Cave Cay to GorgeTown

Our sail from Cave Cay, one of the outer islands of the Exumas was perfect.
Leaving just before sun up we were treated to a beautiful sunrise, we had to pass through a cut ( a gap between 2 Cays ) these cuts are notoriously dangerous and traversed with a lot of caution, the sea can be confused and choppy even on calm days but Craig timed it right and we had nothing to worry about, there was a slack tide and the sea was perfectly calm.

Seamlessly sailing through a stunning sunrise

Up went the mainsail and foresail and they didn't come down until a few minutes before we anchored, the wind was a perfect 18-20 knots, on a beam reach, the whole way with flat calm seas.  We were following behind Seamlessly and Yellowbird was not far behind us.

Adriana loves to be sailing again 

Once out in the Exuma Sound the water turns the deepest blue, I keep taking photos, trying to capture the colour 

Great Exuma consists of over 365 islands also known as Cays, and the capital George Town is our next stop it has an interesting history, founded in 1793, it's past includes, settlement by the loyalists, the town being named after King George 3rd of England, it was used to grow cotton and it also provided many places for pirates to hide in the 1800's.

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Turning in towards Elizabeth Harbour we were back cruising through the bright aqua, super clear waters

We entered  into  Elizabeth Harbour on Thursday 30th January, but then had another day stuck onboard, due to 20 - 24 knot winds and choppy seas, yesterday on our sail here it was a beautiful calm day and the evening was so still it was hard to believe the weather was going to deteriorate, but sure enough around 2.30am the wind started to whine through our rigging and slowly but surely the sea state started to whip up.  No longer were we sitting in a millpond we were now rocking back and forward like a hobby horse with the occasional sharp swing to the side just to keep us awake, we had the anchor alarm set on a short circumference and it went off as we swung back and forward towards the lights onshore.

  

We had to motor though the tunnel to reach the dingy dock some days it was incredibly choppy outside

We are anchored just outside the tunnel entrance to lake Victoria in Georgetown. The wind is coming from a westerly direction so from where we are anchored there is no land protection whatsoever, but there was no point moving as none of the anchorage areas could offer anything better and at least where we are there is no one anchored close to us that we need to be concerned about. The winds are predicted to sit on a sustained 20-24 knots with gusts up to 30 knots not the most comfortable conditions.

This is one of the most popular destination for cruisers in the Bahamas the main town George Town has many services and shops catering to the cruising community, but it is essentially quite a run down weathered place, there are a few  modern resorts on the Island where guests fly in and out but no hi rise multimillion dollar resorts here. 

Children's playground 

All the buildings are painted bright colours 

All the signage is in English so no language barriers here 

Palm trees and sunshine 

The mailboat acts as a ferry for locals, as well as delivering the mail, food supplies including fresh produce.  

For yachters the supermarket provides a dingy dock plus garbage disposal for a small fee and free water.  The Bahamian people are super friendly EVERYONE says Good Morning or Good Afternoon as they pass. I had a lovely chat to an older lady in the laundromat, I had admired her cornrow braids, as I was leaving I turned back to say goodbye and she proceeded to give me a big hug.

The buildings are all painted cute colors but they are old with peeling paint and many are boarded up - abandoned businesses. It must be so hard to rebuild if your business or home has been destroyed by a hurricane, knowing there is a big possibility it will happen again, plus the force of the winds that go through here there is no way you could build something that was hurricane proof.

Opposite George Town about a 15 minute dingy ride, quicker if you have a bigger motor than us, is Stocking Island with it's tiki bar "Chat and Chill, you have pay for the chill (beer and food) but the chat is free, there is a cruisers net that broadcasts every morning with actives and workshops all based either on stocking island or Georgetown it is a wonderful service full of information and social activities.

Chat and Chill 

We caught up with Alexi just in time to say goodbye as he is on his way to Puerto Rico to catch some waves.   

We fitted 7 people on Alexi's 32ft boat for goodbye drinks  

We caught up with Joyce and Peter (Doriana) Just in time to say goodbye to James, Peter's son. 

Yellowbird and Seamlessly are here too.  It is the sailing Mecca of The Bahamas and another destination we were excited to reach another tick off on the must visit list.

The view looking down at part of Elizabeth Harbour

Lots of walks with the crew

George Town seems to be the end of the trip, for most of the boats here, the turnaround and go home after a month or two of cruising. It is also the place where we have to decide whether to return to America and head to Maine, Portland USA or further up USA coast to hide out 2020 hurricane season or do we keep heading south, and if we keep going where is our next stop and which country do we aim for, Cuba, Dominican, Panama, Mexico ?? and how exactly to we navigate our way there.

The mast lights were like stars 

We are leaning towards keeping going South, neither of us particularly want to go back to America it is so expensive for us Australians the Bahamas are equally as expensive.  And why go backwards when there is so much more to see, but we have to work with the prevailing winds and seasonal weather fronts there is a reason this route is called "The Thorny Path"

Our days are filled with a mixture of socializing, exploring the many beaches, boat cleaning and maintenance with lots of discussing and planning.

of course there
is the everyday chores like doing the laundry 









A highlight of our stay was the daily cruisers net, where they asked for daily arrivals and departures, gave out current weather, informed everyone of any local fundraising or interesting events, and kept us up to date on the daily activities.

Craig enjoyed a few poker nights 

They have volleyball everyday on the beach, there is a table making baskets using native grasses, a table playing dominos, various workshops and a weekly, cleaning out the bilge table sale, poker twice a week , Sunday church services and generally a nice comfortable gathering of like minded individuals.

Craig didn't feel so young  the next day after running around playing volleyball

We ate on each other's boats, went for long beach walks and hikes through the scrubby bush. We swam daily and thoroughly enjoyed our cruising lifestyle.

I don't know why I'm holding my skirt up its not like the waves are going to wet me !

One day we joined seamlessly and yellowbird for a bit of a longer dingy ride over to Hoffman beach where we swam with turtles then had a bit of a hike to a better cheaper supermarket than the ones closer to town.

One of the many inhabitants of Chat and Chill beach, this ray hung out next to where they cleaned the conch 

George Town is fun but it has another name "chicken harbour" this nickname comes from the fact that over the years, many people chicken out and don't go any further, whether it is to explore more remote Cays in The Bahamas, or move on to the next country.

It is easy to see how that an happen, our next stop is going to be Long Island and looking at the navigation charts it is surrounded by coral heads and shallow banks also the prevailing winds are Easterly's and that is the direction we need to go, so we have to wait for the wind to swing around so that we can sail and not be motoring straight into the wind. 

 One of our beach walks on the ocean side

The cruiser kids have made all these little destination beaches this one was Flip Flop Beach 

By the time we left there were over 300 boats anchored in the area

We had had a visit from Paul (I went to the goodwill shop with Paul and his wife Catherine, when we were in Halifax) Paul has been great, constantly calling in and checking on our progress from our Nova Scotia to USA, then all the way down the US coast, he has been a wealth of information with good places to anchor ( the gorgeous safe and protected anchorage we hid out in that is owned by the Forbes family was one of Paul's recommendations) and lots of little things like getting an app that gives you a US phone number that you can use once you've departed the US. That one came in super handy. 

Paul had flown to St Maarten to help his friend Paulo - whom we briefly met in Annapolis - to sail his catamaran back to the US. It was a great catch up. 

Paul befriended us in Halifax and went out of his way to visit us when he was passing close by

Pauls first words to us were “what are you doing sitting here, it's just like a trailer park ?” And he was right - as much as it was fun doing all the Chat and Chill activities there is still so much to see, I guess we had a good rest and met lots of great people.

Friday 14th was looking good we had shopped during the week, taking Adriana over to the George Town side of the harbour we dropped the anchor -  provisioned, had a burger, then moved back again closer to Chat and Chill, we actually dropped and lifted the anchor about 7 times in the 15 days we were there. 

We had washed our bed linen and our fridge was full again, we only needed to top up our diesel and the local marina was too shallow for our draught, apparently Long Island has better facilities so it was a good place to head for.

  

While we were in Georgetown my mum took ill and was admitted to hospital, it is very hard being sooo far from home but FaceTime is great and we were able to chat and I could follow her progress, it was sometimes difficult because of the time difference, one night Dad sat up until midnight until he saw the little green light come on that showed I was awake and online, before he called me - bless him.  

On Valentine’s Day 2020 we decided there was a nice turn in wind direction that would allow us to sail the 25 nm over to Long Island, all 3 boats had been tossing around the idea of heading over that way but we had all been busy doing different things and hadn’t made a confirmed decision to go.

Craig and I were up and half heartedly getting our books sorted for swapping, drying off our conch shell ready to make a conch horn when Craig said the weather is just right we should go today or it could be another week to 10 days before it’s right again. We messaged the others, pulled up our dingy, secured the hatches and made ready to set sail. Just like that !!

We soaked the shell overnight then blasted it with a dose of bleach to get rid of any smells, the shell was empty when we started

It was a lovely sunny calm day, our passage through the cut was uneventful and once out of the lee of the land we had our mainsail and foresail up,  turned off the engine and managed to sail all the way there, crossing the Tropic of Cancer as we left the Cut in our wake.

Another stunning beach and a beautiful day greeted us the next morning.  We were up early and ready to explore Calabash Bay at the North end of Long Island.