Little Farmers Cay to Samson Cay

We have successfully avoided Georgetown this year. Many, if not most, boats cruising the Bahamas make Georgetown their destination before returning to the US or Canada. It is a beautiful harbor, a good place to reprovision and there is plenty of shelter for anchoring. We are told there are normally over 350 boats there during the winter season. They have a lot of organized activities, and have a regatta as well. Most seem to like this set up and go back year after year. I suppose it could be fun, but we decided early on to pass on it this year. I'm sure we will make our way there at some point in the future and check it out.

We also decided to enjoy the Exumas slowly our first time around. We will cover more territory next year. We were going to go from Little Farmers Cay to Cat Island, and then work our way up through Eluthera, but the winds didn't cooperate when we wanted to go. There is always next year.

After leaving Rush Bay Rush, we sailed back north a bit to Little Bay. This was our second stop at Little Bay. We love Little Bay. The sand is fine, and the water is incredible. Sometimes there are a few boats anchored there because it is right around the corner from Black Point. We stayed there two nights. On  day one there were two other boats there, but the next day, we had it all to ourselves. We walked the beach, swam, and snorkeled.


After a day at Black Point to do laundry, we went to the northwest side of Bitter Guana Cay. When you land on the beach, the iguanas come running at you. They are protected and they are used to being fed. They look more like Komodo Dragons to me than they do iguanas. They are somewhere between the size of a dinosaur and chameleon.




It was another pretty anchorage, although there was a bit of a swell.


We also took the dinghy to the beach on the southwest side of the cay. We saw iguanas there too, but they were much smaller, and some had racing numbers on them.


From Bitter Guana Cay, we moved north to Samson Cay. There is a nice (pricey) marina here, as well as a small grocery store, and the first Internet we've found that is fast. We are anchored out front along with fifteen or twenty other boats.




We finally got to snorkel at Thunderball Grotto.

It's about a 3 1/2 mile dinghy ride from Samson Cay, but the winds were light so we didn't get too wet on the way over. Thunderball has a cave which has several tunnels to get in or out. There is a hole in the top of the cave which lets sunlight in. The current there is strong, so the idea is to get there at either low tide or high tide. We have not been able to figure slack current yet. It doesn't happen at exactly low or high tide. Don't ask me why not--does not make sense to me. Anyway, at low tide you can swim through a short tunnel with about 16 or 18 inches of air above your head. If you go at high tide, you have to go under water. We went at low tide through the chicken entrance, and then out another entrance, and snorkeled around the outside as well. It is really pretty cool. 

As soon as this front passes through, we will make our way north to stage for crossing the Gulfsteam back to Florida. We haven't decided whether to leave from Rose or Athol Island or from the northern Berry's. Our plan is to enter Florida at the Lake Worth Inlet.

Little Farmers Cay

Here's the post office at Black Point. It's a one woman operation. We were able to fax a tax related document from there.

We hiked to the north side of the cay, then checked out a blow hole on the Exuma Sound side of the cay. One weird thing I've noticed about the Bahamas, is there are no sea birds. No pelicans, no sea gulls. The good news is, the only thing that lands on our boat is salt--if you know what I mean.


Dinghy Dock at Black Point.


Old man posing at Black Point.

We left Black Point and headed south for Bay Rush Bay on southwest Great Guana Cay. We had a great sail. With great skill we were able to do it in about four hours. Point to point should have taken about an hour and a half, but....Lisa was at the helm. We really were in no hurry, and tacked back and forth, and spent some time unjamming the genoa furling line. We had to drop the sail like in the old days to unjam it, and then raise it back up and furl it. We have never had issues with a genoa furler, but I don't think we have solved the problem yet. Despite being led properly to the drum, the line is not wrapping around the drum as it should.


The next day we took the dinghy to Little Farmers Cay. We went all the way around the cay and then tied up at the town dock to check the place out.


We went to get a bite to eat at Ocean Cabin Restaurant and Bar, but since there were no customers, it was not open. 

However, the owner--Terry Baine, showed up and informed us that the cook (which is his wife) would be there in about an hour. Terry writes a monthly column for the Exuma paper, and he asked us what we thought of his latest article. So, we ended up "discussing" politics until the "cook" showed up--I wasn't finished making my points. He reads a lot, is a deep thinker, and a very interesting man...not that there is anything wrong with that.

Staniel Cay

This is Big Rock Cut, viewed from the northwest side of Staniel Cay.

We finally had a perfect day to snorkel the cave at Thunderball. But....there was another front on the way that was supposed to bring squalls with winds thirty to forty knots from the west. So we decided to get an early jump before the spots with good protection were taken. We sailed back up north to Cambridge Cay--also called Little Bell.


On our way north we passed Bird On A Wire headed south. We met them in Nassau, and also shared at a couple of anchorages with them. We really enjoyed meeting them. Their boat is a beautiful, steel, Bruce Roberts 38 foot Spray.

The mooring field at Cambridge Cay is beautiful. It is within the boundaries of the Exuma Land and Sea Park. The whole park is a no take zone. We spent a few days there until the wind clocked back to the north. While we were there, we took the dinghy north to snorkel at the Seaquariam. It is basically a small cay with a decent drop off on one side with a little coral and some fish. On the way back to the mother ship, we briefly looked through our looky bucket at a crashed airplane. The current was too strong to do a real snorkel, and we were cold.

When the weather veered north we made our way to Great Guana Cay. The winds were light from the north, so we were almost on a dead run. We sailed a little and motored a little. We anchored at a great beach on Little Bay.


We moved a little north to Black Point the next day to do laundry (I had some shirts that needed washing--I'm not 20 years old anymore) and some Internet. There is free Internet (with a small donation) at Lorraine's Restaurant, and her fish dinners are excellent. The people are very friendly here. We really like Black Point a lot.

Big Majors

After the front blew through we made our way south to the west side of Big Majors Spot. This is popular anchorage with plenty of room for a lot of boats. It provides good holding as well as protection from winds without a westerly component. It is also a wet dinghy ride away from Staniel Cay. At least it's wet when the winds are twenty to twenty five.

Lisa was excited to wash clothes in the bucket for the first time. Yes, that is a plunger--a new one mind you. I had already been told that my shorts would be too hard to wash. I can wear long sleeve shirts and sweats if it snows, but now I'm told my T-shirts are too hard to rinse out. So I guess it's just bathing suits unless we are around a Laundromat.

We were able to get Internet access at Staniel Cay Yacht Club while we were there. It was very slow, but hey. No discount for slow either. They actually have a sign telling you to relax and have a beer while the satellite goes to work. We hiked all over Staniel Cay. It always feels great to walk after being on the boat for a while. We were able to buy two loaves of bread from a the lady in the yellow house while were there as well. Coconut bread is a big thing around here.

We went to the Isles General Store to look around. You can actually dinghy up to the store's dinghy dock, but we walked. There is very little food or candy in the stores. They get their supplies from the mail boat that comes around once a week, but we are never around at that time.

This is the view from the store, looking out at the dinghy route.

Bond. James Bond.  Or did the hat give it away? In the background is Thunderball Grotto. They tell me a James Bond movie was filmed here, as well as Splash. 

You snorkel into this big cave, which has a hole that lets light in from above. Once inside, I think you can stand up. Apparently there are a lot of fish looking for handouts. We wanted to snorkel there while we were anchored at Big Majors, but the weather never cooperated. We hope to do it at some time in the future.

Here's another picture of Thunderball Grotto.

In the background is Exuma Sound, close to Big Rock Cut.  In the foreground is the Weather Babe.

Yellow Banks, Hawksbill Cay and Warderick Wells

We found the Starbucks in Nassau. So now we were free to leave.

We think we left Nassau on February 17th, but who really knows. We were bound for the Exumas. There was another mass exodus when the weather cleared. It looked like a bomb scare. With winds between 15 and 23 knots, it was a blustery broadreach to Hawksbill Cay. Our first time crossing the Yellow Banks went well. It is a shallower area with coral heads that might try to ruin your day. So one crew member goes to the bow to guide the helmsperson around any potential danger. We dodged all the coral heads, all the grass, and all the clouds that made the water look dark. You can call it luck, but we will call it skill. The clouds are the hardest because they move right when you get to them.


We anchored at Hawksbill Cay with two other boats from the marina in Nassau. Hawksbill was our first beach anchorage. We still can't believe we have our boat in water like this.


Dinghy and the beach.

We stayed at Hawksbill Cay for two days trying to figure out where to go to weather the next cold front. It is easy to find shelter from winds from the NNE to SSE, but when the winds go west it gets a little trickier. Most of the protection from westerly winds are between cays with strong reversing currents.


Warderick Wells.

We decided to go to Warderick Wells. You have to get a mooring to stay there, but there is decent protection all around. There are a lot of boats in the Exumas, so when the winds clock to the west, there is a rush to the areas with good westerly protection. Because the more popular north mooring field was full, we ended up going to the more remote south mooring field. Most boats don't go there because you have to go out into Exuma Sound to get there. There were 3 boats there when we got in, but they all left early the next morning. So we had it all to ourselves for three days. It was beautiful. The tidal currents are extremely strong. Boaters know that when anchored, the bow of the boat is normally pointed into the wind. We were getting sustained winds in the upper twenties, with gusts over thirty which stayed on our beam. The mooring ball banging away on the hull. This was because the current overpowered the wind. Next time I will experiment with locking the rudder to turn into the wind. I don't know if that will work or not. You have to make sure your dinghy is well secured or it will be gone gone bye bye.
This was a perfect hiding place for pirates back in the day. Pirates could anchor site unseen in the cove, and pounce on unsuspecting ships going through the cut. And... there was a well with good water. The water in that well looks black now.

While we were there, we did some hiking. The terrain is limestone that looks like Swiss cheese. OSHA would not approve of these trails. It is like walking on a combination of thumb tacks and knives. I started to wonder how I would get back to the boat if I blew out a flip flop. Lisa had reef shoes on, so no problem there. There were not many living beings that we could see. We did see one bird, one little tiny snake, and three members of the rat family. This is on a protected island. Maybe we have upset nature's course by protecting it. There are a lot of large holes that look like wells.


We use this bucket to check our anchor. I cut a hole in the bottom and glued lexan (they didn't have plexi glass) to the bottom of it with some 5200. A friend of ours, we will call her Leta, calls this white trash snorkeling. I couldn't have said it better. Here I am trying to figure out what kind of fish are attacking our boat. When I would raise the dinghy on the davits, the fish went crazy biting the drops of water falling off the dinghy. By the way, this method of checking your anchor set will not work in Texas or Louisiana.