"Restless" in Hope Town
14 April 2008 | Hope Town, Elbow Cay, Abacos
Mike
April 13...Fisher Bay to Hope Town
As forecast, the wind piped up this morning to about 20kts and since we were on a lee shore Sapphire was rocking and rolling. Our anchor held well but walking around the boat was difficult. At about 9am a Sunsail boat came in (chartered sailboat) to attempt to pick up a mooring next to us. They looked ok heading up wind to the mooring with one of the girls on the foredeck with a dock pole. But things went south quickly from there. The Captain wasn't able to get the boat close enough to the mooring for the girl to grab the line with her dock pole. On the third attempt she was able to grab the mooring but couldn't hold it when the boat floated back over the dock pole which was attached to the mooring on one end and the girl on the other. She held on as long as she could, bending the pole and almost breaking her arm in the process, but eventually had to let go. The dock pole was still attached to the loop on the mooring line so on their next attempt she jumped in to rescue the pole.
At that point, with someone in the water in three foot seas, it ceased being entertainment so I jumped in the dinghy to assist. By the time I arrived the young lady was back on board with the pole but the pick up had caused them to drift into another boat behind. After some quick fending off they were back in the general area of the mooring. I took their line and ran it through the loop on the end of the mooring and returned it to the boat. By that time there were three dinghies on the scene to make sure that their boat was correctly secured.
Shortly after, we hauled anchor and with "Restless" headed south for Hope Town. We sailed on mizzen and staysail for about 8 miles and anchored behind some small islands for protection while we waited for the tide to rise enough to get into the harbor. At about 1pm we took off for the 2 mile run into Hope Town and picked up the moorings that Steve had reserved a few days ago.
We spent the remainder of the afternoon reading. Steve and I took a short dinghy tour of the harbor looking at boats but that was about it for entertainment. We will be here for at least 3 more days so there will lots of time to explore. Lots of our friend say that this is their favorite town in the Bahamas.