We did make it!

I guess leaving on Friday was a good idea. We made it to Allan’s Cay on the 7th of December (coincidence that it was also D-day?). Rock Iguanas and eight other boats made for an interesting anchorage. The current was ripping through so David set a stern anchor so we wouldn’t go onto the sand bank in the middle of the night. This was a bold move, since no other boats had set two anchors. When the current changed we were in range of two boats swinging. Fortunately, for us they only came within 25 feet or so, but it made for a long night. We left the next high tide around 1, when we could finally loose our anchor. We made it to Shroud Cay. As we were arriving we noticed mooring balls and decided to grab one no matter what the cost. When properly moored we had a group hug and moved onto exploring.

Shroud Cay: spent the day exploring the island and looking for Camp Driftwood. Unfortunately, we could not get to the East side of the island due to high winds, but found numerous challenging rocks and pristine beaches to frolic around. There were not any other souls in sight. It was deserted almost. When we got back to the boat, there were two other boats anchored about a mile away, but we never saw any people.

Warderick Wells Cay: A part of the National Bahamian Exuma Park, this was a worthwhile stopover. We spent two days exploring this island. There were marked trails 7 miles long and a bit treachorous. It took us 6 hours to go to Pirate’s hideout at the south end of the island, swim, eat lunch and get back to the boat. The snorkeling was the best so far. We even saw two eagle rays, a nurse shark and several beautiful fishes.

Staniel Cay: We ended up at the yacht club at Staniel Cay, not very cruiser-like, and quite costly. We had a magnificent meal here, much better than ravioli. Thunderball grotto was very cool. The fish came after us as soon as we entered the water. They seemed to enjoy the peas we brought, even taking a small bite out of Sam. The grotto and reef were beautiful, but I didn’t see any fish that I hadn’t seen before. The coral were much more colorful than what we had seen previously. This is by far our favorite civilized cay. The people are nice, even offered us a boat to crew on New year’s day (Mixed doubles regatta), if we come back. It is a class C sloop. We see a man about it in the morning and decide.

Farmer’s Cay: Tomorrow we leave for Farmer’s Cay. We will anchor there and leave early out of Galliot cut for Georgetown to meet Meme (David’s mom) and Chelsea (our daughter) for Christmas. It will be wonderful to see our family again. We have been gone for little over a month now. Wow. It has gone by very fast.