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Published: September 30th 2010
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“Winter 2010 - Island Hopping North to the Abacos”
We are a bit late with this addition of the blog. My apologies.
We left Georgetown on March 14th after a very successful Regatta in Georgetown. A predicted NW breeze at 15-20 knots gave us a beam reach from the Ocean Cut at the South end of Exuma Sound to the North end of Long Island called Cape Santa Maria. This famous cape is one of many landfalls made by Christopher Columbus on his first voyage to the new world.
From this landfall we jibed and reached down the West side of the island until we arrived our favorite harbor of Thompson Bay. We were soon joined by at least 20 other boats that left Georgetown that morning. Some were staging for trips to the remote Jumentos & Ragged Islands. Others, like us, were on our way North via Cat Island & Eleuthera Island. We stayed there six days waiting for suitable wind to head north. Finally on Saturday the 20th of March, we sailed for Cat Island. It was a good sail, partly on the bank west of Long Island and then a 20 mile Ocean leg between
the Islands. We headed into the settlement of New Bight at the south end of Cat shortly after 3:00 PM. This gave us time to dinghy ashore and climb the steep path to the “Hermitage”. This is a small monastery build by Father Jerome, a famous Priest that built many churches throughout the Bahamas. The site of the Hermitage is the highest point in the entire island chain.
The next day we pushed along to the unique island of Little San Salvador. We stopped here during out first winter and wanted to share it with our cruising friends Doug & Sharon on “About Time” who were sailing north along with us. This island is owned by Norwegian Cruise Lines and is used as a “Private Island” by their ships. They allow cruisers to share the anchorage as long as we stay out of the way. When we arrived a very large cruise ship was anchored in the Half Moon Bay. Fortunately, it sailed about an hour later, which allowed us to re-anchor up close to the white sand beach. We went ashore and walked the beach that had been full with several thousand tourists only a short time before.
There were several workers straightening the lounge chairs and raking the beach and at first they thought we were passengers that had “missed the boat”.
The following morning dawned cloudy and the forecast was for a strong front to move through later in the day accompanied by severe thunderstorms and high winds. We left early and pushed hard to reach the more secure harbor of Rock Sound on the south end of Eleuthera. About an hour out we landed a 12 pound yellow fin tuna. As we rounded Cape Eleuthera and had just 7 miles more to reach Rock Sound, the dark clouds closed on us and a light rain began to fall. As the winds increased to 20 knots, or slightly more, we reached along under the lee of the land at a speed of about 10 knots. We had just set the anchor about 200 yards off the shore line of the small town, when the squalls and very high winds descended on us. This anchorage is all sand and provides great holding, so we made it through the storm without problems.
Our two days in Rock Sound were highlighted by a great lunch ashore at
the new ‘Four Points” restaurant which made several types of homemade bread. We left with a loaf of white and a loaf of rosemary basil bread. One night all of the cruisers had a sundown happy hour in an old tiki hut on the shore which featured singing and guitars along with the requisite drinks & hors d' oeuvres.
Our next stop was Governors Harbor, midway up the island of Eleuthera. This was the first capital of the Bahamas and features many very old stately homes clinging to the hillside overlooking the harbor. From Governors Harbor we set out across the banks for Current Cut. The cut is a short way to get to Spanish Wells our next stop. This cut has to be approached at or near slack tide to avoid the currents that run as high as 6-7 knots. We hit it just about 30 minute past high tide and only had a 1 knot current flushing us through the cut.
Once again the weather forecast was for another strong front to pass through the next day so we hurried along to Spanish Wells in hopes of renting a mooring ball in their small harbor. Luckily,
when we arrived there were still 3 moorings available. We met up with our friends Gary & Ingrid on “Tamaki”. They left Georgetown shortly after we did but headed directly North. While in Spanish Wells we rented a golf cart and toured the small island. Most of the men on Spanish Wells make their living as lobster fisherman and the harbor is full of boats used for that purpose.
By this time it had been about three months since my last haircut and I desperately needed a trim. I walked along the waterfront and came to a small open shed where the “good ole boys” too old for lobstering were sitting around discussing the events of the day. This looked like the best way to find out where the local barbershop might be located. Well, they said, there really wasn’t a barbershop on the island. So I asked, “Where could a fellow get his hair trimmed around here”. They told me to hold on while they called Larry. It turns out that Larry has converted his garage into a one chair barbershop and I was soon being driven to Larry’s place in a beat up old golf cart. I
got a great haircut for $10.00 and got to listen to some great stories from Larry.
Our next leg was the ocean passage across NW Providence channel. This is a 63 mile trip from Spanish Wells to the south end of the Abaco Chain. Once through the reef called “The Devils Backbone”, the water drops off quickly to about 7,000 ft. As the depth increased so did the long ocean swells. By 0800 we were sailing along on a beam reach in about 18 knots and seas of about 4-6 feet.
There were about 12 boats making this crossing that had waited in Spanish Wells for this weather window. The calls back and forth on the VHF radio indicated that not all of the crews were comfortable in the current conditions. However, nearly all of the boats pushed on. It turned out to be the right decision as the seas continued to ease as we pushed north. We were regularly hitting speeds in the 7-9 knot range and closed on the islands ahead by 3:00 PM. Now the question was which narrow cut through the rocky islands should we take to avoid the roughest seas? We opted for
Little Harbor Cut which was the closest entrance and looked to be about 80 degrees from the direction of the large ocean swells. If the swells are coming directly into the cut, it often creates huge breaking waves at the mouth of the cut called “Rages”. Every year we hear of boaters that suffer severe damage trying to enter cuts during rages. Fortunately, our passage through Little Harbor Cut was actually quite smooth and we were now inside the island string on the Abaco Bank.
Our choice of anchorage for the night was inside Little Harbor just off the beach in front of a very popular “watering hole” called Pete’s Pub. We picked up a mooring and then launched the dinghy for a look around the island. Pete’s Pub is also known for the bronze art foundry next door as well as a great place for beer and burgers.
The island was first popularized by an artist named Randolph Johnston who settled here in the early 50’s with his family. They lived in a cave at first. Then they built the pub and later the foundry to support their lifestyle. Two of the sons now run the family enterprise.
We now had 3-4 weeks to explore the Abaco chain before heading back to the US.
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