Today's travel is only 15 nm down to Norman Cay. The wind is supposed to pick up considerably for the week and I hope we will have good protection there. It is supposed to be E/NE trades which are prevalent here. The night at Highbourne went well a bit of roll but not a bad place at all.
We may spend 4 or 5 nights at Norman dependent on how we feel. There are no real amenities and most of the island is private homes.
The sail down was lovely we even slowed down a bit just to enjoy the sail. The water is unbelievably blue, just gorgeous. Scott detoured us a bit farther out from Norman's stake which marks the end of the sandbar off the island. We made our way into the anchorage with me on the bow looking for coral heads. There are several around but we managed just fine.
There were four other boats anchored when we pulled in and a few more farther up the east side of the island. The two anchorages are separated by a sand bar and shoal. We tucked up under the little spit of land to try to get some shelter from both the east and the north. Winds today are only about 10 knots due to pick up this evening.
We got the dingy down, motor on and took a little tour of the harbor. Izula is here with us. We met them in Morgans Bluff. She is a big cat with a family on board. Mom. Dad and two boys. The boys were having a marvelous time swinging from the dingy davits and dropping in the water. They had been out hunting conch earlier and had quite a nice haul of them. They were eager to have them for dinner. Scott thought it was just gross, but I was hoping they would ask us over :-) We chatted with them a bit and headed up to where the one and only restaurant on the island was supposed to be. Since neither one of us was dressed to get wet we never went ashore. We did however find the sign for the restaurant.
There is no cell signal here so we are isolated from the main world as long as we remain here. That bothers me because I would like to be able to tell Jess that we are doing fine. Thank goodness we have the single side band so we can stay on top of the weather. I'm hoping that the restaurant might have some means of communication but I fear it may be by VHF radio.
Another couple from a Tartan 40 named Argon stopped by to say hello and ask if we knew if the restaurant had internet access. They are on their way back from the Caribbean via the Turks and Caicos. We told her they would have to go to Highbourne for reliable signal and gave them the weather forecast for tomorrow. It is amazing how many cruisers are out here.
The picture was taken from the boat looking out over the banks. Blue, blue blue Incredible isn't it?