vacation

Following in Columbus’s Footsteps

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As soon as we set anchor on the west side of Conception Island, Capt. Drew of Z-Raye zoomed up in the dinghy shouting ” Watch out for the welcoming committee!” In response to a quizzical look, he added “two big sharks circling the anchorage.” Sure enough, by the time Capt. Mike had donned swim trunks and a snorkel mask in preparation to dive the anchor, a five foot long shadow appeared next to Sanitas. He kept us company for our entire stay on the island and I named him Oscar (the grouch). This was the theme for our stay on Conception; a balance of outstanding natural beauty, contrasted by the reality of the sharks, rays, and barracuda who really belong here.

Lunch under sail from Georgetown to Conception Island.

Conception Island is a national park made up of pristine beaches, fun hikes, and the best snorkeling we’d experienced so far in the Bahamas. It’s also one of the islands that Christopher Columbus visited after crossing the Atlantic Ocean. I’m not exactly sure what his crew did here, because as far as I can tell, there isn’t any fresh water or animals to hunt for food. But Capt. Mike is probably right.By the time Columbus reached these islands, his crew was probably very grateful for the opportunity to get off the boat onto dry land and to catch their breath for a bit.

The soft, white sand beach surrounding our anchorage was one of the most perfect I’ve seen on our travels. And from the beach, there are a few fun hiking trails to the ocean side of the island and up to the cliffs. But the island is so protected and so covered with hearty gnarled vegetation, that it’s difficult to make much progress in the interior without returning covered with scrapes, scratches, and bug bites!

Hiking on Conception

Top of the cliff

The best way to experience the interior of Conception is by dinghy hiking – taking the dinghies to a creek entrance on the south side of the island and very slowly exploring the creek and its tributaries for sea life and birds. At times, the creeks get so shallow that the best way to make forward progress is to row. And at other times, the mangroves are so close on either side that you can reach out and touch them, and can see the huge schools of fish that hide in the mangrove roots for protection from predators.

We saw dozens and dozens of green turtles in the creeks. They’d duck under water quickly as we approached, and after we passed and looked back upstream, all we could see were dozens of little white turtle heads watching us. We cooled off by swimming in a small blue hole, and returned to the anchorage. Once again, we confirmed that our dinghy / motor combination isn’t sufficient for this cruising lifestyle. All of our friends zoom back and forth between the anchorage and the sights, and we just putt along slowly in Bug, usually ending up drenched by waves in the process.

Conception Island also provided the best snorkeling so far in The Bahamas. Just north of the island, we anchored the dinghies in small patches of sand and explored colorful live coral and fish of all types. I didn’t think I was afraid of barracuda, but they glare at you! They come up close with their beady little eyes and their crooked teeth and they swim right at you and glare! I’m still not exactly frightened, but also not exactly comfortable swimming with them! I’ve added an underwater camera to my shopping list for next year, because I’m so sad not to have photos of this gorgeous reef with its purple fan coral and yellow stag horn coral.

As we climbed into the dinghies and prepared for the ride back to the anchorage, we had one of the most special experiences of the trip. Looking north, we watched a mother whale and her calf rise from the ocean in full breach, and crash back down, sending a huge plume of white water into the air! We loitered for a while, watching the calf play as she surfaced over and over again, but when we started up the outboard motors, the good mama decided to hide her little one, and we didn’t see them again. We toasted to mamma whale with watermelon margaritas at sundown on Sanitas that evening.

Conditions on our sail from Conception Island to Cat Island were perfect for our first attempt at using our asymmetrical spinnaker. Winds were light, from our stern at about 120 degrees. There was a bit of a learning curve as we got the light wind sail out of the bag for the first time and figured out how to rig it to the third furling drum all the way forward on the bow sprit, but it worked! Even sailing with only this one sail up, we made about 5.5 knots toward Cat Island.

Using the spinnaker

Unfurling

Full sail

Next time, we will be smoother in raising the spinnaker, and we will experiment with using it in combination with our primary sails. What a wonderful day of sailing, and a wonderful stay on Conception!

Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park

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In 1958, the Bahamian Parliament set aside 176 square miles of islands and surrounding seas as protected national parks. The Bahamas National Trust administers these parks – one of the only non-profit, non-governmental organizations in the world to manage a country’s conservation efforts. (Sometimes I wish the US national parks were protected in a similar way from political wrangling. Poor Bears Ears). The goal of the park is to protect fish and wildlife, and to conserve the islands within it in their natural, undeveloped state. And thank goodness they do, because the result is an amazing, gorgeous cruising ground, filled with sea life and with natural wonders.

Shroud Cay

Our first introduction to the park was at Shroud Cay, where we explored the magical beaches that appear at low tide, and went for a “dinghy hike” through the mangrove creeks.

The water at Shroud Cay was so clear, we could see every ripple and rock on the bottom from the bow of the boat in 18 feet of water. Or, toes from 5 ft 9 inches, during a floating happy hour on the beach!

It was fun getting lost in the mangroves…. puttering along at no-wake speed, tossing a coin to decide which direction to go at intersections, drifting the dinghy onto sand at dead ends. We saw a turtle, and sting rays, and finally did find a beautiful sandy beach on the ocean side of the Cay.

The best part of our stay at Shroud Cay was that Drew and Sharon on Z-Raye (who we hadn’t seen since Key West) sailed all the way up from Georgetown and surprised us there! The entire team from St Petersburg marina Dock 4 is reunited again!

Mike planting a tree on Shroud Cay beach

Warderick Wells

The jewel in the crown of Exuma Cays Park is Warderick Wells Cay. If you have an image in your mind of what an island in the Bahamas might look like, this is probably the closest match! The north mooring field is a narrow U-shaped band of deep water with room for about 20 boats, surrounded by shallow reefs and sandbars, excellent for snorkeling. At low tide, the central sand bar becomes an off-leash dog park and sundowners hang out. There is no development on the island, except for the ranger station and residence.

Legend has it that a ship wrecked just off shore of Warderick Wells, and the ghosts of the ship’s crew haunt BooBoo Hill, moaning and wailing in their despair. Today, cruisers leave driftwood signs with their ship names atop the hill in the hope of better luck for themselves and their vessels. It is the only place in the part that varies from true Leave No Trace ethic; as long as the signs are made of natural materials, the offers are encouraged. I made my own, accidental offering to the gods of the sea. Returning to Sanitas in the dinghy one evening after Sundowners, I lost my polarized prescription sunglasses off the top of my head in the frenzy of activity while boarding the boat. Capt Mike kept into action, scanning the water with a flashlight, and stripping down in preparation to go for a swim. But the current swept them away.

The whole crew took a long hike one morning. Although we are right a sea level, it is surprisingly tricky hiking, with the rocks and sand and small steep hills. But the rewarding views of oceanbeach, tropical vegetation, and boat harbor are stunning. The island is named Warderick Wells because the fresh rain water forms a “lens” floating on top of the saltwater in the works of the island, and people used to live on this island by harvesting the water from wells in the porous rock. It also supports a larger variety of vegetation than you find on most islands.

It’s no wonder that celebrities such as Johnny Depp and David Copperfield keep private islands in this part of the Bahamas. We’ve become Bahamas National Trust members, so I certainly hope to stop at the park again o; our way back north. Trust members get priority in the daily scramble for mooring balls. It’s a fun process to eavesdrop in on the VHF. Sherri, at the park, mans the radio on channel 9 at 8:00 am. First, she asks for departing vessels, who tend to make a shaft but gracious speech about how much they have enjoyed their stay, and thanking Sherri for her support. Then who plans to arrive today; and you can hear the stress in their voices, as they wait to learn whether a ball is available for them, or if they need to find another, less gorgeous, spot for the night. Finally, folks who plan to arrive tomorrow request to be added to a waiting list for moorings. All of this chatter takes place with the usual VHF radio protocol. Hail ” Exuma Park”, wait to be recognized, make your request ( hoping your radio is high powered enough to be heard), repeat back what Sherri said to ensure you heard correctly. Sounds easy, until every boat within range is calling out their boats name at the same time, stepping on each other’s transmissions, ignoring the polite order and protocol, or being too pushy and getting of Shari’s bad side. It is good Theater first thing in the morning!

Crossing the Coral Garden

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Leaving Spanish Wells Harbor was a little bit more exciting than we had expected.

We’d spent three nights on one of Bandit’s mooring balls, but we had only paid for one night. It seemed bad karma, not to mention impolite to leaving without paying the rest. So we spoke to Mrs Bandit on the radio the night before leaving, and made a plan for him to pick up the money at 7:00 am – just before we headed out for the day’s sail. Apparently Mrs Bandit never told Mr Bandit the plan, because by the time we hailed him on the radio at 7:30, he was already two islands away. We tossed around some ideas of how to get him the money without too badly inconveniencing ourselves, and finally settled on giving the money to one of his friends at the fuel dock. So, we cruised ever so slowly past the dock and I shouted “Does anyone know Bandit?” When someone answered “Yes. I’ll make sure this gets to him” I leaned over and handed him an envelope filled with cash as we drifted by. Bandit, if you’re reading this, I hope you got your money. I handed it to the old fisherman with the beard. You guys know each other, right?

Then all of our comm systems suddenly blew up. I heard “Sanitas… Sanitas … Sanitas” on channel 71. Then a DSC direct call, which makes our VHF ring like an old-school telephone. Then my new-school cell phone started ringing (which happens so seldom, I don’t even recognize the ring tone). Our friends on Orion and Disorder were trying to alert us that a massive UFO-sized cargo ship had just entered the narrow Spanish Wells channel.

We were already trying to leave the harbor, and were pretty sure this channel wasn’t big enough for the both of us. So we did a little donut turn to slow down, and moved as far to starboard as we could while still staying in deep water. And I walked along the starboard deck of Sanitas fending off dock pilings with my bare hands. A crewman on the cargo ship waved at me. Now this all happened in fairly slow motion, so it might not have appeared at all dramatic to a bystander, but it was hair-curlingly nerve wracking to me and to Capt. Mike! Especially since I hadn’t had my morning coffee yet!

This was our easiest passage so far: smooth seas, light winds, no dramatic equipment failures. Crossing Fleeming Cut was a piece of cake. (Remember my goal for crossing cuts? No stories!) The trickiest part of this day was crossing the coral garden east of Nassau. The charts for this area are covered with plus symbols and warnings such as “Numerous Shallow Coral Heads”, “Unsurveyed Area”, and “Visual Piloting Rules apply”. We had downloaded a set of eight GPS waypoints from Drew on Z-Raye, and we used these points to guide us from Fleeming Cut down to the northern end of the Exuma Chain near Ship Channel. These waypoints helped immensely, but didn’t substitute for scanning the seas ahead, and adjusting course when needed.

From about 1:30 in the afternoon to 4:30, Capt. Mike and I took turns standing on the bow of Sanitas, wearing polarized sunglasses, scanning the waters around us. We kept the autopilot navigating to the next waypoint, but when we’d spot a round, black coral head, the spotter on the bow would provide guidance to the person at the helm on how to avoid it. Things like, “Twenty degrees to starboard”, or ” hard to port”.

The coral was easier to spot than I had expected, and we usually saw them about a football field away. Still, it kept me on edge for the afternoon, especially when we were in the thick of it and there were coral heads to both sides and directly ahead of us. Once the sun got lower in the sky, it was harder to spot the contrast between the turquoise blue of the water and the black of the coral. I’m glad that by that point in the afternoon, we were through the thickest patch, and the need to frequently adjust course to avoid hitting the coral had diminished.

We pulled into the anchorage at Highborn Cay around 6:30 after about eleven hours of travel. Exactly one month after entering The Bahamas, we’d finally made it to the Exuma Islands! In addition to that milestone, we also celebrated six months since we left our jobs, AND Mike’s birthday. Fresh lime margaritas in the cockpit at sunset, using the last of our rapidly melting ice; homemade pad thai with ingredients from the tiny Asian market in Marsh Harbour, and gluten free brownies standing in for a birthday cake.

Now this is more like it!

A vacation from our vacation

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A week out of Miami, and a month after leaving St Pete, we took a vacation from our vacation on gorgeous Green Turtle Cay in the Abacos.

As I write this, I feel you judging me, and I cringe. But look at it this way. In the two months since we moved on to Sanitas full time, we’ve had a lot of adjustments to make:

  • Selling or donating most of our possessions.
  • Moving from a house to an apartment to less than 120 feet of living space.
  • Embracing a new lifestyle where everything from cooking, shopping, keeping clean, and even going to the bathroom is more complex and time consuming.
  • Finding everything we own is wet and/or salty at all times.
  • Finding that my BED is wet AND salty all of the time.
  • Unplugging from phone and internet.
  • Starting to live on canned goods and whatever we planned ahead to bring with us.
  • Needing to think every day about where we are now, where we are going next, what the wind is doing, how deep the water is, and what the waves will be like.

I have to admit that it has been a difficult adjustment, and we were ready to remind ourselves of why we worked so hard to get here, and why this transient lifestyle is worth it.

So! For $1.50 per foot per night, we tucked Sanitas into a nice cozy slip, and gave her crew access to all of the amenities of the gorgeous Bluff House Resort and Marina: showers, pool, and the Tranquil Turtle Beach Bar. We might have taken a little TOO much advantage of that last one, lol.

Green Turtle Cay is lovely. I took a morning to jog on the Coco Bay beach to the North Point of the Island.

The huge wooden cross at North Point was constructed from an old sailboat mast, and commemorates the miraculous rescue of Grima and Francine Johnson whose boat washed ashore on the coral here on Thanksgiving Day 1981.

We rented bikes and explored the entire length of the island, with a stroll through the historic town of New Plymouth, founded in the 1770s by the Loyalists. This colorful town has everything you need, in miniature. Including a small grocery, four churches, a hardware store and the “Liquor and Lunch” shop.

Sounds perfect, but imagine riding these cute little beach cruisers up and down the short but steep hills all around the island. I admit, I had to walk up two hills on the way home after I filled my belly with lunch! Our sailing buddies rented a golf cart and took it all over the island, up and down hills, and on dirt roads, like speed demons!

We watched the budget by only ordering drinks from the bar during 2-for-1 happy hour. At the beach bar, happy hour is from 4 to 5. Then we ran over the hill to the other side of the island for happy hour from 5 to 6. The Goomba Smash is the specialty of Green Turtle Cay, and the Tranquil Turtle punches are pretty good too! We met fellow Coloradans at the Bluff House: including the guy who owns Boulder Beer and all of the restaurants in the Hotel Boulderado, and a great couple from Dillon, CO. Sanitas hosted a small party in the cockpit on our final evening before heading back out to the high seas.