We thought we’d have to wait a few days to get a mooring ball at Warderick Wells Cay in the north mooring field, but we went on the radio in the morning and they had a place for us. So we readied the boat and off we came.

We had to go west for about a mile, then south, southeast for another 9 miles, and then back east for about 4.5 miles. Since the wind was basically out of the east, we were only going to be able to sail well for the 9-mile stretch going SSE. We got lazy and decided it wasn’t worth un-bagging and raising the main, so we just put the genoa out. Even so, for a good part of the trip we were doing almost 7 knots. This boat sails so well! Our course took us gradually more east, for the last two miles of the southerly course we might have benefited from at least putting the staysail out, but for two miles, when we were still doing close to 6 knots, that wasn’t worth it either. Altogether we came just under 15 nm miles today. We got here at 1:30 and it was another lovely sail in the Exumas!

The mooring balls here are all along a single channel. We ended up with a strange technique; there was both wind and current, and not a lot of room to maneuver, so Bud missed the mooring ball at the first pass. He went up and let the wind take us back sideways into it. I grabbed the line with the boat hook (I wore gloves today as yesterday the sea growth on the mooring line had cut my finger) and Bud came up and helped me secure it and we were in.

We put the engine on the dinghy and went in to park HQ to register and pay and get Internet. On the way in we saw a huge ray in the channel, it must have had a four-foot wingspan. The little beach where you could land your dinghy had baby conchs all over it. The first live conchs I’ve seen. The photo shows the boats between Earendil and the park headquarters building.

Although it’s really nice here, we may not stay as long as planned. You can’t use SKYPE on the Internet, and they won’t let Fuzzy off the beaches. I can’t even carry him in the front-pack we have for him. If Bud and I want to hike the trails Fuzzy has to stay on the boat. Fuzzy is getting better about being left on the boat, but it’s not something we like to do all the time. We’ll at least stay long enough to do some snorkeling, if the water is warm enough. It’s only 70 degrees today (and the air temperature this evening is only about 75). Brrr!