1st December

24 42 N
76 49 W

Weather: sunny, wind 5knots SE, waves small ripple on the water.

ONLY 24 MORE SLEEPS PEOPLE!

Welcome to the December issues of life aboard the good ship lollypop!

It's taken Priss until last night to feel comfortable enough to leave the safety of the cockpit and explore a bit further. Just as we were about to go for dinner to the Pink Octopus restaurant she suddenly jumped onto the companionway hatch and took off through the open enclosure, albeit somewhat cautiously, towards the bow of the boat. I was out on deck at the time and watched as she sniffed at the fenders stowed on deck and then found the life raft very interesting, rubbing herself up against it to leave her smell on it. I called out to Gerry to come and see, also to be prepared to fish her out of the water if she got too adventurous. We gave her a few minutes more to explore but she didn't go beyond the mast so we corralled her from both sides of the boat until she was back inside the cockpit and then took her down below deck to lock her in whilst we went for dinner. The last thing we needed was to have her jump ship and take off exploring when we weren't going to be there to stop her.
The Pink Octopus restaurant proved to be a nice setting, the food was fairly typical of the Bahamas it was hot, tasty and there was plenty of it, so much so that both Gerry and I did something unusual for us and took half of the meal home in boxes! The cocktails were delicious and very strong, we limited ourselves to just one each and as we hadn't finished our dinner we did the right thing and went without dessert! Priss was happy to see us on our return and didn't try to go exploring again, though we made it a little difficult for her as we dropped all the enclosure curtains for the night.
Saturday night was evidently the arrival night for several groups of charter boat patrons, they were in evidence in the restaurant and there were generator noises all night, we think where they had air conditioners running. Of course, the shower block was full of them in the morning so we showered on our boat before going to the cafeŽ for our last coffee and muffin fix.
With all the immediate jobs fixed and the weather looking OKish for the next couple of days, it was time for us to leave the beautiful serenity of Palm Bay Marina. We were captive until the dock office opened at 9am then it was a case of letting them know that we were leaving so that they could take the power and water reading and fix up our bill. We stowed away all the things that might fall over or become deadly missiles whilst we were underway, cast off our mooring lines and did a 300point turn to allow us to exit the marina, we managed to miss everything that was in our path and we were on our way again by 10am. Oh, one other interesting point about Palm Bay Marina is that it is a gated marina, at 7pm each night a chain gate is winched up into place across the entrance preventing any boats from entering or leaving the marina, this stays in place until 7am and is patrolled at night by security, we couldn't have done a runner even if we had wanted to!
Our destination for the day was Highborne Cay, Exumas about a 30-mile trip. The wind didn't want to play today, it was about 5knots and dead on the nose so there was no point in putting white flappy things out to bowl us along. For the next 5.5 hours we motored at a leisurely pace of about 5knots, the sea was calm with just a slight ripple instead of waves. There was of course a mass exodus of charter catamarans out of Palm Cay and they all seemed to be headed in the same direction as us but unlike us they didn't seem to worry too much about how much fuel they were using or how much wake they were putting out.
Again, there was no sea life in evidence for the trip, I'm beginning to wonder if it all vanished with the hurricanes.
At 4pm we were just off Highborne Cay, there is a marina here but we are more than happy to be swinging on the hook for the night. Gerry, having checked the weather forecast for the next few days, wanted us to tuck right up behind Oyster Cay, a small cay just to the side of Highborne, as it will provide us with some protection from the predicted wind shift and escalation that is due to happen overnight. We had to make our way through a narrow channel to tuck ourselves in the bay behind Oyster Cay, we are the only boat here so it's very peaceful with the bonus that we can't hit anyone else if there is a massive wind shift!
The sun is about to set, there won't be a green flash as I can't see the sun going into the water (or maybe because I can't see it tonight will be the night it happens!).
It's time to pour the obligatory sundowner drink, cheers one and all.
A last thought, in case you are wondering, all the repairs have held up for today!