Exuma Bahamas Life

We are lost in the beautiful cruising life of the Exumas in the heart of the Bahamas. Days are moving between beach walks, snorkeling, swimming, trail hikes, visiting with boat buddies, talking about routes and places to go, on and on and on. All the while surrounded by the most beautiful water of teal blue, crystal clear where we see the bottom in 20-25 feet when we drop the anchor. We can not imagine a more beautiful place to sail. Yes, we are outbound from here to the Eastern Caribbean, and we know that is beautiful as well, but we are a bit sad to sail out of the Exumas as this is the most beautiful place we have ever explored. But we need to explore onward and we need to discover new harbors with Island Spirit, so onward south.

We have been running off wind and solar

We have spent the last week in Cambridge Cay, Staniel Cay, Black Point and now Little Farmer's Cay. We are pushing south to George Town because the weather forecasts have been the most confusing of all times. Chris Parker is offering up 4 situations from calms to deep low pressures. Then the Grib files show no big deal, just 15-20 maybe 25 knots east winds, typical. So with this confusing forecast, we are making a run for the safe harbor of George Town where 300+ yachts are anchored. Then next week it is the George Town Regatta and we plan to sail over to CAT Island where we have never been. We hear this is a great island to meet the locals and to explore. We hope to sail out there and learn all about Cat Island.

Typical water color when looking off the stern, unreal

Then we plan to sail back to George Town and prepare for our run to the USVI. We will need to fuel up and change filters and service the engine. Then plan out the final run and look for a good weather winter to run from George Town to the Turks and Caicos and then south to the Dominica Republic and on east to the US Virgin Islands. We have leaned that it is 200 nm to the Turks and then about 150 to the DR. Radeen and I are used to running 240 nm from Cape May, NJ up to Block Island, RI, so these runs are not large, just new to us. We are getting excited to head south. Every year, in March, we have turned around and headed north to Abaco where we usually send April, then in May we run the USA east coast to Rock Hall, MD. This year, we will take that time and run it south and we should end up in Grenada. That is the plan. We will see how far we get. One thing is for sure, we are not heading north, we are heading south. For now, we just need to get to George Town. One leg at a time, that is how we are doing this. 

Here are tons of photos of the past week....

Walking Staniel Cay, we found this

Staniel Cay, typical beach

Blue water anchored off Thunderball Grotto

Radeen and Cynthia sure take a beautiful photo, Staniel Cay Yacht Club

Radeen holding up Bell Rock, Cambridge Cay

The beach walks at Cambridge Cay are priceless

The beach to ourselves

Let's go for a beach walk

Happy Valentine's Day, 2017, 37 years since we engaged

Swimming off Cambridge Cay

Sunset Cambridge Cay

Two Calm days with sun shades up

Dinghy run to Compass Cay to see the marina

A beach walk with cruising friends

The 35 knot squall arrived

B&G Wind Plot data shows peak winds at 34.6 knots

The cruising buddies at Black Point, Linda, Cat, and Radeen

Too funny, I was called "Mr. C" as a teacher

How to haul your boat with the mail boat crane

Lift it up

Lift it over the mail boat

Lower it to your trailer

There it is on the boat trailer, way coo

This is the CMAP navigation chip, which pays for Explored data
Compare this to the next screen

This is WHY Navionics is NO GOOD in the Exuams
It says I am in 3 foot water on a sand bar. NOPE, it is not here.
DO NOT USE NAVIONICS IN THE BAHAMAS, YOU WILL WRECK

Off to Little Farmer's Yacht Club

We meet Roosevelt Nixon, who built the yacht club 28 years ago.

Check out the cool bar

The resaraunt where boaters come in for dinner

That is us anchored off the club

The Little Farmer's yacht Club

The Dinghy Dock

Heading Home, Radeen and Island Spirit

Island Spirit on anchor off Little Farmer's

 So, life is good aboard Island Spirit, we so doing well, we are moving south, and we are loving the Watermaker. We are now running it 2-3 hours at a time every other day. We have all the water we want. What a treat in the Bahamas. Next stop....George Town.