Mar 5 - Georgetown Exumas

Hi all - no pictures with this post as we have only limited access to internet. Will update with pictures next time we have good internet.


Feb 20 – Warderick Wells
It was nice to spend a day without thinking about moving. We did school in the morning and in the afternoon we went for a walk on the Cay. First we walked be the blowholes that were really neat. They are holes in the rock that lead down to the water, and when the waves come in they force the air up the hole with great force and a big howling noise. After we left the blowholes we walked up to Boo Boo Hill. Lots of boats leave a carved piece of wood with their boat name on it on Boo Boo Hill, so there is a big pile of driftwood. It was fun to try to find boat name that we knew. We tried to find a nice piece of driftwood to carve to leave for Bird on a Wire, but the driftwood was pretty scarce. We’ll have to get one ready for our return trip. From Boo Boo Hill we carried on to Boo Boo beach and had a nice walk down the coast of the island that faces the sound, and then back across the island to the calmer, bank side of the island. On our way back to the boat we saw a couple of Eagle Rays swimming across the shallows in the middle of the mooring field. At supper time there was a man on the boat next to us who was throwing some wet garbage overboard and some big fish were eating it, so we tried too. There were a couple big fish that were under the boat and they would come darting out to get what we threw over. We didn’t want to spoil the fish too much with human food so we only did it a couple of times.

Feb 21 – Warderick Wells
No school today as it is Saturday! We packed up a lunch and loaded up the dinghy and took the dinghy around to a beach near Emerald Rock. From there, we hiked though another Loyalist Settlement and then across the island to the sound. We walked down along the cliffs and the beach of the sound down to the other end of the island to the Pirate’s Lair and the South Anchorage. It is a beautiful spot. Protected from the sound by Hog Cay, it has more of that beautiful turquoise water. We could see waves crashing over Hog Cay which was spectacular. There is a beautiful sandy beach and a picnic table where we had our lunch. We were visited by two curious little lizards who were happy to enhance their regular diet with some Pringles crumbs. Dave tried to take a close up picture of one of them and it jumped up a couple of inches to bite him on the finger. Fortunately it was only a little lizard and the bite didn’t hurt, but it was certainly startling! After lunch, we were able to catch the eye of the folks on Nicki May and they came to shore for a visit (the wind was howling far too loudly for us to hail them). We had a great chat on the beach as the tide was coming in, and then realized that maybe our dinghy wasn’t that safe way away on the other coast. We had a hurried hike back across the island, and fortunately our dinghy was safe. We had taken our snorkeling things with us, but we decided it was too windy and overcast so we went back to the boat instead.

Feb 22 – Warderick Wells – Cambridge Cay
We left Warderick Wells this morning after settling up at the office at 9:00. We decided to make the long, 10 mile trip from Warderick Wells to Cambridge on the "outside" - on the sound. The Exumas are a chain of little islands or Cays that rise up on the Western edge of the Bahama Bank. On the East side, there is deep, deep water (1000’s of feet) only hundreds of feet from shore. On the West side the Bahama Banks stretch for several miles with deeps of 8 – 15 feet. On the Sound side the prevailing wind blows from the East, and there is very little protection, so it is like sailing on the ocean. There are narrow cuts between the cays where the water flows between the banks and the sound. All the water that travels between the banks and the sound as the tide changes have to flow through these cuts. When the tide is flowing out, it pushes against the waves that are created by the prevailing wind. (Note from Kristen – this causes very large confused seas). It was a bouncy trip through the cut that leads between the bank and the sound, but then we motor sailed down the Sound to the cut that took us into Cambridge Cay. After arrived and picked up a mooring, we thought we go down to go snorkeling at the "Sea Aquarium". We stopped by Calliope on the way and they were headed down there too. It was about a mile away and we wished we had a hard-bottom dinghy and a bigger dinghy motor! (Are any of you reading this saying "I told you so??")
Snorkeling at the Sea Aquarium was amazing! There were so many fish and they would swim all around you. You could reach out and try to touch them, but they would swim away, always keeping about a foot away from us. There were lots of different types of fish, and coral. It was really great! We left there and went to another snorkeling spot where there was a little airplane that had crashed in about 25’ of water. It was amazing to see this little plane lying there under the water. There was a lot of current so if you swam really hard to the tail of the plane you could coast back down to the dinghy in about 30 seconds!

Feb 23 – Cambridge Cay
Back to school today in the morning. I tried to make some white bread and it was a dismal failure – it wouldn’t rise at all. Very frustrating!
We went over to visit Movin’ On, the mooring hosts and they suggested that we should move down a couple of moorings where we would get a little less motion, so we did that.
In the afternoon we went for a hike across the Cay and up a high hill. Off the beach, there was a limestone tower that came up out of the water about 100’. The kids took their kites and had a good time flying them up on the hill. We hiked along the cliff down to the end of the Cay. It was a great walk.
Calliope came over for supper so that was fun. They brought some brownies over and we were able to cook them in the oven. They were great!

Feb 24 – Cambridge Cay
Today was a fairly quiet day with school in the morning and then a hike to the Conch Cay beach in the afternoon.
Feb 25 – Cambridge Cay
Calliope and Movin’ On were going to go on a dinghy adventure to Compass Cay. We were invited along and Movin’ On offered to take the kids in their dinghy to take some of the weight off ours. Our first stop was Racheal’s Bubble Bath. This is a break in the cliff on the sound side and the waves crash through and then tumble down into a big pool that then leads out to the banks. Rachael’s Bubble Bath is most fun when there are lots of big waves, and that means high North East winds. In order to get there you have to cross Conch Cut. We took off with expectations of getting pretty wet in the dinghy and sure enough, buy the time we reached Compass Cay we were thoroughly soaked. Rachael’s Bubble Bath was really cool! It was like swimming in a pool of alka seltzer. The waves would come crashing through the break in the rocks and bubble all around you. It was really fun and we stayed about an hour. Then we headed further down Compass Cay to the marina. Compass Cay is a quiet spot that has to make it’s own water and generate it’s own power. There are a few little cottages and a larger lodge with a couple of rooms. They sell hot dogs and hamburgers for lunch and they were great! They have a school of fish and nurse sharks they stay off the wharf and Movin’ On brought their wet garbage so we could feed them. You are allowed to swim with the sharks when they aren’t being fed, but having spent enough time in the water already today, we stayed dry and reached over the edge and touched the sharks from the wharf. After lunch we took a garbage bag over to the sound side and collected a bag full of flotsam to help Tucker (the owner) keep his beach clean.

Feb 26 – Cambridge Cay
Today was another quiet day with school in the morning and then snorkeling off the little island on the edge of the mooring field in the afternoon. This was another great snorkeling spot with lots of fish and coral to look at.

Feb 27 – Cambridge Cay to Black Point
We said "Good Bye" to Movin On and headed out of Cambridge Cay. Calliope also left, and offered to take our gas can into Sampson Cay to get it filled up for us as there is no fuel in Black Point. We had planned to stop at Big Majors to see the pigs that live on the beach, and go into the Thunder Ball Grotto that has been used in a number of movies, but it was too windy today, so we continued on to Black Point. Black Point is the second largest community in the Exumas with about 300 people. We got anchored off safely and I took the girls to shore to look around. People are really friendly. We were able to pick up some fresh produce, and ordered a couple of loaves of bread to be picked up tomorrow morning. We tried to get on the internet, but it took soooooo long to connected we pretty much gave up. We met Miakado (from Halloween) on shore as well as a few other boaters we had met along the way. People were going to get together around 4:00, so we went back to the boat to get Dave and went back to shore. We had a good visit with some folks, and then went back to Miakado for a little while. It was another late supper!

Feb 28 – Black Point to Lee Stocking
Kristen and I went to shore to get the bread, but it took a long time as Lorraine’s Dad, had a little accident and it is Lorraine’s Mom that makes the bread. We had a great sail down banks but we knew we would have to go out into the sound to get down to Lee Stocking Island. It was a really, really, rough go through Cave Cut as we went out at the time when the tide was moving out into the sound at it’s fastest, and there were still a lot of waves coming off the sound. It was a pretty rough trip for the 8 miles we had to do off shore, and but then it was a fairly smooth trip in through Adderly Cut just north of Lee Stocking Island. We were anchored by around 3:00. We went for a swim and tidied up the boat. We took the kids dragging on the Air Head tube around the anchorage behind the dinghy. Calliope came over for a visit before supper.

March 1 – Lee Stocking to Georgetown
We left Lee Stocking bright and early to get to Georgetown. The wind was on the nose, as expected, but the seas were much calmer than yesterday. Calliope decided to stay at Lee Stocking until the forecasted front comes through so they can sail down to Georgetown instead of motoring. We arrived in Georgetown at 11:30. We didn’t really think we would be able to find Gotta Life in amongst the 300 boats here, but we saw them right away. We couldn’t raise them on the radio, but Sandpiper called us, and then Gotta Life saw us and came over in the dinghy. They were going to the beach to do a science experiment so they took the girls along. We got anchored off Monument Beach (on of three beaches on Stocking Island that people anchor off) The holding was great and it didn’t sound like the front was going to be too bad, so we decided to stay here instead of going to the more protected Red Shanks harbour on the western side of the harbour. Dave and I went over to visit Sandpiper, and then Gotta Life while the girls were at the beach. After supper we all went over to visit on Gotta Life.
March 2 - Georgetown
It was school again this morning, and I made some bread and some cookies. When school was over we took some bread and cookies to Sandpiper and then to Gotta Life. In the afternoon, some of us went hiking on Stocking Island. Dave decided to stay with the boat as the wind had shifted some and we were fairly close to Sandpiper. It was a great hike up to the monument, and then we went across the island to the beach on the Sound side. It is another beautiful white sand beach. Kristen and Erin dug a deep, deep hole in the sand. The rest of us walked down the beach. There were really neat limestone formations and caves. When we got back to the boat, Dave took his turn and went for a hike and got some great pictures.

March 3 – Georgetown
The Georgetown Regatta begins this week, and it kicks off with Children’s Day so today there was a meeting for Children’s Day so we spent most of the morning at the beach making plans for tomorrow. Children’s Day centers around the grade 3 and4’s from the Georgetown Primary school and organizing events for them for a couple hours, finishing up with them watching the boat parade. Dave went to Georgetown and got on the internet and got a few groceries. In the afternoon the kids went to Volleyball beach and Dave and I went back over to Georgetown to get some water. We got really wet coming back in the dinghy with all the water! It got pretty chilly so we closed up the boat and made Banquet Lasagna for supper, with Brownies for desert and then watch Captain Ron that we borrowed from Gotta Life.

March 4 – Georgetown
Children’s Day was a great success! We all went over to Regatta Point in Georgetown at 11:00 and started setting up the games. At 12:45 the Exuma kids were supposed to come over to start with the games. We were a little disappointed when only 9 of them were allowed to come! The grade 3 class had acted really badly yesterday and the principal decided that as punishment they would not be allowed to participate. There were also several grade 4’s that were missing – I wonder if they suffered the same fate. We split them all up into teams (we had planned for 8 teams so that meant 1 per team) and then added in the 20 cruiser kids. Each team also had a team lead, who was either an adult or a couple of the older cruiser kids, so by this time there were 3 or 4 on a team. Someone went back to the school to see if the principal had changed her mind while we got started with the introductions. A few minutes later there was another group of Exuma kids coming towards the park. Originally we thought the principal had relented, only to learn that she decided to send the grade 5’s instead! They were added into the teams so now each team had 5 or 6 participants, as well as the some of the older cruiser kids. We did two sets of stations, with 4 stations in each set, and two teams were at a station at a time. In the first set there was a water balloon toss, a relay race where the kids had to get dressed up in a big t-shirt, big boots and big foul-weather pants, a tennis ball on a spoon race and another relay where they had to fill up a bucket at one end of the course by running across the course with a cup of water on their head. In the second set, there was a station to make posters, a freeze dance, an obstacle course and a tug-of-war. Unfortunately we ran out of time and not all the kids got to do all the second set of stations. Then we took all the kids across the point to watch the boat parade. Each team had cheers, and waved their posters as the boats came by. There was additional excitement when the sailboats started to go aground right in front of the marshalling station! It’s also worth mentioning that it was blowing about 20knots of wind, again, and still (it has blown an average of 20 knots everyday since we have been in the Bahamas). A boat called Pirate entered their dingy in the parade and they had suckers and necklaces for the kids so they were trying to through this stuff from the dinghy up on to the wharf. Up until then we had all the kids sitting nicely on the wharf, and that certainly created some chaos!! At 2:45 we took the kids back to the park and everyone got a t-shirt left over from last year’s regatta and a ribbon. We spent some time tidying up the park, and then headed back across the harbour to Stocking Island and the St. Francis resort where there was a reception for the cruisers. We didn’t get back to the boat until 7:30 so it was another quickly put together supper – tonight’s choice was tuna casserole.