Manjack (pronounced Monjack)
21 April 2013 | Manjack Cay
Our journey is winding down for this season. Joe and Joy aboard High Spirits, and we left Marsh Harbor on Saturday, April 13th and headed northeast towards Whale Cay and then north to Manjack Cay. Manjack was a place we did not visit on the trip South in the Abacos when we were travelling with Wendell and Linda. The winds at the end of February were not suitable to anchor in Manjack Bay. This time the winds were easterly and the bay was settled and very sheltered. It was also beautiful. Getting there was not without its excitement though. The Whale Cay is a land mass that separates the Sea of Abaco from the Atlantic Ocean. In order to proceed north you have to go out into the ocean, around Whale Cay and then come back into the Sea of Abaco. Just after we rounded the Whale, we were hit with a squall that dumped a couple of inches of rain on us and kicked up winds that were close to 30 kts. Joe and Joy were about a half mile ahead of us and were invisible to us until the rain subsided. Some fun, but it didn't last long and things settled down for the remainder of our trip to Manjack. We arrived around 1500 hours, dropped the hook, and jumped into the crystal-clear water for a well-deserved swim. Then the next squall hit and we tested the integrity of our anchor for about 20 minutes. We held strong and that ended the squalls for the remainder of our trip.
We stayed in Manjack for two days. On day two, we went exploring on this mostly uninhabited island. A couple that live there provides beach chairs and signs directing you to the ocean-side beach and warn you of the free-range chickens roaming the area. They also have a sign that says, "Trespassers Welcome"! Marg and I hiked through the mangroves to the ocean beach. We saw curly tailed lizards, sand crabs, unspoiled mangroves and miles of completely deserted beach. That was worth the price of admission.
Later that day, Marg and Joy and Corky (another boater we met) and I took our dinghies across the bay and went fishing. We had a contest, boys vs. girls, about who could catch the most fish. It was a tie. We each caught 6 fish. Marg baited her hook with a shrimp, caught a fish, removed it from the hook and actually cleaned it. I'm surprised she didn't eat it raw. That night, the six of us had a fresh fish dinner that was better than anything I have had in a restaurant.
The next morning, we pulled the anchor and headed north to Great Sale for our last night on the Little Bahamas Bank. It was a long trip from Manjack, about 8 hours. After we had travelled about 2 hours, our voltage regulator quit working so the batteries were no longer charging. We estimated that we would be completely out of battery power before we arrived at Great Sale if we didn't figure out what was wrong. Marg was driving while I had my head in the engine compartment checking fuses and connections when I saw a broken wire that ran from the alternator to the voltage regulator. I re-connected it and Voila, all was well with the universe. We actually sailed a good ways to Great Sale and spent a very restful night at anchor.
Finally, on April 16th we set sail for West End on Grand Bahama Island for our last night in the Bahamas. We decided to stay at the Old Bahama Bay Marina. This is the port of entry where our Bahamian adventure began back in February and we thought it fitting that our visit to the Bahamas end there. We went out to dinner with Joe and Joy, got a good night's sleep and headed back across the Gulf Stream to West Palm Beach.
The crossing was bumpy but not eventful despite the fact that we broke the first rule of Gulf Stream crossing, "Never go across the stream if the wind has any northerly component." The winds were predicted to be northeasterly at 8 to 13 knots. Of course, the weather report was wrong, more like 10 to 17 knots, but we did fine. We arrived at the Lake Worth Inlet in West Palm at 1630 hours, right at slack tide which made the entrance to the inlet very easy. We were back in the US of A after nearly two months of cruising the Abacos. The next day, on the 18th, we left West Palm and sailed up the Atlantic to Fort Pierce and returned to our home port arriving at about 1500 hours. We were sad the adventure was over, but glad to be back to reliable internet service, cell phones that worked, well-stocked and reasonably priced grocery stores, good pizza and affordable beer. We'll return next season. The Abacos are huge and we only saw at most, a third of them. We now know the places we liked and the places we'd skip on the next trip and we have six months to plan our next adventure. Stay tuned.