atlantic I heard comments like primal scream, dancing off the cliff, a white-lash, left-behind deplorables, the villain is the star, . . . and much worse. It was a sad moment to be abroad as I went around meeting neighbors saying, “I’m sorry.”
Snow flurries were predicted in Bavaria and the car dealership advised changing to snow tires. It was time for my twenty-second annual migration back to the warm sunny shores of the Gulf of Mexico. Fortunately, my head is filled with many memories of pleasant returns to Florida.
In 1987 I sailed my 32-foot junk-rigged schooner, Sabra, from Cuba to Florida capping a memorable voyage. The trip had started in similar cold weather at an ice-choked marina in downtown Washington, DC. Eagerly, I headed for the warmer climate of Hispaniola and a newly designated whale sanctuary off the Dominican Republic. I motor-sailed down Chesapeake Bay and south via the Intracoastal Waterway to Beaufort, North Carolina. Then my brother and I headed into the Atlantic Ocean for a long and chilly winter sail to the Caribbean.
Sabra cruised over 5,000 nautical miles and visited 22 islands in the lush Caribbean Basin, one of the world’s great marine ecosystems. The area is home to many rare marine species, including endangered sea turtles, coral reefs, and humpback whales. I enjoyed the experience of representing an environmental public-policy research organization and promoting conservation measures in the Caribbean crucial to the survival of the marine ecosystem.
The six-month journey was an opportunity to observe spectacular scenery and contact many environmentalists involved in marine conservation. The aim was to discussed ways to join forces and help with local initiatives such as protecting the newly designated humpback whale sanctuary off the coast of the Dominican Republic. Other discussions throughout the Caribbean covered the continued extermination of endangered species, conservation of threatened sea turtles, curbing trade in tortoiseshell and coral jewelry, the destruction of sensitive coral reefs and sea grasses due to anchoring, destruction of mangrove forests critical to marine habitat, plastic pollution of the seas, and the growing pressures of tourism on marine habitats.
The highlight of the trip was sailing to Havana, Cuba and meeting with officials from the Ministry of Fisheries. We were encouraged by their openness when after several meetings the Cubans agreed to send, for the first time, a Cuban observer to the July meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora (CITES) in Ottawa. Cuba is by far the largest island in the Caribbean and a substantial source of international trade in sea turtle products. Their continued participation in CITES would be a very important step in controlling this trade in the Caribbean Basin.
A few months spent in the Caribbean allowed for a mere introduction to some of the complex environmental issues facing the islands. However, brief as the voyage was, the impressions gained reaffirmed the importance of the islands to the sensitive nature of their marine ecosystems. Sabra returned with a wealth of information and a busy agenda for further conservation initiatives in the Caribbean. Along the way, Sabra collected stories of people and the aquatic life around them, the wonders of the Gulf Steam, digressions on the Sargasso Sea, the life cycle of whales, coral reef building, . . . and a little poetry.
Passage by Kit Armstrong
The waves murmur faint protest
as they part before the bow.
Foam hissing softly, they glide alongside,
disappearing astern into the night.
An island of light
in the dark that surrounds,
the compass is steady, reassuring.
The sails curve taught and full.
The groan of mast, sigh of rigging, tremor of hull
articulate the embrace of boat, wind and water
that compels us forward.
We pass the hours over mugs of tea,
talking quietly─
of the day just past,
of the lights of a far off ship,
of adventures known and longed-for,
of our fears and dreams.
Or we sleep, alternating,
curled in the cockpit,
lulled by the gentle rhythm of the boat
and our comfortable companionship.
The Southern Cross hangs suspended
off the starboard bow,
gradually slipping toward the horizon.
Stars beyond counting, dazzling in their multitudes,
arc their courses across the sky,
easing our way toward dawn.
We are friends,
Sharing a night passage.
Sabra’s return voyage from Marina Hemingway, on the outskirts of Havana, crossed the Florida Straits and Gulf Stream to the Conch Republic, otherwise known as Key West. It is good to have a store-full of pleasant homecoming memories.
