Goodbye Abacos

We’ve been waiting on wind to have a nice sail south to Eleuthera, and while
we’ve been watching the weather we’ve slowly been saying goodbye to the
Abacos.

When we were here last winter we heard a rumor that you can watch the
lighting of the lighthouse in Hope Town. On Friday night we headed over to
the lighthouse with Jay and Tanya. The rumors were true and the lighthouse
keeper allowed us to watch him light the kerosene lamp that evening.
Watching him run through his nightly routine was very interesting. First he
preheats the lamp and then pulls down the shades that are in place through
the day. Once the lamp preheats he lights the pressurized kerosene and
starts the rotation of the First Order Fresnel lens. Watching the 8,000 lb.
lens rotate effortlessly on a bed of mercury was very impressive.
(Unfortunately, I can’t post pictures now, but I’ll try to find wifi and
post them later.)

We left Hope Town on Saturday, headed downwind for Great Guana Cay. We had
chosen to anchor in Fisher’s Bay on Guana not to go ashore, we had other
motives… we needed to clean the bottom of the boat. The crystal clear
water in Fisher’s Bay was a great place to scrape the barnacles and
waterline, removing months of Maine growth and scum from the Chesapeake Bay
and ICW.

Sunday morning was dead calm and we finished up the bottom of the boat
before motoring to the south end of Elbow Cay that afternoon. (We can
proudly say that our cleaning helped, we were faster.) Minx and JV met up
with Jay’s parents on Ankers Away for the football games. Ankers Away is a
large trawler and watching the AFC Championship was like watching it in a
home. There were couches, an excellent TV picture, and heavy hors d’oeuvres,
I even made buffalo chicken dip! It was strange to watch the commercials
showing snow and winter weather, then turning to look out at the moonlit
beaches and palm trees on Elbow Cay.

After the game we left Ankers Away, dinghying back to our boats. The water
was completely still and the moon was illuminating the bottom, making it
seem like we were floating on air.

Monday was our wedding anniversary (7 years) and I got to work early to give
Sabrina her present, a newly rebuilt head! After completing that dirty job I
wanted to take a swim so we headed over to Tahiti Beach. After heading back
to the boat to change, we realized it was lunch time, so Sabrina and I
decided to head to Lubber’s Landing for lunch. It’s our favorite place in
the Abacos, and the Ahi Burger was as good as we remembered it. Last spring
we spent our birthdays celebrating at Lubber’s Landing, so we figured it was
only right that we celebrate our anniversary there too.

We pulled into Marsh Harbour Monday afternoon and began crossing the last
things off our to-do list. I bought a new conch hammer (my last one had
rusted through) and we bought what little groceries we needed. A quick trip
to the liquor store and we were back on the boat, enjoying a wonderful
sunset.

This morning Sabrina is doing laundry while I prep the boat for our passage.
Tomorrow we’ll stage down at Lynyard Cay for our departure to Eleuthera. The
winds look good, hopefully they aren’t too strong and we have a nice
downwind sail to Royal Island. We’ll meet up with Minx in a few weeks as
they make their way south after us.

Until next time, farewell Abacos! It’s said if you put some Abaco sand in
your shoes, you’ll always return here- so we picked up plenty on the beach
yesterday!