After about 45 minutes we were past that weirdness—who put those there?—and called Half Moon on the VHF. We cheered each other for getting through the coral unscathed and then vowed not to do that again. I was never a big buddy-boat person (especially after The Whale incident), but in this case it was nice having someone else nearby.
An hour later we were pulling up to Allen’s Cay in the Exumas. Wahoo! Most of the central Exumas are part of the Exuma Land & Sea Park, so we weren’t looking for a place to live here, just a place to get warm, let loose, and have some fun.
We’d be able to island-hop without going into deeper waters or squeeze through cuts for a while. The islands in this area are bounded by the shallow (20 feet or less) Exuma Bank on the west side and the deeper (as much as 6,000 feet deep!) Exuma Sound on the east. We island-hopped down the shallow west side of the islands.
Allen’s Cay
Known for its 2-foot iguanas, or Bahamian dragons, Allen’s Cay was beautiful. Those people who had never ventured farther south of the Abacos were really missing something. “Those people” had almost been us.
The anchorage itself is a cove surrounded by three little islands. You’re engulfed by white beaches while peeking out to the sea. Breathtaking.
We never wanted to leave. But after a couple of days we needed to find an Internet signal so we could check the weather. Our little SSB radio antenna had snapped, so no more Chris Parker, and our cruising guides hadn’t told us about the 7:30 a.m. VHF weather reports broadcast by Exuma Park.
LESSON 55: PAGING AL ROKER There are times you might not have access to a weather broadcast source: Weather itself can interfere with your SSB satellite connection; your equipment might fail; if you’re not near other boats, you can’t mooch off their access to weather; and Internet signals can be intermittent or nonexistent. We always tried to look ahead as far as possible, but weather systems can be unpredictable—a lesson we were becoming all too familiar with in the Bahamas. Having several methods of obtaining weather is a good idea, but when all else fails, get on your VHF and hail a passing boater to ask what they’ve heard. (In the United States and U.S. territories, NOAA broadcasts on VHF—channels WX1, WX2, WX6, and Channel 22 too—it varies by location.) We knew we could check ourselves easily enough, so we headed somewhere with Internet access.
Somewhere meant Highborne Cay, but we didn’t want to leave our pristine location. Instead, we dinghied the 2 miles between the islands. Half Moon’s Joe and Becky had skipped Allen’s Cay because they were concerned about their draft, so they were already in Highborne and knew the drill. Let’s just say that we were glad we had kept the big boat where she was.
Before we left Highborne Cay, we noticed a fisherman throwing fish guts into the water and lots of dark shapes swimming around. Dark shapes with fins. Sharks! On the long dinghy trip back, we kept looking at any shadows with suspicion. We also kept pretending to flip the boat. We’re silly.
Weather was coming, so we knew we had to leave our oasis soon. Because you can’t have all play and no work, while at Allen’s Cay we figured out what was wrong with our three-burner propane stove. Ever since we had bought the boat, we had little explosions right after turning off the flame after cooking a meal. Poof. After hearing various propane nightmares, we took this seriously, but we couldn’t find the problem. We finally broke down and pulled up the oven, only to find that the metal cups under the burners had rotted through. Yep, that would do it. We’d have to replace the stove. In the meantime, we used only the burner with the least corrosion and barbecued as much as possible. There—task done for the day.
We reluctantly left Allen’s Cay for Hawksbill Cay, about 20 miles southeast down Exuma Bank, thinking that it couldn’t get any nicer.
Wrong!
Hawksbill Cay
We could have stayed anchored off Hawksbill forever. Well, had there been any food and water there. We initially anchored waaay off the beach. We dinghied to shore only to be asked by Park Ranger Bob why we were anchored so far out. We squinted back toward the speck that was Jacumba and wondered the same thing. We dinghied back and then re-anchored closer to the beautiful beach. At low tide we were in just 5 feet of warm water, which meant we could hop off our boat and wade to shore. This was exactly what we’d been waiting so long for.
We hiked, we sprawled in the sun on the beach, and even helped Park Ranger Bob clear some nonnative vegetation just to feel as though we were giving back to this pristine place. We were in heaven. Later, we found a set of metal horseshoes in the bushes and played for hours. When we were done, we hid them back in the bushes for the next explorers.
Everything we did involved that amazing beach. We didn’t want to leave, but we knew we should get somewhere better protected. Our final night, we brought wine and cheese to the beach and watched the sun set behind Jacumba and the huge private yacht that had snuck up behind her. Once the sun was gone, we were swarmed by mosquitoes, so we made a mad dash back to the boat. We had been in such cold temperatures for so long that we’d forgotten about those little vampires! Hrmph, it’s never perfect.
LESSON 56: GET WHEELS Dinghy wheels could be the best investment you’ll ever make. That is one big thing I’d do over if we had the chance. If you’ll be sailing in an area with beaches and plan to dinghy yourself to them, wheels are a must. Dinghies and outboards are heavy. Pulling them up dunes to get away from the tide is tough with one or two people. The wheels attach to the bottom of the dinghy and fold up when not in use. They really are a must-have.
Warderick Wells Cay
Happy Easter! Procrastinating about our departure, we did a final beach walk at Hawksbill Cay, raised anchor, and motored the 18 miles to the main part of the multi-island park on Warderick Wells Cay. Most people pick up a mooring there, but the holding looked as though it was sand, so we decided to save the money and anchor in the “cheap” section. We went ashore, paid our park fee, and then immediately hiked half the island. Despite the number of boats moored there, we hardly saw anyone out and about.
The next day, the storm system we had been expecting hit from a direction we were not expecting. Two of our three weather sources had gotten it wrong. There had been other anchorage options; we wished we’d been warned to get to one. Oy and baaaaaarf! Everyone, whether anchored or on a mooring, was bucking like a bunch of wild broncos. Yee-haw! The anchorage was so rough that we couldn’t even lower our dinghy or get to shore to give our stomachs a break. We were glad the storm lasted only one day.
LESSON 57: BE A PESSIMIST Many people would listen to their favorite marine-themed weather forecaster, such as Chris Parker, in the morning on their SSB radios and leave it at that. Meteorologists make mistakes. We listened to Mr. Parker on a tiny, battery-operated SSB radio when we could pick him up, and then compared what he said with two or three other online weather/sea marine forecasts (NOAA, Buoyweather, Windguru). If most agreed, we felt pretty good about things. If there were discrepancies, we tried to figure out why. We tended to take the worst-case scenario and go with that. This method, had we implemented it, would have saved us from The Rage and the episode at Warderick Wells. We did apply it going forward and saved ourselves from further unpleasantness.
Compass Cay
Next stop, Compass Cay (only 13 miles southeast down Exuma Bank). We had originally planned to go to Bells Island to snorkel a seawall, but we changed our minds, did a voluntary controlled jibe (!), and headed to Compass instead. We checked out some semi-underwater caves, where we snorkeled under a ledge and then came up into caverns with stalagmites and stalagtites. The sun was shining in from a hole in the limestone above. Cool.
We returned to our boat to see a discomforting, decreasing depth around it, so we re-anchored in deeper water. We were completely alone. The stars were brilliant, and little bioluminescent fish surrounded us. They were fun to play with; you’d swish your hand around in the water and they would light up.
Later that night the current picked up and did some weird things to our
anchor setup, but we held (not that I slept much).
The next morning we wandered around the island. It had a few cliffs, and tributaries crisscrossed it. The islands were surprisingly varied. The only consistent thing was that many beaches on the ocean side were littered with trash, almost all of it water bottles that had washed up.
LESSON 58: RECYCLE! Please stop using disposable water bottles, or at least recycle them. Use filters on your tap and reusable/washable drinking containers. You’ll see when you’re out there walking and swimming amid the plastic trash what a detriment to the environment plastic can be. You’re boaters now (at least at heart). You should care.
Big Majors Spot and Staniel Cay
We were really enjoying this island-hopping stuff. After realizing that every island was better than the last (or at least equal to it), we stopped dreading our departures and started looking forward to our upcoming arrivals. Next up was a combo. We were heading to Big Majors Spot, where everyone anchors when they want to visit Staniel Cay, about 2 miles to the east (cruising guides warn that Staniel has bad holding). And I mean everyone anchors at Big Majors. So that was where everybody was. Even Johnny Depp was in the neighborhood! Despite the crowds, we were able to get a little anchorage space by maneuvering between everyone and coming right up to the beach, where there were … get this … wild pigs. They swim out to you and meet your dinghy if you have some carrots (which we did). The pigs can get aggressive and bite, not to mention puncture a hole in your dinghy, so be careful.
Staniel Cay’s claim to fame is Thunderball Grotto, seen in one of the James Bond movies. The waters were too cold for me, so I skipped it, only to have Michael come back all excited and telling me that it was the best snorkeling ever! Hrmph.
At least I got to go ashore in search of the town dump. I know, doesn’t that sound like fun? But we needed to get our trash off the boat. It had been a month! Where it got exciting was on our way there, when we were almost run over by a car. We hadn’t been on a road or seen a car since we had left Marsh Harbour a month before, so we hadn’t even thought to look. And to look left.
LESSON 59: TRASH TALK I get into this in more detail in the Tips chapter at the end of the book, but I thought I’d give you a quickie lesson here. The less trash you bring on your boat in the first place, the better off you’ll be once under sail. Look for products with the least packaging. Remove and dump whatever wrappings you do end up with in the nearest onshore trash bin before bringing your purchases aboard. Avoiding water bottles will also save you lots of garbage (and do wonders for the environment too).
Black Point Settlement, Great Guana Cay (Yes, Another One)
Only another 10 miles southeast and we reached the Black Point Settlement anchorage at Great Guana Cay. On our way there, I asked Michael to stop farting—he was stinking up the boat—only to discover that it was one of our engine starter batteries that was doing the “farting.” Well, leaking. So we turned off the engine, and once again we motored lopsidedly to the anchorage. All we had to do was disconnect the battery from the engine (because the engine was already running), but we hadn’t been using our noggins.
Engine issues were so commonplace that we didn’t think much about it initially and just anchored as usual. Once we got our anchor set in nice firm sand, we had only one thing on our mind. Laundry.
We were desperate to do laundry (yes, it had been a month for that too), so we each grabbed a bag (or two) and got that chore out of the way first. We had washed some of our clothes using the ammonia/water bucket method, but some things (such as sheets) needed a washer/dryer. Badly. We found one of the cleanest Laundromats I’d ever seen (remember, I’m a city kid). There wasn’t a lot on this island, even the grocery stores were the size of train cars, but all the businesses were spotless and smelled good!
Thank goodness the island people were friendly, because we needed help tracking down a new battery. The request made it down the grapevine, and a local fisherman whose boat had just sunk just happened to have an extra battery he could sell us. Problem fixed (although not cheaply). Well, sort of fixed. I turned on the engine and it died …
This is where Michael’s and my personalities diverge. I had wanted to spit on the engine, tell it a few “your mama” jokes, and then use the other engine for the rest of our odyssey. Michael calmly stared at it for a while, grabbed the manual, and tried pumping the air valve. Sure enough, there was air in the line. Well, okay. But my way would have worked too.
Once again we heard conflicting weather reports, so we decided to stay put. We would be safe for this one. Others weren’t so lucky.
While we waited for the weather, we fixed a few other things. The hot water stopped working on the galley sink, which led us to discover that there was no turnoff valve that would allow us to fix it. That would require parts we didn’t have. Put them on the list.
At least fixing the newly clogged toilet was easy. A lot of boaters throw their toilet paper in a trash can, but we thought that was gross. Our Lavac toilets were supposed to be uncloggable. Apparently all toilets have their limits. This particular fix (plunger) didn’t require us to dismantle the toilet. We just adjusted our toilet paper thickness and use and never had the problem again.
Once the weather cleared, we realized that we had reached the end of the central Exumas (well, the mostly inhabited parts anyway). How’d that happen? We’d had such a great time that we considered going back through them and hitting a few islands we had missed, but we were so excited to have come this far that we wanted to go even farther south.
That meant George Town, about three-quarters of the way down a verrrry long island, Great Exuma Island to be exact. George Town would be our last lengthy and most densely populated stopover before heading to the Turks and Caicos in the Caribbean (the Bahamas are not actually in the Caribbean). So we staged ourselves near Farmer’s Cay, another short (11 mile) jaunt south, so we could sneak out the Galliott Cut (I still hate the word cut) the next day. We would be leaving the shallow waters of the Exuma Bank and heading into the deeper waters of Exuma Sound. It had been a while since we’d been in the ocean and, yes, we were still reluctant to go out there. Plus, we were on our own this time. We had lost Half Moon. All right, we can do this. Let’s go!
14
A Milestone Is Reached—George Town (Bahamas)
That was a piece of cake. The winds and seas were so calm during our 45-mile, 7-hour motor down the eastern coastline of Great Exuma Island that I’m not even sure we can count it as a journey at all. It was so placid that we let the autopilot steer while we read books and played cards the whole way (of course checking for path-crossing boats every 15 minutes, a standard procedure that Captain Tim taught us and is shared by most boaters we meet; see upcoming Lesson 65, The 15-minute rule). Sure, it would have been nice to sail, but with wind comes waves, and we were relieved to have an uneventful passage.
The harbor was big, and boats were everywhere. Should we anchor off ugly old George Town, where things were convenient? Or should we get settled in at Stocking Island, about 1½ miles east across the harbor, where a pretty beach beckoned? Of course, the beach won out. Plus, Stocking Island seemed to be where the action was.
It was now mid-April, so some people had started heading to wherever their hurricane homes were, but it was still pretty crowded (more than a hundred boats). And the water was deep! Well, deeper than we were used to. We had been anchoring in 6 to 8 feet of water; this was more like 18 to 20 feet. At a 5-to-1 scope (it was too crowded for any more than that), that was 100 feet of chain out. Parts of our chain had never before seen the light of day!
We were in George Town! Well, close enough. Can we get a holla! That’s right, we were impressed with our bad selves. If anyone had told us when we were shivering and practicing our moves around Green Turtle that we’d make it as far as George Town, about 263 miles, we wouldn’t have believed it. It was an achievement that should be celebrated. We cheerily dinghied around to the famous Chat & Chill bar, right
on the beach on Stocking Island, and prepared to click beers and rejoice with our fellow sailors.
We walked in, looked around, and almost walked out again. Were they even open? The only conversation was coming from Fox News. The bar contained two comatose couples and a surly female bartender. I even said something like, “Boy, this is the quietest bar I’ve ever been in,” but the couples just smiled and went back to watching TV. The bartender looked peeved that she’d have to get up to bring us a beer. I thought we might be in a Twilight Zone episode.
We got our beers and celebrated anyway, but quietly. A little later a few more people straggled in after a volleyball game, but they stayed in their little clique. Hmmm. We decided we’d have more fun back on our boat, so we went to pay. I walked up to the seated bartender, handed over some cash, and waited for my change. That would require the bartender to get up and go to the cash register. No movement. When I politely suggested that she owed us money, she sighed heavily and looked forlornly at how far the register was from where she was sitting. Oh for Pete’s sake. Never mind. We just left. It wasn’t worth it.
We didn’t have the best impression of Stocking Island, so we decided to dinghy over to George Town the next day. A check of that town took all of 10 minutes. There were two small grocery stores, a much needed ATM, a library, and a small marine store. That was pretty much it.
Our biggest concern was being able to get an Internet signal. We had detected one from our boat but needed a password. We tracked the holder of that password to a friendly Rasta guy living in a sprawling shack. Guess he put all his money into the computer side of the business.
A Sail of Two Idiots Page 13