The Bahamas, leaving Georgetown and beyond

Time to leave Georgetown as I mentioned in our last blog.

March 11th Sunday

Time to go, its going to very different now, we did have fun in Georgetown.

Off to Lee Stocking Island, a smashing journey, just 29 nm, lovely calm waters just a few boats here.

March 12th Monday A short trip just under 3 hours and we were in one of our favourite places Rudder Cay. Shame we could only stay one night as we heard that the weather was misbehaving again and we needed to take some shelter from the West winds.

March 13th Tuesday.

Blackpoint again, great place we took a quick dinghy trip ashore for a walk and lunch, we do like this place. This will be one of our most memorable stops for a long time, lets just say probably the worst rolling, bouncing and awful times until now. Pearl bucked like some wild bronco, our table and TV fell over and now way could I attempt to make a hot drink never mind cook anything. Having said that we had a much better ride than some of the boats around us, there were sailing boats that were almost submarines buying their bows at times. So here we were stuck along with 30 + boats in this place for 3 days.

March 17th Friday.

It was a cold start, both of us with fleece jumpers on, the winds were still at 20 knots so we didn’t go too far, just 20 miles to Compass Cay.

March 18th Saturday.

Off to another favourite place Warderek Wells, we anchored outside as all the mooring balls were full. Saturday night is a “get together” for cruisers who meet up for drinks and nibbles exchanging stories and lots of laughs. We met some nice folk that gave us some useful info on how to do some of the passages we would like to do. I have way too many photos of this place to post, shame, maybe one day I will.

We exchanged information, food and a few drinks

Sometimes it goes on quite late

On Sunday we did manage to go inside the lagoon and pick up a mooring, lets just say with the bow being so high and the ball pennants being very short it was not an easy task. Very little room to manoeuvre Pearl with strong winds too. We did go ashore and take a walk over the island and up to Boo Boo Hill. This place is so pretty!

View from Boo Boo Hill 

There we are second on the right

Ours is in there somewhere from the last time we came 

Sign to the Beach

Local resident

Thats something we don't do very often, pick up a mooring ball, way too close to other boats

21st March Tuesday.

Just a 3 hour trip today to Skipjack Point, its cool and a little rolly again but it did calm down at night.

22nd March Wednesday.

Well this is somewhere we haven’t been to before over to Andros Island to cut down time spent in the Northwest passage which can get rough. A 55nm trip 7 hours and it was pretty calm for a change.  

March 23rd

Fresh Creek, the trip into “town” it has a ferry dock, small petrol station which looks in a very sorry state, it has a tiny store with a few groceries.

Its in a sorry state

The marina or I should say whats left of it after a hurricane is in a pretty bad way, closed and I doubt it will ever reopen.

We walked quite a way, saw hardly any road traffic, the children must have just left school. I chatted with 2 little girls, one of which who was obviously prompted by her mother that she made straw baskets, looking for a sale maybe.

Even the metal bridge is in need of some TLC

All washed up in the entrance to the bay

The anchorage in Fresh Creek is pretty small, just us for the whole time, we could see the sea raging just beyond the reef and when the wind changed direction yet again we rocked and rolled. Its the first time we had to put out a stern anchor to keep us in the correct orientation to stop us from getting any worse. Don very cleverly managed to do this without lowering the dinghy and taking the anchor away.

Then this came

We ended up staying for 4 nights, the weather grabbed us in its grip again, we weren't going anywhere. The wind and sea doing its best to shake us about. Don mentioned he was here before in his navy days and that there are nasty flies that sting. They are called "doctor flies" it seemed like every time Don went outside they tried to make a meal of him, he ended up with some pretty painful bites with big hard lumps. Will these fronts with northerly winds ever stop? The sea state is way to rough and in these shallow waters are very dangerous

Monday March 27th

Our plan was to traverse the inside reef, our hearts in our mouth until we reached a small anchorage just before Morgans bluff, we had a still night but we knew the anchor hadn’t really set and we did drag, its always difficult when its shallow sand over hard coral. That was at Mastic Bay, strange name for a place where the anchor dragged.

Tuesday 28th March The following morning on we went in the inside reef up to a cut out into the ocean to cross again. 

A fantastic crossing, can’t believe its so flat, it was pretty deep and we can see huge starfish on the bottom, at least 15 - 20 feet deep.

So wish it was like this every time

Great conditions for a change

 57nm heading for Great Harbour in the Berry Isles. We dropped the anchor in Little Slaughter. The only signs of life were small boats which carried the staff for the island made for the cruise ship passengers which was not far away.

We left at 06:40, I wondered if we woke anyone up on the cruise ship

Wednesday March 29th
So off we go again to Abacos. Moores Island, the first “true” Bahamian island, we were the only tourists. The town dock had 2 large fishing boats one of which looks like its not moved in years. There are a few smaller docks where the small fishing boats come in with their catch, mostly conch, snapper and lobster. Of course we had to lighten their lobster catch and at 9 $ a pound ( just tails ) we were delighted with our find.

We took lunch at the only place to eat and yet again a real bargain at 22 $ for both of us including a drink, pork chops with veg, and lamb chops with veg. Theres just one grocery store and we did buy a loaf of bread, 2 tomatoes, a small lettuce and a can of orange juice, cost 18.20 $ ouch!.

Thursday March 30th

Another 06:50 start for a 64 nm trip to Crab Cay an nice roomy anchorage
our first stop in the Abaco, a very well protected place but theres nothing there just 15 other boats.

So I'm ending this blog here for now and hope I can update again soon with the remainder of the trip back to the US.

BFN

Glenys and Don 

M/Y Pearl