Many cruisers describe Marsh Harbour as the hub of the Abacos.  Eventually all cruisers in the Abacos pass through here, whether it’s for parts, food, water, fuel, etc.  Little would we know how true this would prove when we made our trip over from Great Guana Cay to meet my parents who were staying for 6 days at Abaco Beach Resort….

After Sabrina and I left Great Guana Cay on Monday I single-handed the boat across the Sea of Abaco while Sabrina baked bread in the galley.  The wind was light at 8 knots and I was having a blast sailing JV around 4-5 knots while tidying up the decks.  I dropped the sails outside the harbor and we motored in and dropped the hook. We knew some folks that were keeping their boats in the area, and I was curious if we might have a chance to meet up with some of them.

Sabrina and I untied the dinghy and headed for the public dinghy dock in town named the “Union Jack.”  As we pulled closer, we noticed that it seemed a construction crew was working on the dock.  As we got even closer we noticed that it wasn’t a Bahamian construction crew, but seemed to be cruisers working on the dock.  And as we touched the dock we noticed that one of the cruisers was Tom from Emerald Lady who keeps his boat on B Dock at Bohemia Bay where we dock our boat.  We waved hello and told him that we’d meet up with him when he was less busy.  We’d been in Marsh Harbour for 15 minutes and already met someone we know!

Since the “Union Jack” was under construction we headed around looking for a dinghy dock.  We fueled up with gas to ask a dock hand and he directed us to “Snappas.” On our way we passed a boat that looked familiar, it was Ankers Away, our good friend Jay and Tanya’s parents boat!

Our good luck continued as we tied up the dinghy and headed to the Abaco Beach Resort to find my parents.  The front desk didn’t know where they were and couldn’t reach them in the room, but assured me that they had checked in.  They suggested we check the pool area and there my parents sat enjoying lunch after their flight. We keep wondering how people managed before cell phones, but apparently in Marsh Harbour you just wander around till you find who you’re looking for.

On Tuesday we took JV to Treasure Cay Marina to check out what is reportedly one of the Top 10 Beaches in the World.  We grilled burgers in the harbor when we arrived and then dinghied into the marina. (There we saw another friend of a friend’s boat, but Steve wasn’t on Sundance.)  It was a quick trip, this is the slow season and there wasn’t much going on at Treasure Cay.  I can understand why people like the beach, but I’m more of a fan of Atlantic beaches with waves crashing ashore. For folks that like waves, I highly suggest Manjack Cay.  Unfortunately we had to motor both ways to Treasure Cay since the winds have been so light.

Wednesday Sabrina took the dinghy into town to hang out with my mom while my dad and I headed out the North Man of Way Channel to try some fishing.  I had picked up some frozen rigged ballyhoo and some other things that I was lacking when Sabrina and took our last fishing trip. I was determined that we would have better luck than the last time. Luckily we did, we had several good bites and I was able to land that Wahoo with our first hooked fish.  As he got closer and closer I tried harder and harder to keep from losing him, when I grabbed him and tossed him into the cockpit it was cause for much celebration. I filleted him while we were on the water since I didn’t have anyplace to keep him cold.  Sabrina and I had some pan seared last night (Nermal was ecstatic) and we all had grilled wahoo for lunch today.  (And there’s still a bunch in the freezer for later.) Dad and I also hooked a barracuda on a cedar plug as we were pulling back into the channel to come in.  On the way back to Marsh Harbour I thought I heard some other friends of ours from Tidewater on the VHF.  It couldn’t tell if it was Beth and Lynn’s voices, but I hailed Coyote to see if it was them and it was!  I had tried to email them a long time ago, but I couldn’t reach them.  I guess if you’re looking for someone in the Abacos, just come to Marsh Harbour and wait?  We’re going to meet up with them on Sunday for the Ravens game – Merrill and Larry, I’ll even root for the Ravens, but if they end up playing the Broncos, I’m rooting for Tebow.

Today we walked around Marsh Harbour, had the grilled wahoo on the boat, and then swung around to the Jib Room, Jib Room, Jib Room!  It’s a nice place and they have Bingo, Bingo, Bingo! on Thursday night. (The Cruisers Net here always says it three times on the net, it’s somewhat like their calling card or something?)  We didn’t stay for bingo, but the Jib Room seemed like a fun place and I can see  why it’s popular.

Tomorrow we’re headed for Hope Town before my parents leave, we’ll see what it has to offer.

I was a little dismayed that we hadn’t harvested any of the excellent seafood here in the Bahamas.
No lobster. No conch. No fish.

Luckily that all changed today:

wa-HOO!!!!!

We’re back to what most Bahamas cruisers consider “civilization,” and I must say that we like the “un-civilized” world much better. Right now we’re anchored at Great Guana Cay and we’re headed for Marsh Harbor this morning. My parents are flying into  Marsh Harbor today and we’re going to hang out with them for the week.

Thursday:

After leaving Green Turtle Cay we moved the 3nm up to Manjack Cay and dropped the hook in a beautiful harbor. We took the dinghy between Crab Cay (another one, not the one where we met P48) and Manjack Cay through a tiny cut of land, you might be able to see it on Google Earth. We messed around in the shallow water, saw what I think was a bonefish, some rays, and a bunch of baby conch.  We then headed to the Atlantic side and tried to do some snorkeling in the rough swells, we found some lobster but they proved to be too much for us in the swell.  Sabrina briefly had a little guy in her hands, but we let him go because he wasn’t big enough to keep.

Friday:

We headed ashore to try to find some of the paths on Manjack that everyone talks about, and eventually found our way to the huge deserted beach on the Atlantic side. We walked along the beach and on our way back we ran into some other hikers, including Ann from a home-built catamaran named “Peace.” Ann explained that they anchored in Manjack for much of their time in the Bahamas because they love it so much, she said the whole island is marked “YES Trespassing” not “No Trespassing” and that there are only three or four houses and everyone loves to talk to the cruisers. She drew us many maps in the sand showing us other paths that we should explore, and we did.  Our short walk ashore eventually took up our whole morning.

That afternoon we took advantage of the settled conditions and ran the dinghy to the other side of Manjack to try to find some reefs.  Our first hop in the water was cloudy, cold and there wasn’t much to look at, I was very disappointed.  We decided to try another reef farther off the beach and found a sand lagoon to anchor the dinghy.  When we jumped back in the clarity was excellent and the fish were beautiful, we found a lobster but his hiding hole was impenetrable.

Saturday:

The Sea of Abaco was dead calm now and we HAD to head back to our snorkeling reef on the other side of Manjack.  This day I took the Spot to record our path and our snorkel spots for future reference, you might have seen us flying along on the tracker in the calm conditions.  Still no lobster, but we explored more of the reef and saw tons of beautiful fish.

In the afternoon I finally set my mind to making wahoo rigs for our trip into the Atlantic.  I rigged various lures for the rest of the day and prepared for our trip around Whale Cay.

Yesterday:

Finally the day had come when I could sneak into the Atlantic to try to catch some of those wahoo that I saw the boats bringing into GTC.  We headed out the Nunjack Channel in calm conditions and motored back and forth along the shelf looking for fish.  Sadly I must report that we didn’t bring anything onto the boat.  I had one bite on a purple cedar plug that took some line, when I reeled in the lure I noticed that there were teeth marks in the hard mylar paint on the side, I’d say it was definitely a wahoo, unfortunately he just missed the hook this time.

We didn’t want to leave Manjack but we had to get further south and cross the infamous “Whale Cay Passage” a notable rough passage in this otherwise easy to navigate area.  Now we’re in the more heavily populated area of the Abacos, I’m currently listening to the “Cruiser’s Net” which relays weather and announcements.  We’ve been listening to it for several days and wanted to visit the many places that they discuss.

After a short walk last night on Great Guana we’ve decided that it sounded better than it is….

We’ll let you know what we find in Marsh Harbour and Hope Town as we visit those places this week.

So yesterday we readied a few things for our departure and I looked out of the boat to see that the tide seemed pretty low.  I took a look at the inlet to White Sound and thought I saw a mast in the channel.  Hmmm, he didn’t seem to be moving? Shortly thereafter I heard a VHF call saying the guy was stuck, another boat was also stuck and got off, and another boat was going to try to get around both of them.

That helped me make the decision to stay one more day, we took the dinghy into New Plymouth, did some brief grocery shopping and then took a dinghy tour of Black Sound.  When we got back we walked to Coco Beach and looked at all the grass that the storm had washed up. Back at the marina we met some cruisers that are younger than us.  It was nice to meet some people that weren’t actually retired-retired but just retired-for-now.  They’re kind of headed in our direction, so I’m sure we’ll see them around.

Now I have to run, we need to get out of here before the tide drops, GTC has been nice, but now we need to move on. There’s good weather for snorkeling over the next few days, so we are going to move the boat closer to the reefs.  Pictures sure to follow!

This morning I was up with the chickens, seriously, the roosters are loud!

We ended up spending a full week here at Green Turtle Cay Club and that seemed like an eternity after our hectic trip south. Not entirely sure where we’ll end up today, we could go north to Manjack Cay, or south to No Name Cay, or we could go through the Whale Cay Passage to points farther south. We’ll be checking the weather and the waves when we get out of White Sound and figure it out then. The winds are supposed to die down during the day and overnight, there might be a breeze on the hook, but nothing like yesterday.

Yesterday we hunkered down at the Club during the wind and downloaded directions on how to clean conch and lionfish and a bunch of recipes that we need to try.  We’ll be filling up with water on our way out, and this will be the first time I’ve paid for water and it costs $0.20 a gallon. Luckily we don’t need diesel yet.

I checked the graphical wind forecast, something that I’ve learned we need to follow closely here, and this is what I found:

Friday's Forecast

For those of you that have never seen one of these, you read the wind direction as the long barb, and the ticks on the barb are the wind speed.  Short ticks are 5 knots, long ticks are 10 knots and just add them up.  We’re due east of Florida and off that funny looking island that runs mostly north and south.  The time is in Coordinated Universal Time and to find our local time (Eastern Standard) you subtract 5 hours.  So this forecast is for Friday, January 6th at 1:00 p.m.  There are no tick marks in our general area, so we won’t be sailing, my guess is that on Friday at 1:00 we’ll be diving somewhere on the barrier reef east of Great Abaco Island!

It’ll be cold, but hopefully the water will be nice and clear.  We’ll post pictures the next time we have a good internet connection.  I’ll try to keep the Spot on when we’re moving, but this will be our last post for a couple of days.

Does anyone know the toughest thing to keep on a boat?  Fresh fruit? Fine China? Dry goods? A full bottle of rum?

Nope, our friend Glen explained to me the toughest thing to keep on a boat:  A Schedule.

When we brought JV south we were largely running on our hectic crazy intended schedule, we had great luck with weather, diesel, crew schedules, etc. Our plan for the last week was to go to Junkanoo and then wait till the shops opened today, buy a couple things we need at the hardware store and move up to Manjack Cay to go scuba diving for a couple days. I mentioned our plan to our neighbors here at the dock last night and our neighbor Rick suggested we check the weather….

Barometer Bob was predicting a gale for today, 20-25 knots from the WNW with higher gusts! A report came over the VHF from a guy on the other side of the island this morning that said he saw a 54 knot gust (that sounded a little high, I would put them at 35, he was French, maybe it was in kilometers/hr?) and the VHF keeps chirping with boats calling each other saying “You’re dragging down on me!” Needless to say we’re still hanging out here at the Green Turtle Club Marina.  I would say we’re “safely” in a slip, but there’s not too much safe about it.  We have two slender pilings holding us stern-to the wind and I’m hoping they’re solid.  The finger pier doesn’t even extend to midship, so I got creative with the spring lines to ease the pressure on these pilings.  White Sound here on GTC seems like a great place to ride out the wind, but even here there are white caps in the anchorage, I can’t imagine what the Sea of Abaco is like.

Yesterday we made a lucky decision to head out in the morning to do some snorkeling.  There was only a light breeze and we were able to run the dinghy to the “Inner-Outer Reef” on No Name Cay.  The sea fans there were exquisite, and I snapped some quick photos, unfortunately, the camera’s batteries died on me shortly after we got there.  We also walked along the beach in Gillam Bay on the south side of Green Turtle Cay. Getting back the wind had increased to about 10 knots out of the west, a little wet in the dinghy, but nothing compared to today.  We came back in time for the Buckeyes game, but alas, GTC doesn’t get ESPN2 and I called around to the other bars in White Sound on the VHF to see if anyone had the game, with no luck.

Instead of watching the game, we performed a little maintenance on the engine yesterday and then had drinks with some other cruisers in the marina last night and talked about places to dive and places to visit.  Another couple was from Annapolis, but their boat never makes it back there anymore. We’re settling into the rhythm of the islands, trying to sense the weather, and how fast or slow things will happen. Most people advise to explore the open areas and dive while it’s nice, and work on your boat or go into town when it’s not, we’re trying to adapt to this plan.

Stores are open here after the holidays and we need to go buy a couple small things.  I need some PVC to make a tiller extension for the dinghy, my arm is killing me on our long dinghy runs.

As I finish typing this I had to run into the clubhouse, the sun disappeared and it started to rain.  Luckily the club has a fire burning on this cold Bahamas day…

(I forgot to include a link to read a little more about Junkanoo if you’re interested.  Feel free to check this out if you’d like to hear more about this tradition.)

Happy New Year!

Sabrina and I took the dinghy around to Settlement Creek on New Plymouth yesterday afternoon for the local festivities.  The amount of people compared to Friday was astounding, check out the two photos of the “Jail” below to see what I’m talking about.

We were able to raft off the dinghy at the public dock and head ashore.  The parade was definitely running on “Island Time,” it was advertised to start at 2:00 and finally kicked off a little before 4:00.  My theory was that this kept all the visitors milling about town and going to the numerous conch stands and bars. There was a stand on the public dock operated by a man and a woman with another guy cleaning fresh conch in the water nearby. The gentleman at the stand painstakingly made conch salad fresh about 10 servings at a time.  You had to get a ticket and wait in line for over an hour to get one of the salads, but everyone said it was worth it.  I didn’t have the will to wait so I purchased the conch fritters which were delicious.

The Junkanoo parade was wonderful and I couldn’t believe the size of some of the “floats” that the dancers wore in the heat. The drummers tirelessly beat on makeshift toms or 55 gallon drums with their bare hands.  The locals followed the parade, dancing along to the beat and waving hello to all their friends.

We made it back from New Plymouth before dark, I cooked a nice dinner and we headed to the bar for a drink around 10:00.  The island was pretty quiet and we ended up ringing the New Year in back on the boat.

Sabrina and I are starting our New Year’s Resolutions today- our most important one is to pare down our possessions and clean out the boat!  We’re using GTC to finish up some things on the internet that we didn’t have time to do before we left, and we can’t wait to anchor out in some peace and quiet at Manjack Cay in the next couple days.

Hope you all had a safe and Happy New Year!

We’ve settled in at Green Turtle Club marina for a couple of days.  They have a deal here that whatever you spend at the restaurant or bar comes off your dockage fees.  At only $1.25 a foot (that’s $50 a night for JV) a couple nice dinners for the four of us covered our dockage fees through Junkanoo (New Year’s Day.) For landlubbers, $1.25 a foot is a fantastic price, we paid $1.50 for Great Bridge Marina and that place was FAR from paradise.

We want to hang out and experience Junkanoo here at Green Turtle Cay, apparently this is a very big festival even though Green Turtle only has about 300 residents. Their parade attracts visitors from Treasure Cay and Marsh Harbour and it sounds like a big deal.  It’s at 2:00 today, but the locals say that might be closer to 2:30 or 3:00. We’ll be posting pics.

We bid farewell to Jeannine and Dennis yesterday at noon.  Before they left we had a  nice breakfast at GTC and Jeannine and Sabrina were able to do a little kayaking through White Sound here on Green Turtle. They have a long trip home of planes, trains, and automobiles, and I hope everything goes well for them. Sabrina talked to them last night and their flight was delayed a few hours. Here’s their travel itinerary:

• Ferry from GTC to Treasure Cay
• Puddle Jumper from Treasure Cay to Ft. Lauderdale
• Tri-Rail Regional Train from Ft. Lauderdale to West Palm
• Cab from West Palm to Old Port Cove Marina
• Pick up the parked truck at OPCM and drive home to Indiana

We wish them safe travels and hopefully everything goes according to plan.

Sabrina and I rented one bike yesteday to accompany the folding bike we carry and decided to explore New Plymouth before everything closes for the Junkanoo Holiday. It’s a cool little town with narrow streets, a couple grocery stores, and several bars. The “Original” Goombay Smash at Miss Ellie’s was a little disappointing, but the conch fritters at the Wrecking Tree Restaurant were wonderful.  I was able to purchase a bottle of Cruzan Aged Rum for $12, so I was glad we didn’t purchase a bunch of hard liquor before we left the states, the prices are excellent here.  Beer on the other hand was running $46 for a case of 24 Kaliks.

The preferred mode of transportation on the island is the gas powered golf cart, and with the Junkanoo party today, every cart is rented.  We decided we’ll run the dinghy around and pull in with all the other cruisers. The number of boats in the marina has tripled since we’ve arrived, and the GTC is hosting a formal New Year’s Eve dinner tonight which is out of our price range.  I think we’ll hang out here to watch OSU play Florida on the Club’s big screen tv on January 2nd.

We need to inflate the dinghy today to take it over to Junkanoo and we’re still working on cleaning up the boat.  Here’s some photos from yesterday:

Two local fishing boats just got back with coolers full of wahoo.

It was a grueling day for these guys, they were on the water almost 4 full hours!
I thought something was odd when they didn’t leave the dock till 10:00, but they knew what they were doing.

I think I’ll follow them tomorrow to see where they go, I should be able to keep up with the Bahamas 37.
He only has 900 hp.