Up early for our 6 am departure from Ft Lauderale to Great Sale Cay Bahamas. It's 120 miles and we estimate it will take us about 19 hours.

The New River at Ft Lauderdale is not really awake yet as we pull away from our slip in the dawn light heading for the ocean inlet and our exit US from waters toward the Bahamas. Depths offshore soon increase until the reading on the unit is just a line of dashes as the depth plunges to over 2500 ft.

It is an absolutely beautiful day for a crossing with a fairly cloudless sky and an ocean that is about as flat as we have ever seen it. Winds are light and variable but generally in the right direction and with full sail and some engine we're soon cruising along at a reasonable 6.5 knots.

The forecast is good although a front is due later in the day and we'd like to be in sheltered waters before it's northerly gusts stir up the gulf stream.

About three hours into the journey we locate the gulf stream and Alexia picks up speed to an amazing 9.3 knots as this northbound flow gives us an extra boost. There is little sea traffic - a few ships stacked high with containers and perhaps half a dozen yachts heading in various directions and the occasional fishing boat.

By 5.30 pm the sun is getting low in the sky behind us, it looked like a huge orange and seemed to grow in size at it got lower on the horizon.

At 7pm, with five hours still to go, we reach the flats of the Little Bahama Bank, the only indication of our arrival being the depth meter, which went from off soundings to 20ft in a matter of a few minutes.

It is till 50 miles to the nearest chunk of land at Great Sale Cay and the steady breeze during this time keeps our sails full. A bright, almost full, moon is now beaming down catching the tops of the little wavelets making them sparkle.

Dinner by moonlight was a steaming dish of good ol' bangers and mash with ketchup followed by Eton mess, made with the last of our fresh strawberries, cream and meringues!! How good can it get???

At 23.00 William calls 'Land, a'hoy" as the low, dark, smudgy outline of Great Sale Cays starts to loom in the distance. There are some lights twinkling and through the binoculars we see mast lights of about 14 other boats already in the anchorage.

Great Sale Cay, a former satellite tracking station, is uninhabited, long, very narrow and has an inhospitable rocky shoreline that makes it difficult to get ashore but It is a welcome anchorage - a great staging area for boats entering/exiting the Bahamas and offering protection in most weather with its long curving shore line - beyond which the Atlantic Ocean continues on, uninterrupted, toward the UK.

We weave our way between the anchored boats, nudging in toward shore, which we can see clearly in the moonlight, dropping anchor in 7.2ft of water at 24.15.

Once we have finished securing things for the night we sit on deck at 1.00 drinking our hot chocolate in complete quiet, looking up at a clear sky full of stars and a bright moon.