It’s time to make some miles happen. We’ve got a few friends sailing over on their own boats from Florida to the Bahamas beginning at the start of the month. They will be arriving in the northern Abacos and we are way down here in the southern Exumas, about 270 miles away (that is if we didn’t have to weave our way around a bunch of islands and sandbanks), and of course we want to go meet up with them so it is time to get moving. To meet up with our friends we sadly had to say goodbye to the ones we were already with, both The Lucky One and Smitty. This becomes one of the challenges of a nomadic lifestyle, you come together and drift apart to only hope to run into each other again in another anchorage whether its in a few days, a few months, or a few years. Frustratingly you sometimes miss each other completely by just a few days. We figure we have seven solid full days of travel ahead of us including one crossing from Eleuthra to Little Harbor and a couple of offshore cuts to navigate meaning we need some good weather to make this whole thing happen. Considering we waited WEEKS for weather to get around the Whale cut, and WEEKS to make the Eluthera crossing at the beginning of the trip we know we need some luck on our side.
From Cat Island, we made a stop back in George Town and waited out a front before moving up to Lee Stocking. From Lee Stocking we made a short jump up to Bitter Guana and enjoyed the setting sun lighting up the white sand cliffs at the anchorage. From there we went to Little Hall’s Pond (pretty enough of a place to get a post of its own). We caught three Mahi on those two passages, and had to stop fishing because our tiny freezer was full even though we are still on the hunt for a tuna. So far we are off to a good start. Another front passed through with reports indicating that a second one might be right behind it so we pushed north up to Highborne Cay. This meant that once again we pretty much skipped all of the Exuma Land and Sea Park. We are definitely making it a priority to see the next time! But, we made our miles.
As I write this we are making our way to Current Cut on Eleuthera. We started out the morning with a reefed main and reefed jib and still pulling 7 knots but the winds have settled and of course have shifted so we are barely making 5 knots with the motor. We knew that today wasn’t going to be ideal but the anchorage last night was much less than ideal, we rolled uncomfortably all night long so it wasn’t a difficult decision to get underway at dawn this morning. We were anchored with more than twenty boats last night yet we were the only ones to leave this morning. We are not sure why. We are not ones to follow the crowd or need a group consensus, but sometimes being the only sheep to leave the flock makes you start to wonder.
It is pretty out here, and it’s much more comfortable than the anchorage. And, bonus, we moving in the right direction so all is well. We even have it all to our selves. We should be able to make the crossing to Little Harbor tomorrow before any more weather events come through. If we can do that, the biggest challenges will be behind us (we hope).
Wright Away Sails Away 