1 April
Great Bahama Banks
The photo is of our anchorage at Chub Cay, a beautiful setting, but a lousy anchorage. We spent Easter day and night there in 20 knot winds and constant rolling motion from the surging seas that came around the spit of land that protected us from the open ocean. The marina is beautifully built, but it and the surrounding unfinished resort are in receivership and are up for sale for $50 million. All these bankrupt developments must be connected to our banking and financial woes of recent. I guess congress bailed out many of the wealthy investors in these projects, a sickening thought.
After weathering several more cold fronts and visiting Norman Cay and Nassau again, we are on the final leg of our cruise, crossing the Great Bahamas Banks, a vast area on the west side of the Bahamas that averages 12 or 15 feet deep. It’s about 100 miles across, and we can’t make it across in one day, so we decided to stop for the night.
We are anchored about two thirds of the way across, about 30 miles from the nearest land, utterly alone in stillness and quiet. The only light is from the stars and occasional flashes of distant lightning on the eastern horizon from a storm that we skirted all day. The North Star shows that we are anchored with the bow pointed due south in nearly motionless seas. There is no sound other than our voices and the faint creaking and groaning noises from the boat. And it’s not just me and my bad hearing, Pat and Janna agree that our world is silent. It’s a unique experience to savor.
2 April
We arose with the sun and headed west for Cat or Gun Cay, where we plan to spend the night before crossing the Gulfstream tomorrow. The water was so clear and still that we seemed to be floating in a swimming pool. We see starfish, small plant life, rocks, and shells on the sandy bottom 12 feet below us. There are no fish.

We returned to Staniel Cay two days ago to wait out passage of yet another cold front. The wind has been around 20 knots out of the north, with 6 - 8 foot seas, but we are in a very protected spot, so we are quite comfortable. We are all getting pretty tired of cold fronts and hope to have some of the warm weather usually prevalent this time of year as we work our way back north up the Exumas.
Today we went ashore for lunch and encountered a colorful looking local guy from Connecticut, whom we had seen yesterday driving the most unusual water craft pictured in this blog entry. He could pass for a character out of Waterworld, the Kevin Costner movie that featured all kinds of novel people and water craft. He has eked out a living on Staniel Cay doing metal work of an undetermined nature for the past 11 years and seemed a nice enough guy, but as we talked he occasionally got a far-away look in his eye as if he was in another space.
Before leaving Emerald Bay we rented a car and drove to Georgetown for the day and were able to get in a short visit with the crew of S/V Chinook, Jeremy, Heather, Thea and Shea whose home port is the same as Larry's on the beautiful Flathead Lake in Dayton Montana. They are about half way through a year - long cruise and are enjoying the experience of a lifetime in the process. It was pretty neat to see them in this far away place.
Cruisers are, for the most part, a very friendly and convivial kind of person. Wherever we meet, at a beach, store, café, bar or Laundromat, a natural conversation is easy and usually begins with where you are going and where you have been. If headed in opposite directions, tips are exchanged concerning upcoming anchorages and attractions. The conversation invariably changes to the language of Boatspeak and involves discussions of anchor types and size, boat repairs and parts, past ports of call. It's kind of like being in a close mobile neighborhood. Having previously cruised for 6 years, Pat and Janna are much more proficient at Boatspeak , but I am learning.

We made it to Emerald Bay Marina on Great Exuma Cay yesterday after sailing about 6 hours in 6 to 8 foot waves. We were all tired from holding on to the boat and enjoyed our first real shower in 3 weeks shortly after arriving. Life is good! The marina and facilities are first class. We have good WIFI here and I added a bunch of photos to the gallery section of the blog.

We enjoyed visiting the Black Point settlement on the way here and spent a beautiful night anchored off Cave Cay. Tomorrow We will visit Georgetown and head out Tuesday on our return trip back up the Exumas.

We have been hanging out around here over the past five days waiting out two cold fronts and accompanying bad weather. On Sunday we went ashore in the rain and had lunch at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club, where the food was good and reasonably priced by Bahamian standards. There are definitely worse places to get stuck for a week, as we are in a very protected anchorage, the area is beautiful, and there are three stores to serve our basic needs. All three stores combined would be smaller than a 7-11, with about 1% of the goods stocked. The shower I had anticipated didn’t materialize, so we continue to bathe in the sea. Surprisingly, if you dry off thoroughly as soon as you get out of the water you don’t even feel sticky.
We have all been struck by the friendliness and courtesy of all the Bahamians we have encountered. They invariably greet you with a smile and a greeting, as though they enjoy having you as a visitor. We met the exception yesterday at Batelco, the Bahamian phone service. The woman there reminded me of the “soup nazi” on Seinfield. She seemed displeased to have to sell me a hundred dollars worth of cell phone service.
Today another cruiser came by and gave us the largest lobster I have ever seen. Since we are obviously ignorant of how to prepare a lobster for cooking, he even cleaned it for us. We thanked him profusely, as he refused to even accept a cold drink for the favor. Guess what we are having for dinner tonight.
We hope to leave Thursday and go to Black Point, a traditional Bahamian settlement a few miles south of Staniel. We plan to spend one night there and then continue on to Little Farmers Cay and then to Emerald Bay marina for three nights. It’s part of a Sandals Resort and has all the amenities.
Chris Parker broadcasts an excellent weather forecast every morning on HF radio and he predicted that tonight’s cold front will be the last of the season. Sure hope so.

Written on 27 Feb 2013

We have been cruising for two weeks today and the days have passed swiftly for the most part. I have to admit that we are looking forward to spending a few days in relative civilization in Staniel Cay, where they have ice cream, showers, Laundromats, bread, phone service, etc. We plan to be there in a couple of days, in time to wait out the passage of a “cold front”. That means higher winds and waves for a few days, but not much change in temperature from the high 70’s.
We have been moored at the park for 3 days in a narrow channel of deeper dark green water, surrounded by waist deep water in varying hues of light green. One has to learn to judge the depth of the water by it’s color and navigate accordingly, as most of the charts for this area are old and not very accurate. It’s very possible to cruise right over the top of an island, if you are just relying on GPS and a map to determine your course. Navigating by eyeball means that you only attempt passing through shallow areas with the sun high overhead so you can see shallow water and coral heads. The water is almost transparent in clarity and you can see the bottom in 30 or 40 feet of water.
The cays are quite arid and mostly covered by bushes and small species of Palm trees. Lizards, iguanas, and a few birds seem to be the primary inhabitants. The cays are limestone, which looks like lava, and is very porous and sharp. I can’t imagine being able to walk on it barefooted, and am sure it would shred most shoe soles in short order. So we confine most of our walking to beaches and sandy areas.
Marine life in the park is presumably much more abundant. It’s closed to all forms of gathering and fishing , thus the reefs are often like aquariums. We are looking forward to snorkeling an area tomorrow called the Seaquarium, which is said to have spectacular variety and numbers of sea life.

Having left Nassau on 20 Feb and stopping at Allen, Highborne, and Norman Cays on the way, we are moored in front of the park HQ with about 20 other boats. There are no facilities here except for Wifi and mooring balls. Can't take a shower or buy ice, but we can surf the internet. Weird!

The setting here is idyllic, with the clearest light turquoise water I have ever seen. No sound except the wind, waves and various boat noises. Speaking of boat noises, we spent last night on a much more exposed mooring and got to enjoy a night of loud boat noises and the rolling, yawing and pitching boat movements. I awoke much earlier the usual 8 or 9:00 hour. But I'm not complaining(: