B-Bye Abacos

All good things must come to an end, and spring is around the corner.  It's time to start inching towards home.

Marsh Harbour Marina and Jib Room Restaurant & Bar

Wednesday is the weekly Rib Night Party.  That's Desmond our dock hand
winning the Limbo contest while lighting a cigarette from the flaming limbo bar.

We left Marsh Harbour with the intention of slowly inching towards home, stopping here and there on our way to check out a few new anchorages and a few favourites.  But the first challenge was going back through the shallow Don't Rock channel without scraping our bottom or hitting our prop on a rock.  We had our departure time calculated to hit Don't Rock Pass at the high end of a rising tide, factoring in a quick fuel stop and two hours of travel.  Unfortunately, the boat sitting on the fuel dock had different ideas and decided to just sit there for an hour and a half, taking up the only spot available for fueling, thus putting us more than an hour behind schedule.  I don't understand why people do these things.  Aggravating.  It was a bit of a nail-biter when we finally went through the channel as the tide was reversing but we made it through, with a little unnecessary stress.

First stop was supposed to be Treasure Cay but unfortunately the winds had shifted and our selected anchorage had become too bouncy to be comfortable. This day was NOT going as planned at all.  But that's the beauty of the Abacos, there are so many wonderful anchorages so close together.  We hopped over to No Name Cay, tucked in the lee of the island and dropped the hook.  We hadn't had a chance to say hello to the wild pigs yet this year so this worked out fine.  By sunset, all the other boaters left and we had the anchorage to ourselves.  We dinghied into a little cove and there saw a huuuge ray.  He came right up to the boat and as I leaned over to get a close look, I swear, we made eye contact and he smiled at me.  Well that's my story and I'm sticking to it!  A quiet night was spent rocking gently at anchor under a glorious canopy of stars.

The wild pigs at No Name Cay

Next, we needed a place to find shelter from a big blow that was forecasted, so back to Leeward Marina at Green Turtle Cay we went.  We spent three days there hanging with friends and taking in some night life at Pineapples Bar, where we danced the night away and took an evening swim.  "Sooo-zan is in the house!" The deejay would shout into his echo box as I merengued by.  He had learned a bunch of our names. Too much fun!

Deejay Kevin

Dancing Fools

That pool looks refreshing!

And of course, as we were making absolute dancing fools of ourselves, I was introduced to a fellow boater named Peter.  That face was so familiar but so out of context it took me a few minutes to connect the dots.  I finally blurted out "Hey, you used to be my boss!"  It was Peter Gumbrell, a retired Principal of Special Education that I had worked with back home in Canada.  The boating world is indeed small!

The wind died down and we knew it was time to start moseying home.  With sad farewells to Green Turtle Cay and our friends there, we pulled away from the dock and pointed our bow to the North.  We spent a night anchored at Manjack Cay, where we walked the trail to the beach on the Atlantic side and cleaned up plastic.  This is a huge problem in the area. We dinghied the mangroves there and saw a ton of turtles.

Sooo much plastic washes ashore here with every tide.
Eye-opening!!

 Next, we spent a night at Little Sale Cay.  As we pulled into Little Sale we were greeted by a friendly dolphin who came out to swim in our wake.  The water was so clear that we could see every detail.  He had a white nose!  Being greeted by a dolphin is always a good omen in my books.

Two quiet and relaxing nights in a row, enjoying swimming, dinghy 'sploring, cockpit barbecues and watching the stars.  As much as we enjoyed visiting all the popular hotspots in the Abacos, these quiet anchor days, we both said, are our favourite.

We had the whole anchorage to ourselves.
I was so much hoping that dolphin would come back to swim with me,
but he didn't.  It just doesn't get any better than this.
Living Life Large.
Gran Vida!