Sunset at Adams Creek in North Carolina off the Neuse River and near Oriental.  It’s our last night at anchor at the end of the trip.

After posting so many pictures of pretty things on these trips, it may be time for a “Boat Horror”.  This piece of bronze piping dips to the bottom of our toilet waste holding tank and is used to suck out whatever is in there.  You can see the corroded hole in the side that kept us from completely emptying the tank during the last months of our trip.  Bill made a special trip to New Bern after we got back home to replace the whole thing.  Yuck, yuck, and double yuck.

 

Hello from Tennessee.  Bill and I are in our land home, and Irish Eyes is tied in her slip in Northwest Creek Marina.  It is nice to be in our cool house and not to have to fret about the weather.

We left our peaceful anchorage in Cow House Creek in the early morning of June 13 headed north.  The tidal currents were in our favor, and we were rapidly washed up the Waccamaw River to Socastee and then all the way through Myrtle Beach to the Little River Inlet crossing with the ICW.  We did not go out the inlet because the seas were still high from the offshore weather.  At the crossing a tug and very large barge was aground in the ICW.  It was quite a feat for the tug captain to get the barge out of the shallow water while dealing with the fierce tidal current.  The tug had to turn the barge completely around to get it free.  We passed by the tug as it was maneuvering and managed to stay ahead of him all afternoon.  We worried about the two shallow trouble spots in the next stretch, the Shallotte and Lochwood’s Folly Inlets, we did not have any real trouble with either.  We anchored in Dutchman’s Creek Park near Southport, NC as the sun set.  It was a very long day, 72.5 miles.

The next day, we were up and away early to have favorable currents in the Cape Fear River and then through Snow’s Cut.  We made good time until we arrived at the Wrightsville Beach Bridge where the scheduled noon opening was delayed by an EMS crew that was attending to a medical emergency on the island.  We thought about leaving the ICW and going outside to Beaufort, NC, but again bad weather in the ocean nixed that idea.  Our anchor went down in Mile Hammock Bay in Camp Lejeune as both the sun and the temperature went down.  All was nice, quiet, and calm until the marines started their nighttime operations.  The sky overhead filled with helicopters and Osprey tiltrotor aircraft all coming and going from the adjacent airfield lighting us up with their spotlights and making a deafening racket.  Bill just slept with his good ear buried in his pillow seeing and hearing nothing.  At 2 am when the marines finally stopped, I was ready to go outside and wave a white flag.

A dry cold front passed over us during the night.  The air was cooler and drier, but the post frontal wind was 20 knots.  We had a lot of small boat traffic between Swansboro and Morehead City, but we managed to completely avoid the Big Rock Fishing Tournament traffic in Morehead City.  That was a relief.  The Big Rock had 220+ large sport fishing boats competing for a total prize pot of $6,000,000.  Understandably, the sport fishing boats would  always be in a hurry and not have time to be polite to little slow sailboats like us.  This was a short day for us; we were anchored in Adams Creek by 5:30.

Thursday, June 16 was an even shorter day.  With only a 3 or 4-hour trip to Northwest Creek, we did not depart until almost 10.  We watched a thunderstorm, with lots of lightening, bomb the town of Oriental.  Luckily for us we only had a few sprinkles of rain.  Irish Eyes was tied up in her slip at 2:30pm.  We got the car unlocked, moved the air conditioner to the boat, and said goodbye to the summer heat.  Ah, Freon, my dear friend.

I was looking forward to a shower with unlimited hot water and the use of a regular flush toilet.  We do have a 5-gallon water heater on Irish Eyes as well as an excellent marine toilet, but I was just ready for the conveniences of modern household plumbing.  To my dismay, the marina women’s bathroom was being remodeled and could not be used.  The closest women’s toilets and showers were at the recreation center a good distance away and only available during their open hours.  To Bill’s dismay, while I was using our on-board toilet, he could not replace the corroded and leaking piping on our holding tank.  Oh well.

We packed our clothes, food, and Bahamas boat stuff and took them to the car then moved the things that we had stored in the car back to the boat and did a little boat maintenance.  That sounds so simple.  It wasn’t.  It took four days.  While we were in New Bern, we had dinner with three other couples we met years ago while cruising.  Two of the couples now live in New Bern, and one couple was just passing through on their boat.  We had a wonderful time catching up.

We left New Bern Monday June 20 and made the long drive back to Kingsport.  Most things here in our house did well.  The refrigerator was not working properly, but Bill has worked on it, and it seems fine.  The washing machine had a leak, but Bill fixed that too.  It is probably one of the things I am most grateful to have, a very handy husband.

Hope you all have a wonderful summer.

While sailing between Eleuthera and Abaco, we had three LNG tankers cross our path along with several other ships.  This one was the closest.  The US is apparently exporting a lot of LNG right now.

 

In Little Harbour, Abaco we came across this cork tree in full bloom.  The open blossoms are yellow, and the older blossoms turn red.

 

These pretty purple flowers are butterfly peas.  We saw no butterflies nearby, but that was its name.

 

This noble craft is the “Thirsty Cuda”.  It pulls up alongside a partially submerged sandbar covered in tourists, opens the big flap on the side to form an awning, and dispenses great quantities of food and drink.

 

The Hopetown Lighthouse is one of the most photographed things in Abaco.  It is still lit with kerosene and powered by falling weights raised by hand.  It is one of the last of its kind.  Ths was the view from our cockpit.

In the place where a nice house once stood on the shore in Marsh Harbour is the Hurricane Dorian Memorial Garden.  Among the several things there is this tablet.  Take a minute, click on the picture, zoom in, and read it to get an idea of what happened here.

 

If you get a chance drop by Donnie’s Marina in Green Turtle Cay.  It’s easy to find Donnie.  His voice will give him away.  We recommend the place highly.  Simple is often the best.  And, it is an easy walk into town.

We were treated to several good thrashings on our way from Green Turtle Cay to Fernandina Beach.  After one serious rainstorm in the Gulf Stream, the sun came out, and this rainbow appeared.  Too bad the wind and waves remained.

We also had unexpected weather later off Hilton Head Island and Fripp Island when a long tubular cloud extending from horizon to horizon came at us from the west.  Our spot along the cloud had less rain and lacked the lightning that were present on either side, but none-the-less the wind reached 30 knots and stayed there for about 15 minutes before calming down to 25.  I stayed below and Bill dealt with it.  It was followed several hours later by another cloud just like it with similar results.

This is calm, tranquil, and uninhabited Cow House Creek off the Waccamaw River in South Carolina.  That is where we are now.  On arrival we were greeted by an alligator, a pair of nesting ospreys are in a tree behind us, and turtles are sunning themselves on the logs along the shore.  Nice.

Hello from Cow House Creek.  It is June, and we are back in the US.  We left Green Turtle Cay, Abaco making it across to Florida before the tropical storm hit the Bahamas and before a threatening cold front made it down to Florida.  More about our trip back later in this post.

Around May 1^st we turned north and began our trip toward North Carolina stopping at several beaches on Guana Cay in the Exumas.  Stopping at Black Point, Bill and I quickly collected about forty sand dollars on the sand flats in the harbor.  I finally said enough, we could not pick up any more sand dollars.  Still, it was hard for me to walk by sand dollar after sand dollar leaving them behind in the sand.

The weather this year has been rainy in the Bahamas.  We have not had many fierce thunderstorms with strong wind; it has been rain, just lots of rain.  We anchored for several nights at Sampson Cay to explore intending to go from there to the Aga Khan’s Bell Island.  From Bell Island we were planning to leave for the all-day trip to Rock Sound, Eleuthera.  But, on the day we were to leave, it rained, then rained some more.  While the rain did fill our water tanks, it ended our plan.  In the afternoon the sky finally cleared, and we decided to execute a new plan… go to Conch Cut, anchor for the night, and leave for Rock Sound early the next morning.

We had only light wind between Conch Cut and Rock Sound, and we mostly motored with the sails up pretending to sail.  It was an uneventful trip until we got close to the island of Eleuthera.  We could see a distant thunderstorm over Rock Sound.  Not wanting to meet it underway, we anchored at Powell Point for about an hour letting the storm go away.

The Rock Sound Harbor is almost 2 miles wide, and boats often move from one side of the harbor to the other to get the best protection from the wind.  Our first day in Rock Sound we stayed on the east side of the harbor which is the town side.  Bill bought fuel at the local filling station, and then we both went into the Wild Orchid Restaurant for lunch.  We had lunch there three years ago when they had first opened.  This time the owner, who is also the chef, came out and talked with us.  She and our waitress both told us that in the spring of 2020, the Bahamas was completely closed to tourists due to Covid, and she was forced to close the restaurant for a full year.  The cruisers anchored in the harbor were not allowed to come on shore for anything.  To help them, the police compiled a list of phone numbers for the boaters to call for groceries, fuel, medical assistance, and other necessary things.  The boaters would call for whatever they needed, and it would be delivered to the dinghy dock at Wild Orchid where they could also get fresh water.  The boaters could dinghy to the dock and pick up their orders, but they could not get off their dinghies.  To be a boat prisoner, wow!, not me.  I am thankful we had decided not to travel to the Bahamas in 2020.  We were also impressed that the restaurant, which depends on tourists, could survive a year-long shutdown.  It must have been a tough year.

On Saturday, May 7, the wind shifted to the southwest, and thunderstorms were predicted for the afternoon and the next day.  We, along with most of the boats anchored on the east side of the harbor, moved across to the west side of the harbor for wind protection.  By supper time, another 23 boats came into the harbor and joined us on the east side.  We had some wind and rain with the worst at about 4am, (It always happens in the dark.) but nothing too horrible happened.  Sunday, we had threats of more storms, but we only got a few sprinkles.  By Monday the weather cleared, and we moved back across the harbor to be near town anchoring near Frigate’s Restaurant.  From their dinghy dock it was a short walk to a local grocery store.  The store was like a small grocery in the US.  I had bought lots of food in Miami, so our shopping list was short which was nice because there are now no grocery bags in the Bahamas.  We were expected to bring our own reusable bags.  We filled Bill’s small backpack and all four of our hands.  On our way back to the boat, we dropped into Frigates’ for a nice cold Kalik beer and a bit of rest.

Tuesday, May 10 was an eventful day.  We had packed up some heels of bread to feed the fish at the Ocean Hole in Rock Sound.  The hole was a saltwater lake set in the town’s park connected to the sea by caves.  We were walking down the sandy road to the park when at the last house on the left six dogs came out barking at us.  They were not barking friendly barks but were snarling unfriendly barks.  Bill and I just kept walking saying pleasant things to the dogs.  The woman in the house came out and yelled at the dogs.  We just kept walking.  One of the dogs evidently did not like my looks, snuck up from behind me, and unexpectedly lunged out and bit me on the back of my left leg just above my ankle.  I was shocked.  I have never been bitten by a dog.  I yelled to Bill that the dog had bitten me, and we kept walking avoiding any conflict with the dogs or their owner.  Bill remembered bathrooms at the park where he would get water to clean my leg.  Unfortunately, the bathrooms were closed.  We walked over to the parking lot, and Bill asked a man sitting in a small van in the shade of a tree if there was a water faucet nearby.  The nice man offered Bill a half full gallon jug of water.  When the man saw my bleeding leg, he said I needed to go to the clinic, and he would take us.  Bill and I squeezed into his front passenger seat, and we took off.  The man was waiting for the vet to come to look at an injured goat that was behind us in the car.  His jug of water was for the goat.  When we told our driver and then later the clinic staff where we were when the dog bit me, every one of them knew the dogs and their owner pronouncing them all “mean”.

The nurses at the clinic cleaned my wound, dressed it, gave me a tetanus shot, and a course of antibiotics.  The total fee was only $70 including a return examination.  I am sure I’ll get advice on how not to get bitten by a dog.  Trust me, I did not do anything to cause that dog to bite me.  They were just “mean”.

We stayed in Rock Sound until Sunday, May 15 partly waiting for a break in the rainy weather and partly because I had to return to the clinic on Friday for a dressing change and a wound inspection.  The nurses told me I could leave, and they told Bill to change my dressing every third day.  Bill walked around town without me, shopping at another grocery store and going back to the Ocean Hole to feed the fish the two heels of bread that he still had in his pocket.  He wisely avoided the mean dogs’ house.  When we left Rock Sound it was not raining, but along the way to Governors Harbour we saw large raining dark clouds all around us.  Fortunately, using our radar we were able to dodge the storms and arrived in Governors Harbour dry.

Our stay in Governors Harbour was rainy, again.  Two of the boats we were with in Rock Sound came into Governors Harbour on Monday.  We all met that evening on the sailing catamaran Sangaris for drinks and snacks swapping tales of past adventures and advice on the trips ahead.

We left Governors Harbour on Tuesday, May 17 and headed for Current Cut.  Current Cut is an aptly named narrow channel between Current Island and Eleuthera.  The tide flows through the cut at up to 5 knots, and the approach is curvy, narrow, and shallow.  We wanted to pass through the cut with good visibility and with a favorable current.  Our timing was good.  We were mostly concerned with a big black cloud to our west.  Thankfully, that squall missed us, and we only had a few drops of rain.  We came through the cut without a problem and anchored just northeast of the cut off a white sandy beach backed with palm trees and some nice houses.

Ahead lay a 50 nautical mile open water crossing from Eleuthera to Abaco.  To get to the jumping off point, we motored to Egg Island and anchored there planning to leave early the next morning.  The seafloor where we anchored was rocky, and it was so calm and the water both so clear and so still that I could sit in the cockpit, look over the side, and see the colorful tropical fish swimming around the rocks 15 feet below.  It was magical.

We left Egg Island before sunrise on May 19.  “Before sunrise” is really, really early for me.  When we left there was no wind, so we motored.  Later, the wind returned, and were able to raise all three of our sails.  It was a good trip.  We arrived at Little Harbour Cut in Abaco at 5pm and motored through the cut.  Our anchor was down shortly afterwards in the lee of Lynyard Cay.

The next morning, we launched the dinghy and went into the Little Harbour settlement for lunch at Pete’s Pub.  Pete also had a gallery and a shop in Little Harbor where he sold the cast bronze sculptures that he made in his foundry (along with tee shirts and such).  After lunch, we went to the gallery and spoke with the clerk who was also a potter.  She was quite friendly, and we had a long conversation about Hurricane Dorian.  She lived in Marsh Harbour which was heavily damaged in the storm.  She told us about the storm and how they coped when it was over.  It was quite a story; certainly not one you (or I) would want to experience.

Bill and I headed north to Elbow Cay stopping first at Tahiti Beach.  Tahiti Beach brings in lots of people on their small boats who are in the Abacos staying in rental properties.  They come to play on the palm tree lined white sand beach (well, it used to have lots of palm trees and post hurricane Dorian a few still remain) and to play on the huge sandbar that emerges at low tide.  We watched the Thirsty Cuda, a houseboat made into a restaurant and bar, pull up to the beach, anchor there, and began to sell food and drinks to the crowd.  The customers waded out to the boat, placed their orders, got their snacks and drinks, and waded back to the beach or stood in the waist deep water to enjoy their purchase.  It was fascinating to watch.  The Cuda guy must have made a killing, and he did not have to clean toilets.  We went to the beach early Sunday morning May 22 before the arrival of Thirsty Cuda and the crowd.  I found several sand dollars but left them for someone else to find.  Bill found three nice shells but placed them in the sand behind a small girl who was digging away.  He hoped she would later discover them.

With the tide rising, we left Tahiti Beach and motored to Hopetown’s harbor where it can sometimes be difficult for us to enter with our 1.5m draft.  We usually anchor outside and take our dinghy in.  But, at high tide we had no problems, we easily came into the harbor, and I snagged a mooring ball on the second attempt.  (Bill screwed up the first attempt.)  The town looked nice, much had been rebuilt, and all the rubble had been removed.  We ate in a restaurant, bought gifts, went shopping, and walked around town.  One evening we sat in our cockpit and enjoyed watching the lighthouse keeper atop the tower silhouetted in the evening sky take down the curtains, light the kerosene lamp, and start the clockwork driven lenses revolving.  I really enjoyed our time in Hopetown.

We dropped our mooring early on Tuesday May 24 at high tide in order to have sufficient water depth leaving Hopetown and headed across the Sea of Abaco to Marsh Harbour.  I do not know if any of you saw pictures of Marsh Harbour after Dorian, but the town was totally devastated.  Not one building was left standing.  Everything was washed or blown away.  As Bill and I were entering the harbor, we had to stop and examine our charts because we did not recognize our surroundings, so much was gone.  Here the rubble has mostly been carted away, the concrete floor slabs of the buildings remain, and rebuilding is in progress.  Three restaurants were open.  Colours, a restaurant we had visited before, was open in a spot beside the ruins of their old place.  They built a new deck with a bar and restaurant seating.  The kitchen and storage were in a pair of shipping containers.  Walley’s restaurant was rebuilt in its old location.  A new restaurant, A.J’s., was open near the restored Maxwells Grocery which now has a large hardware department.  Three marinas were re-building, and one was already selling diesel fuel and fresh water.  The local laundromat was restored and open.  What impressed us the most was that everyone we met was smiling, happy to be working, and delighted that we were there.  The number of cruising boats in Marsh Harbour was a fraction of what was there previously, but hopefully with time more will come.

After getting our laundry done, buying a few groceries, finding gauze and adhesive tape for my dog bite, and eating in restaurants, it was time to continue with our journey north.  We left Marsh Harbour and anchored for one night at Water Cay before going around Whale Cay on Friday.  A string of sand bars extended from Whale Cay to the Abaco “mainland” closing off any route north in the protected water between the cays and the “mainland”.  To continue north, we had to go around Whale Cay on its ocean side, and we did.  Back in protected waters again, we anchored Irish Eyes off the settlement of New Plymouth on Green Turtle Cay.  With unsettled weather expected, Bill took the dinghy into Black Sound (one of two protected spots inside the cay) and arranged for a mooring ball at Donnie’s Marina.  At high tide we got over the shallow spot at the entrance to the sound and went to the marina where I snagged the mooring ball on my first attempt.

Green Turtle Cay had hurricane damage too.  We walked around town and ate in restaurants while we were there.  Once again, we could see dark stormy clouds all around, and we had a few periods of rain but nothing horrible.  Chris Parker, the weather forecaster we listen to over the shortwave radio, began talking about a possible tropical storm impacting the Abacos by Saturday June 4.  About that same time a cold front was expected to exit the US mainland around North Carolina and move south toward the Bahamas.  It was time for us to leave the Bahamas.  I did the online portion of clearing out of the Bahamas and Bill telephoned Customs.  A Customs Officer was to meet us at Donnie’s Marina early Tuesday morning May 31.  She never arrived, but after lunch we received our outbound clearance by email.  The dinghy was onboard within minutes, and we were off.  The only problem was that the customs delay left us leaving at low tide.  We grounded, but Irish Eyes’ keel pushed through the mud, and we got out of Black Sound.

Our course was set for the St. Mary’s River entrance at Fernandina Beach, Florida 325 straight line nautical miles away.  Over the next three days and nights, we had 25 knot storms, very light wind, huge swells breaking into the cockpit, and three and a half inches of rain.  It was a long and rough trip.  We sailed, motored, and motor sailed.  At 8am on Friday June 3 we entered the St. Mary’s River.  We anchored Irish Eyes, and I did our online clearance into the US.  We had managed to avoid both Tropical Storm Alex and the cold front.  The weather forecast for Fernandina was for strong winds, so we arranged a slip at Fernandina Harbor Marina for three days to let the cold front pass.

The first day we slept, and even after that we were tired.  When we re-emerged, we were rested but still sleepy.  Bill called his first cousin, Joe, and set plans for supper on Sunday.  We took showers, our first real showers with unlimited hot water in a long time.  We went out for a pizza, a real pizza with stringy cheese and with leftovers that were good for lunch the next day.  We visited two museums, Bill bought a book, we walked around the downtown, we bought fresh shrimp, we got our second Covid boosters, we bought some groceries, and I talked to a few of the many people who walked up and down the marina docks during the day.  One couple left us with some memorial seashells that we agreed to toss into the ocean for them.  Another had four kids in tow, and Bill gave a guided tour of the boat to the younger two while the other two watched with an air of superiority from the cockpit.  We went back to the same Italian restaurant where we had pizza with Joe and his wife Carolyn and even had the same waiter.  Our conversation was too enjoyable, and we talked too long while the establishment closed around us.  It was fun.  I was worried we would not sleep well in the marina with all the lights, the road traffic, two paper mills, and a railroad, but after three nights at sea we both sleep quite well each night.

While we really wanted to go back into the ocean and sail for the Cape Fear River, the weather kept us in the ICW motoring first to Lanier Island near Brunswick then to the North Newport River south of Savannah.  There we went into the ocean through the St Catherine’s Sound Entrance and up the coast to Charleston.  Once again, in the ocean we got hit by bad weather.  The thunderstorms coming off the coast missed us, but we had some rain, winds that peaked at 30 knots, and seas that reached six feet.  We entered Charleston Harbor at sunrise amid ships entering and leaving at daybreak.  We found ourselves between the rock jetties at the entrance with two ships and a pilot boat.  Think of the squeeze… rocks - outbound cargo ship - pilot boat - incoming tanker - us - rocks.  It was alarmingly tight. 

Continuing north in the tranquil ICW at the Ben Sawyer Bridge to Sullivans Island, we followed behind then overtook two sailboats both with young crews and failed engines being pushed ever so slowly north by their inflatable dinghies’ outboard motors.  Oh, the optimism and perseverance of youth.  We stopped one night in the South Santee River then continued past Georgetown and into the Waccamaw River anchoring in the isolated Cow House Creek.  Here, we will wait out the weekend small boat traffic Myrtle Beach and press on toward New Bern on Monday.

It's good to be back in the US, and I don’t have much farther to go to be home.

 

We were in Black Point for the Easter Bahamian Sloop Races.  They raced class C boats which are smaller than the class A and B boats.  There were six boats racing, and everyone racing seemed to be having a good time.

 

The boats have huge sails for their size and boards called ‘the pry’ to lever them upright.  Otherwise, they would turn over and sink.  You can see that this boat’s sail has been enlarged with an extra panel of cloth.  It will need a heavier crew sitting farther out on the pry to avoid a capsize.

 

This worrisome cloud appeared before the second day’s racing, but the races went on anyway.  Yes, it rained, and the wind blew.

 

The races were closely contested with the boats evenly matched.

 

It was windy, and even with a reduced size sail the crew had difficulty keeping the boat upright.

 

This was only a part of Bill’s beach junk collection.  He brings this sort of stuff back to the boat.  We have no room for it.  It had to go… and it did.

 

More of Bill’s beach junk.  He used most of his collection to mark a trail that crosses Great Guana Cay.  This life ring and yellow rope look sort of like Gilligan’s Island.  They are at the east end of the trail.

 

Look at my shells from a morning walk on the beach.  They are in a ‘looky bucket’ with a clear plastic bottom.  I hold the bucket in the water while walking in the shallow water just off the beach, and I can clearly see the shells on the sand below.  That way I can get the shells before they wash up on the beach.

 

Our dinghy has wheels making it easy to pull the dinghy up on the beach.  They came from New Zealand and fold down like airplane wheels.

  

Hey y’all from Big Farmer’s Cay, Exuma, Bahamas.  This may be as far south as we go this year and the spot where we turn around and head north toward home.

On our last day at Hawksbill Cay, Bill took the dinghy to the beach to walk across the island through the brush and rocks to the southern anchorage.  Because it would not be on a path, I chose to stay on Irish Eyes.  I have been warned by my medical team not to fall down and hurt my new knee.  While he was gone, the floatplane we had seen at Norman’s Cay Cut days ago brought in a family to play on the beach near our boat.  Bill missed all the excitement.  The plane managed to land threading its way through the eight empty mooring balls that lay in its path.  It was quite a feat!  It taxied over to the beach and dropped an anchor.  The family played on the beach and in the water for an hour or so.  Then, everyone boarded the plane and left despite the loud and angry protests from the youngest child who was previously quite happy playing with his unlimited amount of sand.  I wonder what that short outing cost.

We left Hawksbill Cay on Monday, April 4, motoring south to Warderick Wells, the island home of the Exuma Land and Sea Park Headquarters.  We picked up a mooring ball in the south mooring field near Emerald Rock.  Bill made a device for me to use when picking up a mooring.  I snagged the heavy 1-1/2” rope with his special hook and had it aboard on my first try.  That gave me the right to criticize the sometimes-failing efforts of those on the boats that arrived after us.  Bill took the dinghy to the office to pay for the mooring, then he climbed Boo Boo Hill to retrieve our sign.  It was not to be found.  Three years had passed since we last were there, and the board seemed to have vanished.  Bill was determined to find it.  The next morning, he printed out a photo of the sign that we had taken in 2019 and went looking again.  With the photo in hand like a pirate’s treasure map, Bill started digging through the heap.  There it was, under three years of accumulation, right in the spot where we left it.  Success!  Bill brought the sign back to Irish Eyes where he put MMXXII on it.  The cracked and weathered sign recalls all our trips, and we decided to bring it home with us.  I’m not exactly sure where we will hang it in our house, but that will be a dilemma for another day.  Bill carved “Irish Eyes” on a well-worn slab of driftwood, and we both went to the top of Boo Boo Hill to add it to the stack.  [Just a bit of trivia, Jimmy Buffett’s last album “Life on the Flip Side” has the song “Book on the Shelf” that mentions the boards upon Boo Boo Hill and has a picture of him atop the hill with the big pile in the background.]

After spending a rocky night at Emerald Rock and expecting increasing winds with the approaching cold front, we let go of our mooring ball and headed south to the better protected Cambridge Cay.  It was a rough trip sailing into the 15 to 17 knot wind with waves splashing over the bow of the boat.  We survived, arrived, and picked up the next to the last available mooring.  The following four days were windy, but we were comfortable, well protected from the waves and spending our time walking the nearby beaches.  Our only excitement came on a dinghy trip to some more distant beaches.  About a mile and a half away from Irish Eyes, the 8 hp outboard motor suddenly stopped and would not re-start.  Faced with a long long row into the wind, Bill dug into our emergency kit for tools and went to work.  He cleaned the spark plugs, drained any water from the carburetor bowl, made sure gasoline was getting to the engine, disconnected the stop switch, and just messed with it.  He finally got the engine to start at wide open throttle and part choke.  It ran, missing, coughing, and spitting, but it ran.  We came straight back to the boat where the thing quit again yards from the boat.  He rowed the last little bit.  We had a spare carburetor aboard, Bill swapped the carburetors, and the engine ran fine starting on the second pull.

Our next port of call was Staniel Cay.  We needed water, fuel, clean laundry, and a few groceries.  The fuel and water were available at the Yacht Club fuel dock, but boats were circling waiting their chance to dock there.  This operation was interesting to listen to on the VHF radio.  It was, as usual, quite uncivil.  Accusations of queue jumping, arguments over right-of-way in the narrow current ridden area, and the lambasting of the occasional boat that just drove up and docked without waiting filled the airwaves.  The dock attendant let the boats sort themselves out, just doing his job, manning the pumps, and avoiding the fray.  Bill took our fuel and water jugs in the dinghy to the inaccessible back side of fuel dock, filled them there, and returned.  In a relatively fast four trips we had 60 gallons of water, 25 gallons of diesel fuel, and a gallon of gasoline.  We went to the Yacht Club for lunch electing to sit in the fancier part of the restaurant rather than the crowded bar area.  This despite the fact I had on a bathing suit and tee shirt and did not meet the dress code.  It is one thing to go into a crowded place at home where I kind of know where most folks have been, and still another when I am in a room of twenty-five here where the people could have come from twenty-five different countries.  Ahh, COVID!  We did our grocery shopping after lunch and returned to Irish Eyes to rest and digest our big lunches.

It had been 49 days since I last did laundry.  The pile was large and, well, aromatic.  The laundromat in Staniel Cay was also a bar and liquor store.  We arrived at the laundromat around 11:00.  The proprietress was busy putting laundry in and out of machines.  There were piles of laundry everywhere, some in plastic boxes and some in bags.  The lady said we would have to wait and come back about 2:00.  That was fine, it was just another excuse for a Yacht Club lunch.  This time we ate outside on the docks watching the tour boat tourists wade among the swimming sharks.  Not me, they maybe gentle nurse sharks, but they still have teeth!  We wandered back to the laundromat after lunch, and I did our three big loads of laundry in about three hours.  It was a pleasant time sitting on the porch, drinking a beer, and chatting with the folks who came in to leave laundry, have a drink, or buy some booze.  I thought it was not a bad way to spend the afternoon.  Bill went for a walk.  I got a giggle from a group of young Americans who came in to buy a case of beer to enjoy at their rental house, but after discovering it was a $67 item, decided there were better things to spend their money on.  Things are not cheap here.

Having completed our required errands and with the wind blowing 20 knots, we moved Irish Eyes the mile or so to Big Major’s Spot.  This is where the famous swimming pigs live.  We have seen the pigs several times and did not have any desire to feed them.  It was fun to watch the tour boats from Nassau and George Town arrive and then listen to the squeals of the passengers when the pigs got too close.  It did not take much to entertain them.  We swam and did some beach walking too.

Bored with the pigs, we moved on south to Black Point on Good Friday, the first of two days of Bahamian sloop races.  The class C boats were racing in what I think were practice races for the abbreviated National Family Islands Regatta to be held in George Town the following week.  Our anchor spot was perfect for viewing the boats racing along.  Cruisers were encouraged to join the Bahamian crews for these races.  Bill and I did not think we would be an asset and declined.  I was afraid I would do something wrong and cause the boat to lose, and Bill doesn’t weigh enough to be useful on the pry.  Between intervals of sunny weather, it rained, and the wind howled, but the races went on anyway with lots of excitement.  There were right of way violations and collisions.  One of the race boats was sunk in 10 feet of water, but it was refloated, repaired, and raced the next day.

On Sunday, we decided to have our Easter lunch on shore.  It was decision time… would it be Lorraine’s Café or Scorpio’s Bar & Grill?  Both places had people from tour boats in for lunch.  The folks at Lorraine’s were eating outside and at Scorpio’s inside.  We ate at Lorraine’s inside basically alone with the bar tender and cook.  Lorraine stopped by after church, and we complemented her on the expansions and improvements she had made to the café.  Next, we went over to Scorpio’s for two bottles of rum for the boat.  He was also expanding with a new waterside building.  We had a very nice Easter Sunday.

The wind was forecast to blow from the northeast at 20 to 25 knots with gusts to 30 knots for the next seven to ten days.  We had seen boat races in Black Point, and it would be unpleasant traveling to George Town in the unprotected Exuma Sound, so we decided to not go to George Town for the Regatta which would only have the little boats anyway.  Instead, we adopted for the beach-a-day plan, planning to move every day or two from one beach to the next down the protected banks side of Great Guana Cay.  We bypassed Little Bay and Jack’s Bay Cove planning to stop there on our way back north.  We first went to White Point, then onto Hetty’s Land.  We walked both beaches and found some beach treasures.  Bill went across the island at Hetty’s Land a couple of times to watch the waves break on the rocky shore and to search for ‘good’ beach trash.  He also rigged up his stuff for measuring the load on our anchor and experimented with our riding sail.  Our next stop was Isaac Bay, about 2 miles south of Hetty’s Land.  There were three beaches there, and I walked all three of them.  Bill bushwhacked through the scrub vegetation to the exposed east shore.  He came back with two big (2 foot) spherical fishing floats and tales of more.  The things filled our cockpit leaving me no place to sit.  Then, it was down to Bay Rush Bay where years ago we abandoned a sea kayak with a glass (plastic) bottom that we found on the east shore.  Bill used four of his collected big fishing floats and a life ring to mark the trail where we left the kayak.  We now have only two floats aboard.

Yesterday, we came down to Big Farmer’s Cay anchoring in the deepest (2 meter) spot of water west of the cay.  I’ve already collected a pile of sand dollars from the shallows and baked a loaf of bread.  We have looked at the calendar and at our past trips and decided it is time to return north if we are to be home in early June, so this is as far south as we will get this year.

Cheers.

 

Twenty-seven hours after leaving Key Biscayne, we anchored at Morgan’s Bluff, Bill went ashore to deal with the formalities of entering a foreign country, then we both went ashore for a celebratory Kalik or two and lunch.  This was the view into the outer harbor from our table.

 

Captain Henry Morgan (of rum fame) was an English privateer plundering Spanish shipping.  He supposably hid his plunder in this cave.  Bill crawled around for half an hour not finding the “X”.  It has got to be in there somewhere.

 

These people flew in on a Cessna 208 landing behind us to go snorkeling on the corroded remains of a cocaine runner’s crashed airplane behind us.  It is no wonder that rich people die in small plane crashes.

 

On takeoff the pilot backed up a couple of thousand feet behind us, gunned the engine, and came roaring at us.  Taking off just to our starboard side, his port wing dipped, and for an instant it looked like he was going to hit us.

 

The southern interior of Norman’s Cay is a shallow sand filled basin that nearly all dries out at low tide.  That area and the nearby beaches were fun to explore.

 

This is sunrise looking east behind our boat at three more boats anchored behind us in Norman’s Cay Cut.  We are all there hiding from the west winds of three cold fronts in quick succession.

 

Looking at a bright yellow boat at Shroud Cay one day and doubting my sanity, I said, “I’d swear that boat was blue.”  Two days later I understood why.

Bill found this sling chair washed up on the rocks on the north sound side beach on Hawksbill Cay., repaired it, and moved it to our beach.  That is our dinghy and Irish Eyes in the distance.  As Zac Brown said, "I've got my toes in the water, ass in the sand..."

 

Greetings from Hawksbill Cay, Exuma, the Bahamas.  As you can tell we decided to leave Miami and to come to the Bahamas rather than continue south to the Florida Keys.  The Bahamas travel restrictions were eased a bit; all we needed was a negative Covid test taken less than 72 hours before our arrival and some online paperwork.  It all sounded easy to do, and it was, well, except for the on-line paperwork, but more on that later.

The effects of Covid on the Miami Beach tourist economy were obvious.  Several restaurants where we have enjoyed meals in years past were no more.  Long time businesses we had frequented in years past had their windows filled with ‘closed’, ‘available’, and ‘for rent’ signs.  Miami Beach did not seem to have many foreign or domestic tourists, but they still expected to have thousands of young Spring Breakers with all the problems they bring.

In Miami we were anchored near our friends from the boat Dots Way, Dorothy and Glen.  We had not seen them in three years, so we spent a lovely evening chatting in our cockpit over drinks and snacks while we ‘caught up’.

One Saturday a cold front was to pass over Miami bringing strong west winds.  Our anchorage near Mt. Sinai Hospital was open to the west, and we expected it to become rolly.  Early that Saturday we pulled up our anchor and motored over to anchor between Star and Plum Islands for better protection.  Star Island has several “stars” who live there.  Miami tour boats cruise the area pointing out their houses.  With a crummy weather forecast, we thought the boat traffic would be light.  Boy, were we wrong!  Groups of partying Spring Breakers had chartered large motor vessels to have a fun time.  Since our spot was protected from the wind and waves, lots of the boats came to keep us company and share their music with us.  It was a harrowing afternoon with these large boats dragging their anchors in the 30 kt wind and coming far too close to us for comfort.  I googled the cost of one of these charters.  It was listed at $3000 for a half day.  I could not tell if alcohol and food were included in that price, but I do know alcohol was being consumed at a ferocious rate.  I may be showing my age, but when I was a college student, I did not have any portion of $3000.00 to spend on a half day party cruise.  Thankfully, not long after sundown the charters ended, and all the boats went home.  At sunrise, we moved back to our quiet anchorage near Mt. Sinai Hospital and vowed not to repeat that mistake again.

After Bill and I decided to go to the Bahamas, we instantly had a long to-do-list.  We needed fuel, water, food, booze, beer, and Diet Coke.  I know Diet Coke is horrible stuff filled with chemicals and carcinogens, but we drink it anyway.  It’s perfect for diluting rum.  Instead of buying cases upon cases of cans we usually buy a 5 gal bag-in-box of the syrup, dilute it with water in empty 1 liter tonic bottles, then charge the bottles with carbon dioxide from a 5 lb cylinder that Bill has on board.  The box is the equal of 13 cases of cans but takes up much less space.  Sam’s Club has stopped carrying Coke products, so we left home without a box.  I googled around and found a food distributor in Miami that sold the syrup.  I ordered it online for local pick-up from Gordon’s Food Service.  Bill and I gathered our folding hand truck, added money on-line to our Miami transit cards, and took two different buses to collect our order in Miami’s Little Havana.  The first employee we met did not speak English at all and despite Mrs. Leffler’s best effort in high school Bill does not speak Spanish, the second employee could not decode our accents, but finally a third employee understood us and brought us our 45 lb box expecting us to put it in the trunk of our car.  Out of his sight, we tied the box to our hand truck and pushed it down the street looking for the first of our three return buses.  I can imagine that the employees were trying to figure out what in the world two, old, pasty-white, English-speaking folks were going to do with all that Diet Coke Syrup!

By Wednesday afternoon March 16, the shopping was complete, everything was put away, we had two negative Covid tests, the slimy dinghy bottom was scrubbed clean, the dinghy and outboard motor were aboard, and we were ready to move to No Name Harbor on Biscayne Bay to anchor for the night so we could leave before sunrise on Thursday.  The only thing left to do was to fill out our customs and immigration forms online and get our Bahamas visas.  Bill quicky gave up in frustration and turned the job over to me.  It took me over 3 hours to get all the forms filled out, the various fees paid, and the documents printed.  This was the first year the Bahamas has had this online entry process.  The website needs some serious simplification.  Bill hummed tunes, whistled, and laughed while doing boaty stuff while I huddled over the computer fuming, cursing, and filling out forms.  We finally left Miami Beach at 6pm anchoring just after sunset outside No Name Harbor.

The alarm went off at 4am (ugh) and we were underway by 5am.  The crossing to the Bahamas was fairly easy.  We were able to sail across the Gulf Stream passing north of Bimini around 3pm, but after turning southeast into the wind on the Great Bahama Bank, we had to take down our sails.  The motor chugged all night while Bill and I took turns watching the boat and napping.  We did not see much boat traffic during the night this time.  Irish Eyes was anchored in the harbor at Morgan’s Bluff on Andros Island by 8am on Friday.  Bill went to shore and cleared us with Customs and Immigration.  My computer paperwork was fine.  We took the dinghy into the inner harbor and had a lovely lunch at Unca Harvey’s Water Loop.  The rest of the day we napped.

There is a cave in Morgan’s Bluff where Sir Henry Morgan, a pirate, is said to have hidden out and stashed some of his treasure.  Bill and I explored the area on Saturday finding the cave.  The entrance required a slight descent along a rocky slope.  I decided my new knee would not like that trail, so Bill crawled through the cave by himself.  I enjoyed the view, the breeze, and the birds.  On the way back to the boat we watched lots of small sea turtles swimming over the white sand bottom.  I love to see them darting around in the crystal clear water.

We needed to get out of Morgan’s Bluff before Monday, March 21 as a cold front was to pass over the area bringing high north winds, large waves, and possibly some rain.  Leaving Sunday morning and motor sailing all day, we passed Nassau’s New Providence Island, continued into the night, and arrived at Highbourne Cay at midnight under a full moon.  We anchored among the boats already there and fell into bed.  The expected wind and a brief bit of rain arrived as expected on Monday, so we spent the day aboard the boat resting.

We were now in the beautiful Exumas, the primary objective of the trip.  We travelled the short distance from Highbourne Cay to Galleon Point on the northwest corner of Norman’s Cay on Tuesday.  Our first step on land since Morgan’s Bluff was to walk around on some of the beaches there.  Once again, the weather persuaded us to move.  A trio of cold fronts having caused havoc in the southeast United States was coming to the Exumas.  For good protection from the wind, we motored around to anchor in Norman’s Cut.  This is a channel between Norman’s Cay and Wax Cay that goes between the Exuma Bank on its west end, and the Exuma Sound on its east end.  It is a pretty place.  There is a two-engine cocaine smuggling airplane that crashed here that is a good snorkeling spot.  During our stay, it attracted a near constant stream snorkelers from both Nassau tour boats and charter yachts.  This time Bill and I did not snorkel around the old airplane, there really is not much of it left.  When we first saw the C-46 in 2008, we could sit in the cockpit seats and hold the yokes.  Now little remains except the engines and corroding fuselage frames.  We walked on the beautiful beaches and the sand flats north of the cut just marveling at the colors.  Norman’s Cay is being rapidly developed and now has a superyacht marina and a 5,000 ft airstrip.  McDuff’s Restaurant and its rental cottages remain but are much more up-class than they were in the past.  For five days, we watched boats come and go from the well sheltered Norman’s Cut.  Charter sailing catamarans and crewed charter yachts were far more numerous than in the past.  The number of mall privately owned and crewed cruising boats seems to have declined.

We anchored for four nights at Shroud Cay, one of my favorite places.  There is not any development here as the cay is owned by the Bahamas Trust and is part of the Exuma Land and Sea Park.  There are several mangrove lined creeks that go through the island to the beautiful sound side white sand beaches and their brilliant blue water.  Our trusty old dinghy with its outboard motor has taken us on several wonderful tours of these creeks, winding through the mangroves looking at the turtles below us and at the tropic birds above.

It was quite windy during our last two nights at Shroud Cay, but we found a spot to anchor that was out of the wind.  When the wind calmed down, we motored south to Hawksbill Cay, grabbed a mooring ball, and now intend to stay here for three days or so before we continue our journey south.  This is also an uninhabited island owned by the Bahamas Trust with ruins of a previous attempt at settlement, trails, and beaches.  Fun.

This year we have a cell phone booster, hang its antenna in the rigging, and have intermittent but occasionally usable cellular service even though we are now miles from a tower.  I’ll try to write more often.

Happy Days to you all.