....or at least I thought it was. When we listened to the Cruiser's Net this morning everyone was talking about 40+ knot winds but we certainly didn't get them. Perhaps it was simply a factor of being deep in a well sheltered harbour, or sound asleep.

Barb still isn't 100% but she did come with us to walk Peri and help with the lines. While ashore I asked the dock master to keep us in mind if a dock came available. I'd like to spend one day and night alongside to charge up the batteries fully and to get some water before we set off. It is looking like we might luck out a little bit with the weather at last. Starting Friday the winds are decreasing to 15-20 kts from the NE and that will be good to push us along to Little Harbour and across to Bimini and then over the weekend they are forecast to die right down and come from the south west which would be perfect for crossing the Gulf Stream, so perhaps we'll get a quick trip back to Lauderdale or Lake Worth.

This morning at the mooring the winds were actually more, I think, than we had last night and along with the bright sun we are getting a good boost to the house bank. We had a few moments of excitement when what looked like a father and his two sons from Quebec aboard a rented catamaran came barging into the mooring field rather like one of those silver balls in the pin ball machine. They totally messed up the original mooring pick up and careened about nearly hitting two or three of the adjacent boats. It would have been funny to watch everyone scrambling for their fenders to put over the side if it weren't for the fact that his wanderings seemed to be increasing in radius and we were likely to be next. They eventually managed to pick up the mooring only to be told later that the plastic jug attached with "Reserved" written on it meant that they couldn't tie up to it. So when last seen they had dropped the mooring and motored right over it and were off out the harbour. That story is to illustrate one of the hidden hazards of cruising in the Bahamas and Caribbean - rented yachts. Don't get me wrong, in principle I don't have a problem with the concept it's just that it would seem that anyone with the money and ability to pay the weekly rate and damage deposit can fly down and rent one, including people with little or no experience. Even folks that are experienced sailors are on a boat that is not their own and that they are not used to, and a lot of people just aren't all that experienced. Under calm conditions this is a minor problem but in a crowded anchorage in 30 knot winds this could have been disastrous.

By mid afternoon the winds were really blowing and we cut short our walkabout ashore to come back to Nelleke to make sure that she was holding up alright. We did have the time to go through the small museum in town and found it really interesting. The white Bahamians all seem to have stemmed from a couple of families and the young mate of a British ship that had been wrecked on Man-o-War Cay and I find it fascinating to listen to them talk. They have an accent which is a cross between a fisherman from New England, specifically Maine, Lunenburg County from Nova Scotia and a small dash of Brit tossed in to round out the mixture. It makes for a fascinating sound. The black Bahamian speech is even more chameleon in nature. When they are speaking to us they sound very posh but when they are speaking to each other it gets very patois.

By evening the wind has started to die down, which in some ways is good (less stress on the mooring, etc.), but in others not so good (little effort on the wind generators for power). It's a good thing that we have a pretty large battery bank.

More Bahamian musings: What must it be like to love in Paradise? The rest of us arrive by airplane or boat and stay for out allotted time and ten we must go home. But there are loads of folks here that call this place home, even those that can pay a fortune for property and stay here as residents and every morning they wake up and they are still here. The rest of us are looking, sooner or later at heading home.