Sampson Cay

After several amazing days in Warderick Wells we headed south to Sampson Cay.  It was a bit of a rough sail as we were beating into 20 knot winds with pretty big waves.

We decided to tie up at the marina at Sampson Cay because there is ANOTHR front moving through.  It is coming from the west which creates very rough conditions for anchoring out. This is another beautiful cay.

Sampson Cay is a local hurricane hole, so it is very protected and the perfect place to ride out the storm. It also has a great little restaurant and bar to hang out in with the other boaters....

Exuma Land and Sea Park

We left Highborne Cay in Thrusday March whatever  to sail to Warderwick Wells. 

It is in the Exuma Land and Sea Park -- 176 square miles of protected tropical waters, coral reefs and fish breeding grounds.  Their motto is "Take only Photographs -- Leave only footprints".  No fishing, conch-ing, shellfishing, or lobster-ing allowed.  Nothing living or dead may be removed.

We are tied to a mooring ball in the middle of the area that looks like a river running through the white sand.  It is paradise.

Park Headquarters

We have seen huge Stingrays (4-5 feet across) along with yellow snapper and lots of other very large fish swimming in and around the boats moored here 


Our friends on Barefoot (Jim and Michelle) are here as well.  We all got together last night on their boat for cocktails, stories and lots of laughs.  A great night in a very special place.  
We spent the next day doing a little hiking on the island, reading about where to go next and just plan old chilling out.  


Life is very good here.

The Exumas

Tuesday morning March 23rd turned out to be a perfect day to set sail for the Exumas.  We had 15-20 knots of wind with crystal blue skies that would make it easy to read the water as we cross the Yellow Bank to Highborne Cay.  The Yellow Bank is a very shallow few miles of the Great Bahama Bank.  In places it is only 9 feet deep with coral heads that can be as shallow as four feet.  Don't want to hit one of those!  We took it slow with Sue on the bow as lookout.

We made it through just fine and arrived at Highborne Cay in mid afternoon --- 40 miles southeast of Nassau.
Highbore Cay is a pristine 500 acre private island with a very spectacular harbor and a small quant marina.  It is referred to as the gem of the Exumas.  There are nine beaches surrounding the Cay.  The longest is 2 miles of powdered white sand and no one in sight.

The island has had visitors and inhabitants for hundreds of years.  The remains of a shipwreck, believed to have sunk in the 16th century, was discovered just north of the island.  It is  considered one of the oldest and most significant wrecks in the Bahamas.
No, this is not a picture of the shipwreck...

Unfortunately, the water is still a bit too cold to snorkel, wish we had wet suites.  I think we will try and pick up a couple of them in Georgetown.  Although swimming with the sharks may not be a good idea anyway...

There are lots of Nurse Sharks around the Cay.  The locals say they will not bother you, and that you can actually grab onto their fins and they will pull you around.  Yeah...RIGHT.

We took the dingy and explored a few of the other Cays.  One was Allen Cay which is known for their wild iguanas.  It was like something out of the movie the Birds except with iguanas.  There must have been 20-30 of them on the beach when we landed.  Some were the size of a small cat (10-15 pounds).  Oh yea -- they do bite!

We stayed in Highborne Cay for two nights and then headed to our next destination. WOW, what a spectacular place it is!

Nassau

We arrived in Nassau late Thursday afternoon March 18th, tired and a bit beat up from the rough sail from the Berry Islands. Nassau is a very busy port and a great place to stock up on supplies, including three new batteries for Kinja. 
The main working dock... 

We got our new batteries and installed them.  We also picked up groceries and other supplies.  We have discovered that sailing is not a vacation...it is a lifestyle.  A very nice lifestyle!

This one is for Jim, Marla and Ray...and of course David :)

Another weather front is moving through so we decided to lay low and chart our next passage to Highborne Cay in the Exumas.  It looks like an easy jump over except for a a few miles over the Yellow Banks (an area of coral heads that are verry shallow and must be visually navigated around).  It is best to cross on a sunny day so you can read the water --- brown=reef, yellow or white=shallow, black=grass, light blue= 10/12 feet, dark blue= deep water.

Tomorrow (tuesday). Looks like a good day to head out to Highborne Cay,  40 miles or so. 

Crossing the Great Bahama Bank

We departed Bimini on Tuesday March 16th for Chub Cay in the Berry Islands.  We left late morning after waiting for the seas to subside a bit (it had been quite rough the previous few days).  It was a two day sail to Chub Cay.   Our new friends on Barefoot joined us for the sail to Chub Cay. 

Tuesday turned out to be an absolutely perfect sailing day.  A constant 15 to 20 knot breeze out of the South/Southwest with crystal blue skies and tourquoise water --  now that is what we signed up for !!!   We sailed for about 6 hours before we had to anchor out for the nigh in the middle of the Bank.  They say not to sail the Bank at night because it is so shallow with many reefs.  You really need to see where you are going.

We had made it to Mackie Shoal which is about half way to Chub Cay.  We were sailing with Barefoot and we contacted a couple of other boats on the VHF radio who were sailing the same route.  We decided we would all anchor together in the same basic area .  So with no land in sight and the sun setting we set anchor for the night.  It is very strange to be able to anchor in less than 20 feet of water and not have any land in sight!

These are the other boats with anchored with

We woke early Wednesday morning to find the Bank flat as a pancake and sort of foggy.  It was a day for motoring.  We arrived at Chub Cay and decided to anchor out again before heading on to Nassau.  We did not plan on stopping at Nassau but Kinja needs new batteries and Nassau is the last place for some time that we would be able to get them.

Barefoot off our port side as we motored to Chub Cay

Our night anchored at Chub Cay was the roughest night we have ever had.  The winds picked up to 25-30 knots with very confused seas all around.  We were very worried about our anchor dragging so we took turns on watch.  The boat pitched and rolled all night so neither of us really got any sleep at all.

As soon as the sun came up we decided to get out of there and sail to Nassau.  So we set sail in very rough conditions with 20-25 knot winds and seas of 4-6 feet.  Fortunately the waves were coming from behind us.  It was rough, but a pretty fun sail!

Five hours later we arrived in Nassau.

Last days in Bimini

Well, we finally did move on..... but before we tell you about that,  here are a few more shots about the dangers of cruising in the Bahamas.  Harbor entrance channels are supposed to have red and green markers to show you the way and are usually very narrow.  If you stray outside the markers you run the risk of going aground.  The entrance to Bimini is supposed to have red and green channel markers to mark the channel.  As we entered (and left) Bimini we found that there we no markers at all!  In fact it was next to impossible to detect where we should be going.  Luckily, we made it in and out fine.  But, a few days later another boat was not so lucky.

Within a few hours a power boat was able to pull them off the reef.... but not without one of the crew breaking their leg and putting a hole in their boat.  They were towed into Bimini and who knows how they will proceed from there.

Bimini

Gateway to the Bahamas

We are on Bimini Island.  It is a very quiet, funky island.  It kind of reminds us of Bocas Del Toro without all the nice restaurants.  It is still very windy so we decided not to anchor out and are staying put at the Bimini Bay Marina.

A few shots from around town.......

 Filling up the jerry cans with diesel

The guy who controls the fuel pumps... what a cranky man!

They make the best bread here...yes, it is called Bimini Bread.  They bake it at and sell it right out of Charlie's house. 

Evidently there is also a town called Bailey .... go figure

We have had time to regroup and are ready to head out across the Great Bahama Bank to Chub Cay.  It looks like Tuesday March 16th has reasonable weather.  Having this lay over has given us the opportunity to chat with a lot of other boaters.  We met Kent Kohlberger the Captain of Goose Bumps (he also used to be the captain for Jimmy Buffett for several years).  A great guy who has skidded these waters for many years.  He stopped by our boat and gave us some great pointers on the route we are taking around North Rock as well as other great islands and pristine anchorages to explore on our way down the Bahama chain.  We also met a nice couple from Minnesota who keep their sailboat in the Florida Keys and are sailing the same route we are.  I think we will sail together when we cross the The Great Bahama Bank.

The Crossing

Kinja's motor is finally fixed - she purrs like a kitten and we are ready to cross to the Bahamas.  We are looking for that decent weather window -- we wait -- and we wait.  It is not the distance that makes the crossing difficult, it is only 47 miles from Miami to Bimini.  It is the Gulf Stream that flows northward along the coast of Florida at 3-3.5 knots that one has to worry about.  When the winds blow out of the north, north-east or north-west it collides with the Gulf Stream current and can create huge sea and very dangerous conditions and a very long passage.  The winds have been coming out of the north at 20 plus knots.....so we wait.

While waiting we came across a service on the web called Commanders Weather.  These guys provide weather routing for sailboats all over the world to help them avoid dangerous seas and make passages as fast as possible... and as safe as possible.  So we asked them for their advice.  The guy who advised us was Ken. He was also providing advice to several sailors in different races around the world.  So what was his advice?  You have a one day weather window on Tuesday March 9th that looks reasonable. Sounded good to us.  But instead of crossing straight over from Miami he wanted us to sail 20 miles south and then turn east to make the crossing.  That makes the trip about 67 miles.  Without going into too much detail, he wanted us to take this route because the wind was out of the east and if we left directly from Miami we would be heading right into the wind.  We would have to motor the whole way and fight the current of the Gulf Stream (which would slow us to 4 knots) and it would be a very rough ride.   Taking his recommended route meant we could sail all the way (at 7-8k knots) and have a much smoother ride.  Even though it would be a longer distance it would take the same time as the other direct route.  So we took Ken's advice and left Miami at sunrise....

Ken was indeed right...we had a great crossing sailing all the way at 8-9 knots.  

We made landfall at North Bimini Island about 2:30pm and headed for the Bimini Bay Marina.  On our way in we hoisted our yellow quarantine flag signaling that we were coming from another county and had not yet cleared customs.   Once tied up, we jumped into our dingy and motored down to the government dock to process through customs and immigration. No problem there except paying our $300 to enter the country!  Once we cleared customs we raised the Bahamian flag.

Bimini Bay Marina is not bad :)      The water is amazing......