It's too cold!

Hope your life is good.  Elyse has been complaining because the temp has only been getting to the high 60's.  I think it will get back to the 70's by the end of the week.  We may slow our  progress north.  We went to the grocery store.  A real treat.  I think we may head out north toward Spanish Wells tomorrow.  Winds look good.  There will be another front coming through later in the week.  From Spanish Wells we will jump off to the Abacos.

Take care.

John

Rock Sound

We are anchored in the bay by Rock Sound, Eleuthera. After a couple of bouncy days in New Bight on Cat Island we asked what Chris Parker, weather guru, thought of us sailing to Little San Salvador and on to Rock Sound the following day. He said with the 13-14 ft. swells from the NE in the Exuma Sound we would not be smart to anchor in West Bay at Little San Salvador. By the time we digested that info it was 8 a.m. but we decided to pull anchor and see how far we could get up the south coast of Eleuthera. Our bail out would be Davis Harbour Marina even though the cruising guide and chart said the channel depth was too shallow for us to attempt. At that point we would be committed to traveling the remainder of the way through Davis Channel after dark which is not recommended due to shifting sand bars and shallow coral heads. We felt, however, that if we didn't leave then we would be in Cat bobbing around all night for at minimum a few days. So off we went. It was a good sail although a little intimidating. As calculated, we just made it to Davis Harbour about 1 hour prior to sunset and were grateful to hear that we could enter with no problem. 

The following morning we pulled up to the fuel dock and filled our tank to the tune of $6.00 per gallon. We departed and arrived in Rock Sound about noon. This is one of our favorite settlements as it has a great protected bay, the best grocery store south of Marsh Harbor, and Pascal's, a great bar/restaurant, where we enjoy a cold Kalik after running our errands. 

I neglected to tell you about Sandy the Manatee who lives in the waters just off the dinghy dock at Long Island Breeze in Salt Pond, Long Island. He appears to be a young manatee and he comes up to the back deck of the restaurant where the owner has left a hose for him to drink fresh water. He comes up and drinks right out of the hose. Very amazing as I assume most manatees don't get to drink fresh water. 

Anyway, yesterday "we" (my part was to crawl into the rear lazerette where I could physically fit and screw the wire to the tuner box) installed a KISS ground for our SSB as we were not getting very good reception and John cut pieces of pvc pipe to use to hold our antenna off of the back stay. We were pleasantly rewarded with improved reception this a.m.  We are here for at least one more day and then north to anchor off Pigeon Cay or in Hatchet Bay and stage for our trip through Current Cut, which has very strong currents so we must time our passage to slack or ebb tide, and on to Spanish Wells. 

We turned our clocks forward Sat. night a time I always look forward to as it means spring is near and the daylight hours are getting longer.

Best to you all,

Elyse and John

Cat Island

Here we are in Cat Island after a good sail straight from Long Island. Looks like weather and sea state will keep us here for a week!!

Elyse and John

Long Island

Hey Gang,

We are in beautiful Long Island.  The water is 80 degrees and flat.  We are doing laundry and a little food shopping.  Yesterday we swam in Dean's Blue hole.  Over 600 feet deep and where they hold world champion deep diving championships.  Lots of beautiful fish and clear water.  Tonight the wind is supposed tp pick up so we will be sure to be back on the boat.  There are a couple of weather fronts coming through and I think we will wait till they pass which may mean it will be next week before we head back north to Cat Island.

We just finished our laundry at the Island Breeze resort.  There is a manatee hanging out next to the dingy dock.  When we finish with the computer we will walk over to the grocery store.  

I hope your life is good.  We feel like we are living the life.

John & Elyse on Spunky

Last Stop South

Here we are in Long Island doing laundry and catching up on internet. The winds are supposed to get to 25 gusting 30 tonight with squalls so we are prepared to hunker down. 

Yesterday we shared a rental car with Hayden and Raydeen from Island Spirit and went to Dean's Blue Hole which is 664 ft. deep and used for Free Dive competition. There is a platform in the middle of the hole for divers. We swam out to the platform. It is a little intimidating and there are warming signs saying to stay out unless you are a good swimmer. I figure you can drown in 20 ft. or  600+ ft. either way. We also visited Clarence Town and on the way saw one of the island race boats under construction from local trees. We visited two of the churches that were built by Father Jerome who retired on Cat Island and built the Hermitage on the hill that we saw last year. 

We had a good time in Georgetown playing dominoes and attending the opening ceremony for Cruisers Regatta Week. There was a "No Talent Talent Show" and a Doggie Parade. 

We departed Georgetown on Thursday morning and had a great sail down. We may be here for a week waiting for good weather to move on to Cat Island. 

Elyse and John

Georgetown

We have arrived Thursday Feb. 21st. at Emerald Bay Marina about 10 miles north of Georgetown. We sailed here from Black Point yesterday. We left the anchorage at Black Point at 7:15 a.m. hoisted the main and headed for Dotham Cut. Because the tide was against the wind at that time of the day we hobby horsed out the cut to the Exuma Sound. The Sound on the east side of the Exumas is more like being in the ocean. The waves are higher and the water a lot deeper than on the Banks which is on the West side. We had anticipated 12-14 knt winds out of the east based on Chris Parkers morning cast, but the winds were consistently above 20 and the waves 4-6 ft. We had about 40 miles to go to our destination. It was a bit rough.

Our stay in Black Point was very enjoyable. We had dinner at Lorraine's Cafe (a Bahamian buffet) and met a nice young couple from Montreal who were on a captained charter for 10 days. Their experience was very different from ours. No boat repairs, meals cooked and served, taxi service to and from shore, and no cleaning up.They want to buy a boat and bring it down sometime in the future. 

 We visited "the garden of Eden" which is a garden of driftwood sculpture that takes some imagination to define the subjects. The sculptor, Willie, lives in a house in the middle of the garden and he came out to give us a tour. He is an elderly gentleman with a great sense of humor. He described what each sculpture was in his mind but understood that we might envision something else. There must be about 30 of them. He then took us on a tour of his vegetable garden and fruit trees. It was quite amazing to see how much he could grow in between the rock that made up his yard (apple, papaya, banana, grapes, peas, squash, lemon grass, almond and much more)

I forgot in an earlier update to tell you about the Pig Beach in Staniel Cay. It is a beach on the West side of Big Major Spot where the island pigs, expecting to be fed, swim out to meet the incoming boats.. They are huge and great swimmers. We went just before the big blow so it was a bit rough with the wind starting to pick up. We had heard from other cruisers that the pigs try to get into the approaching dinghies and can do damage. Fortunately for us, there was a tour boat bringing out guests with lots of food for the pigs. They swam to the tour boat and we were able to watch them and take a few pics. They ignored us and rightly so as we did not bring food. 

Today we did laundry and are waiting for the fuel dock to open (the fellow who mans the dock had to drive to Georgetown for a part) and then we will take a walk. 

Black Point

We are now in Black Point.  Had a good if short sail today to get here.  Hope your life is good.

Thunderball Grotto

Happy Valentine's Day 

We are in Staniel Cay.  We are anchored next to Thunderball Gratto where the movie Thunderball with James 

bond was filmed.  We will dive in the grotto tomorrow.  We are having a wonderful trip.  Hope your life is as good or better.

John & Elyse

Exumas

Our location in Waderick Wells, the Exumas Land and Sea Park and Elyse's update are below.  We are having a great trip.  Touch wood, the boat is performing well.  There are a lot of fronts this year so you grab your chance to move and then enjoy yourself and wait for the next opening.  Most evenings are spent with new and old friends on someone's boat.  This evening a Canadian couple we spent 10 days with last year in Rock Sound are coming over.  They are on their way back to Nassau for engine batteries.

We had talked about this being our last year cruising but as we spend time in beautiful places with warm weather we may come again.  

We will leave tomorrow for Staniel Cay.  That is the location where Thunderball was filmed.  We will snorkel into the grotto where James Bond climbed on the rocks.  

Hope you have a great week.

John & Elyse on Spunky

Exumas

We left Nassau and headed to the Exumas. Our first stop was Highborne Cay where we anchored for the night and were anchor up and heading south early with a destination of Hawksbill Cay which we thought would give us a little more protection from the winds than Shroud where we stayed last year. 

Hawksbill was beautiful. Just what you imagine the Bahamas should be. There are clean white beaches that taper into turquoise water. We stayed two nights taking the trail across to the Sound side. It is one of the cays in the Exuma Park and there are rules preventing visitors from fishing or removing any wildlife including shells from the park.

Each morning on VHF the park office announces openings for the mooring balls in Warderick Wells (there are 22 balls in the North Mooring Field). Our name came up at the top of the waiting list and we were assigned a ball so we pulled anchor and headed down. This will be our third day here. Yesterday we climbed Boo Boo Hill and left a piece of driftwood with our names on it along with many others left by cruisers from past years. We have been visiting with new friends from this year and also friends from last year who happen to be here. 

Right now John is listening to the weather which we hear each a.m. on SSB so we can decide if we shall leave here tomorrow for Staniel Cay where we will anchor and ride out 25-30 knt winds from the north or stay here through Monday when we will be able to travel once again.  

We are hoping the winter is not too harsh wherever you may be. Love hearing from all of you.

Elyse and John