Sunday-Tuesday, May 1-3, 2016

As mentioned earlier, trip planning in the Exumas is a never-ending unpredictable challenge. And it begins with the weather forecast. Over the next few days, a system is forecast to move in and shift the wind direction from the prevailing easterlies to west and northwest. Normally, not a big issue, but most of the Exuma anchorages such as Big Majors are well protected from the easterlies but wide open to the west and northwest winds - which are forecast to gust over 20 knots Wednesday night.

Not a major problem - simply contact the Staniel Cay Yacht Club and book a dock for a couple of days - where, when we departed on Saturday, I was assured would be readily available this week. WELL - when I called Monday afternoon for a reservation, I was informed that the marina was full - with four 100-foot motor yachts scheduled to come in (I guess size does matter??). I was advised to call back in the morning to see if there was any availability.

So Tuesday morning was to be a rather uneventful day. We spent Monday night in Black Point Harbor, with a pleasant "rock a bye baby" rolling action and awoke to a gentle breeze from the south. I planned to call SCYC first thing and then head back to Staniel, only about a 1½ hour run with the wind at our back. I would first stop at the fuel dock and then hope for a dock at the marina.

Now the fuel dock is located about 20 feet above the water and a good 12 feet above the deck of the "Lady J" - which will make docking challenging enough - but add some wind and current????

I try to do very thorough planning before entering these Exuma harbors; they are well populated with shifting shoals and there are NO channel markers. Even though we had been in and out of Staniel Cay harbor and we had the tracks of our route on the chart plotter, I still re-read one of the guidebooks to refresh my mind. I was confident that between the guidebook instructions and my previous chart plotter tracks, I would have no trouble.

WELL - I failed to realize we were entering at low tide (a 3.5 foot tidal change) and as I tried to follow the previous track, we ran aground (softly) twice trying to enter the harbor??? Finally, using the braille method, we bounced our way into the deep water that led us to the fuel dock.

I called for assistance at the "mountain-top" fuel dock and was told someone was there who would fuel us. The "someone" was an older dockhand - and I do mean "hand" - as he only had one arm!! How was Judy going to toss the line UP to him to catch and then I was to toss him the stern line - while the wind and current were pushing us away from the dock.

On our first approach, we started drifting away from the dock. Then as I was backing away for another attempt, the dockhand said that he could not service us now because a fuel tanker was about to arrive and it would take 3 hours to unload their new load of diesel and gas. . .

So we contacted the marina office again. Fortunately they did have a dock for us that we comfortably tied to. Once secured with lines and power hookup, we went right to lunch - where I immediately ordered a "Goombay Smash" and began the road to relaxation.