We headed to the north end of the Berry Islands then went down the east side of the island chain and ducked in at Hoffman's Cay. We spent four nights anchored in total seclusion. For three days, we saw no other humans, except for one fishing boat that cruised on by.
We snorkeled, swam, read and walked the beach. On New Years Eve we enjoyed a surf and turf dinner of steak and lobster, with garlic mashed potatoes and champagne. Can it get any better?
One day we hiked a trail through the bush to a blue hole. This is a nearly perfectly round "sink hole," with clear blue water. We snorkled the edge and were reminded of doing the same thing in Topaz Lake in Lake Huron's North Channel.
We reluctantly left Hoffmans Cay and weaved our way in shallow water to a spot near Little Harbor Cay. The water was never more than eight feet deep and often under five feet. We repeatedly expressed our thanks for our shallow draft and our chart plotter.
After we got settled at our new anchorage, we radioed to Flo's Conch Bar and asked about coming in for dinner. The bar is operated by Chester and his partner, Lovely. The bar and their home are the only buildings on the island. Lovely answered Laurie's radio call and asked what we wanted for dinner. Laurie asked, "what are our choices?" "Fish or conch" was the reply. We chose, "one of each."
We shared the two dinners that came with rice and beans and cole slaw. As you can see, we enjoyed the meal and cleaned up our plates.
While we were there, we met two couples that have cruised this area a lot. We told them we were planning to head to Nassau. They suggested a less conventional route of going to Spanish Wells and then on to Eleuthera before heading to the Exumas. After a few minutes of thought, we decided to give it a shot.
This is the reflection of Glory Days' mast in about eight feet of water as we sit at anchor.
We had a nice weather forecast and hauled anchored at 7:00 am and left the Berry Islands and headed across an area known as the Tongue of the Ocean. This section if the Atlantic is interesting because the water depth drops from about eighty feet to over 3000 feet in a distance of about 200 yards. The water color turns from aqua to deep cobalt blue.
Dan set the fishing lines and soon hooked a cero (which we kept) followed by an angry looking barracuda, (which we carefully released) and then another cero. Several hours later, the line started screaming out and before Dan could stop the fish, he had stripped all of the line, snapped it, and was last seen headed toward Cuba with a $12 lure in his mouth.
We pulled in to Royal Island at about 4:00 pm and enjoyed fried cero. In the morning we traveled the short distance to Spanish Wells. This is a very quaint town that is dedicated to fishing. The harbor master informed us that ninety percent of the commercial fish caught in the Bahamas comes through Spanish Wells.
The homes here are painted in pastels and the vegetation is well maintained. All of the people we encountered were friendly, but none more so than Maureen, who gave us a ride back to the marina after our rented golf cart died in front of her house.
We bought some perishable foods at the local grocery store and some snapper from a local fisherman. We had to wait for him to finish cleaning it before we headed back to the boat and fried it up for dinner.
In the morning we are going to head out and explore the western shore of Eleuthera. In the meantime we have enjoyed having Internet access and getting caught up on the blog and emails.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Spanish Wells
No comments:
Post a Comment