Bahamas Tour. November and December.
After a great week in one of our favorite Florida anchorages, No Name Harbor, we found a great weather window to head to the Bahamas. We were D-U-N, done with Florida after a year of repairs. Even though the time in No Name was amazing, with dear friends, we were excited to move on. We checked into the Bahamas in Bimini. We had been there in March of 2020, just before Covid created such trouble. We sailed with Danny, Cindy, Steve, and Glenn. We had been using Glenn as slave labor for almost a week, so we thought sailing would be a good reward.
Checking in went well, even though I had to call on our IT guy to help me fill out the Click2Clear website. We had missed the detail that it is mandatory now. The first Customs guy was a bit touchy about our ignorance, but after I secured Steve to help make things happen, the first guy was at lunch. The second guy was like a website support specialist for cruisers. I think the paper method took less time, but maybe we can see how it goes checking out. We also walked the island, stopping to buy some Bimini sweetbread at Nate's. Three hundred calories a bite, but who's counting? Our favorite was the guava loaf. It's not that lightweight Wonder Bread. We needed a handtruck to carry it back to the boat.
We decided to do an overnight passage to Great Harbour Cay, so Glenn could experience a night under the stars, and do some shift work. He had already completed a dozen boat projects, now he had to take a turn at the helm. The passage was pleasantly uneventful, with an amazing night sky.
We have a friend with a dock in Great Harbour Cay, and enjoyed our time there. We helped out with some house projects because we wanted to, but it was fun to feel like we earned our dock time. Glenn flew out, back to regular life, and we transited around the island to pick up the new crew, including Melody, Conner, and Morgan. It's a one-mile drive, but a four hour sail. We wanted to anchor off the beautiful beach, though. We had west winds, so the night was not as rolly as it could have been.
We sailed around to White Cay, where we all had crazy adventures. I think it may be a post of its own. But there was a beer glass lost at sea, a presentation sent on a sketchy cell connection after a long dinghy ride, and rescues happened.
The next anchorage was Jaws Beach. (Yeah, where they filmed some of the 1970's movie. Just when you thought it was safe to read my blog again.) Steve dinghied Danny and Cindy to the beach to catch a plane to Colorado for their early Christmas visit. The rest of the crew enjoyed the islands around Nassau. One big favorite was Rose Island. We happened to be visiting our friend Rose at the same time Miles was visiting Rose.
When we returned, the core crew, Danny, Cindy, and Steve sailed up to Bird Cay. We didn't see many birds. We did find a shallow area with about a hundred conch! Maybe it should be named Conch Cay. Our friend in Great Harbour Cay had given us some tips on harvesting and cleaning conch, so we tried some conch fritters. Tasty! Beats Long John Silver's anytime.
We sailed up to the same anchorage as we stopped at on the way south, at White Cay, despite some trepidation about our last time anchored near the Cay. Steve decided to book his flight to the US out of Nassau, and a first flight on LeAir from Great Harbour Cay to Nassau. Now we had a schedule.
We have heard that having a schedule on a boat is not a good thing. Normally, that means you don't pick the wrong day to sail, just because you HAVE to be somewhere. For us, the next day, it meant that stuff can break. We had the mainsail up, and were just getting ready to put out the genoa, when I noticed that some of the new rigging up high (D2s) had way too much slack in them. While we were discussing this issue, one of them came off, dangling around the mast! While we were in "emergency take down the sail, we have lost enough masts to last a lifetime" mode, the other D2 came off. Apparently, our high-priced riggers missed the detail of putting cotter pins in the turnbuckles. We motored back to the anchorage, muttering under our collective breaths about how to take revenge.
We had enough cell service to contact the aforementioned rigger. I sent a picture, saying that "I'm not a rigging expert, but this seems wrong." He asked for our location to send someone to fix it.
I was honestly tempted to require someone to get on two airplanes, and a charter boat, to come to this remote location.
Cindy hoisted me up the mast the next day, in winds up to 20 knots, to reassemble, and try to tune, the wire rigging that had come loose. We decided to try using cotter pins. Novel idea.
We came off the dock, and anchored in the harbor, but decided the next day to go outside, near Rat Cay and the Gov't Dock, where the mailboats come in. We enjoyed many days there, exploring a blue hole, fishing, looking for lobster, and snorkeling on a wrecked DC-3 that was a drug-runner back in the eighties. We even met some cruisers we had seen in Annapolis during the boat show. Cruising is a small world.
We had a decision to make. North, or south? We had a friend in the Abacos, but he may be hard to connect with, based on where we thought we might cruise. Weather helped us decide. North it would be! **rousing music from "North to Alaska"**
We left in the afternoon, and had a calm overnight passage around the south of Great Abaco. Only one thing broke! We anchored off Lynyard Cay, and have been enjoying "the best snorkeling in the Abacos" and meeting some of the other cruisers.
One good thing about snorkeling the best spot in the Abacos, is that we actually snorkeled the best spot in the Abacos. The bad thing is that it is all downhill from here.
Our time here has been amazing, and is worth its own post. In the meantime, have a great New Year!
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