Wayward Sun Sailing

Well we were supposed to leave Georgetown for Cat Island on Saturday, March 9th, but Capt'n had other ideas. For one, he wasn't really relishing the idea of going, but couldn't think of another option to override me with. It's a bit of a long sail and pretty out of the way, but I've been wanting to go there and this is our chance. Another cold front to move through on Wed, March 13th , but again it'll bring no westerly winds with it only strong NE to E and we will be protected from those by the island.

So, I'm looking at wind and seas on Friday and notice one site says 8' seas near Cat so I suggest leaving Sunday instead, but Capt'n then trumps that with, but the Indy car race is on and we can watch it at St. Francis like last year. Hum, okay that was fun and Monday still looks okay for sailing, winds are supposed to die off later in the day, but we would avoid the 8' seas too. So Friday we went to the heritage festival in Gtown, got last supplies, more eggs, water and fuel. We are topped up and ready to go.

Sunday, after beach church, we did catch the race at St. Francis resort and had a nice time. George, the owner is somewhat a race fan, he and his wife Jill come from South Africa and were from the same town as the retired Formula 1 driver Jody Scheckter. They left South Africa on their boat years ago due to political reasons. George mentioned that a few years back the Andretti's were interested in buying St. Francis and turning into a private compound for themselves and their drivers etc. He said Michael Andretti had sent a bunch of his lawyers down to try to work out a deal, but they didn't want to sell. Interesting to say the least - it would make an awesome private compound, but ruin a lot of stuff for the cruisers. St. Francis hosts a lot of events and is a major meeting place for cruisers, esp. ones trying to escape the tourists now being bused (or ferried) over to Chat n Chill. When we were here 11 years ago it was all cruisers at Chat n Chill that has changed drastically now.

Monday at 7 am we picked up anchor and motor sailed out of the Georgetown anchorage into Exuma sound. It was pretty rolly with some left over seas from the higher winds on Sat / Sun (oh we hiked around the bottom of Stocking Island on Saturday and the seas were ugly on the Exuma sound side - glad we didn't go that day!) with winds out of the E and almost too close to sail. Luckily, winds shifted a bit to the south and we shut down the iron genny and we off sailing close hauled doing 7 knots. We sailed that way most of the way over then the winds started dying a bit and seas had settled down a lot making it a pretty nice sail. We got close to the bottom of Cat Island where we would now have to turn even more E and figured that was it, we would have to motor the next ten miles into the anchorage. To our amazement the winds shifted even further south right then and picked back up to almost 20 and we were again flying (for us) into the anchorage under full sail. Well a cat did pass us, they were doing 8.3 at times, while we were in the 7's. It was the perfect picture and I was hoping they took one, but just got a wave. We got anchored in New Bight around 4 pm, a lot earlier than we had expected so that was great. It's at least a 54 mile sail so we made very good time. Had our anchor beer(s) and watched a few more boats roll in. There were two boats anchored when we got here and now a total of five.

Tuesday, we decided to head into New Bight and check out the Hermitage on top of Mt. Alvernia aka Como Hill the highest point in the Bahamas at 206 ft. It was built by Father Jerome in 1939 as a place he could get away and retire to. It's said he is buried there and we heard from Cookie Monster, a boat in Gtown, that it was verified by a catholic priest on the island recently. Either way it's a little hike just to get to the bottom where there is a somewhat paved road, then a turn to the stone steps to go up past the hand carved Stations of the Cross along the way and then very steep steps (I crawled!) passed a small replica of Jesus grave with the stoned rolled away. It is definitely a must see place with a small chapel, cooking room, overlook tower, one tiny bed room and an area attached to the cooking room that I'm guessing was for dining. It looks huge from a distance and we can see it from our anchorage, but it's super small when you are there. We also found the cave behind it where it is said that Father Jerome would take his animals to hide during a hurricane and also hide there himself. There's an easier dirt road in the back to head back down - I took that route - while Capt'n had to go down the steep side again, just because! There is a disclaimer at the bottom, placed by the Catholic Church in Nassau and if you visit there and climb the steps, you'll know why. After that we took a walk to the fish fry area, row of colorful shacks that some were open selling food and some were not yet. Ended up meeting Simplicity (who passed us) and Corsair and talked with them for a long time. Simplicity commented on how beautiful our boat was under full sail and said oh geez I should have taken a picture for you. Oh well, maybe we'll get a good one someday. We took a walk further down a mile or two to the grocery store, but started raining, which was not forecast. Local stopped and picked us up and took us to the store. They are super nice here similar to Long Island. With no tour boats heading here, Cat has retained the Old Bahama charm and is a really cool place. We did walk back and it wasn't too far, but started raining right before we go to the fish fry so we ducked into one of the little shacks and ordered a couple Kaliks. I mean what else could we do? Finally, got a break where we could get to the dingy and back to the boat before it completely dumped again.

So, with Tuesday being a no wind day and calm seas, everyone on earth has come over here. There are now almost 30 boats in the anchorage and, of course, a trawler anchored on top of us. I just don't get that - the anchorage is huge and this guy acts like we're in Gtown where you have to squeeze in. Oh well, the generator is now running and our halyards are clanging in the high winds - so hope he's enjoying being so close. Anyway, the front moved in early Wednesday morning so we now have very cloudy conditions and high winds from the NE and E. Which is fine, it gives me a chance to catch up with things on the boat, but I can bet the Capt'n will want to venture in later, we'll see. Front will pass today so tomorrow should be a nice day here, just a little windy. We'll probably be here until Friday then head back to the Exumas to try to find a good place to hide from the next front. Corsair had invited us to a rake and scrape they set up for 5 pm in town Friday to celebrate their 40th anniversary, but so far it looks like Friday's the last day for sailing back before the winds go light for a few days so we may have to go that day. All In was supposed to be here this weekend, but may change their plans due to the next front. Either way we'll probably miss them unless they move up their plans and get here Thursday instead, which would be nice. Next front is forecast to be pretty bad and have west winds, which are hard to hide from on most of the islands. We "think" we may be able to squeeze in somewhere near Compass Cay, Pipe Cay, not sure though since everyone else will have the same idea. Capt'n definitely doesn't want to head to Gtown again and I don't either at this point. We'll just keep an eye on the weather and hope it isn't as a bad as predicted.