Highbourne Cay to Shroud Cay
We weighed
anchor at 0745 which was near low tide.
We wanted to enter Highbourne Cay Marina at near slack tide so we could
take on fuel and pick up a few provisions.
We entered the marina basin at 0830.
There were two large motor yachts docked on either side of the fuel
dock. The wind was blowing in the
mid-teens even in the protected marina basin.
Two years ago, we would never have attempted to dock the boat under
these conditions. Now, we better know
how to adjust for the wind and realize how these large yachts create wind
shadows when you are very close to them.
We adeptly maneuvered Foreign
Affair onto the dock and had a foot at each end to spare. It helped that the bow of the 100+ foot yacht
in front of us curved enough to let our two bows overlap at the dock.
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| Just Enough Room for Foreign Affair at the Fuel Dock |
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| We Are the Biggest Sailboat at the Fuel Dock - Just a Matter of Perspective |
Dwayne topped off our fuel while Carla shopped for groceries. A loaf of bread was $10 and a head of cabbage $3. The fuel price was reasonable at $4.75 per gallon. Getting off the dock was another exercise in using the wind, snubbed dock lines and prop walk to orient Foreign Affair’s stern far enough off the dock to allow her to back away and clear the two motor yachts. The captain of the motor yacht to our stern was a bit concerned and came to the aft of his boat to observe. His 20 foot long Zodiac tender was alongside at the stern. It would serve as a big fender if we strayed into his vessel. We backed away in good order and he gave us a thumbs up. It is rare to get any acknowledgement from anyone on the mega-yachts.
We were soon
out of the marina and on our way to Norman’s Cay. The wind was blowing in the high teens with
gusts in the low 20s. We only set out
the genoa as Norman’s Cay lies only a few miles south of Highbourne. We were clipping along at close to 6 knots
under genoa alone.
A series of
squall lines began to appear and the winds increased by 5 knots as they
approached. We only got a few drops of
rain; however, you never knew how much rain you might get with the next line of
clouds. We decided to skip our stop at
Norman’s Cay and continue on to Shroud Cay.
We’ll catch Norman’s on our return trip as we retrace our route back to
Nassau.
Shroud Cay
is located in the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park which is a very large Bahamian
national park covering hundreds of square miles. Moorings are established in several locations
throughout the park for use by visitors.
We decided to grab a mooring since the winds were supposed to continue
blowing in the high teens and low 20s.
The high wind and current made grabbing the mooring difficult and it
took several attempts to pick up the pendant.
Dwayne secured our line to the mooring which did not have a thimble in
the eye of the pendant. We passed our
line through the thimble-less eye and it broke before we could get our second
line on the mooring. This was quite
disturbing.
We moved to
a second mooring and again, had a heck of a time picking up the pendant. We were finally secured with both of our
bowlines passing through a large thimble on the pendant. However, the three strand line used for the
mooring was not looking very good.
Actually, one of the stands had broken and was unraveling. Dwayne was not happy with this situation.
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| The Best Anchorages Attract the Powerboats |
We sat back in the cockpit and relaxed a while watching the activity around us. About a dozen other boats our size and five mega-yachts were anchored and one sport fishing boat was on a mooring next to us. Much to our surprise, a mega-yacht with two crew on the bow took the mooring ball behind us. It was amazing that they could even fetch the pendant as their bow was a good 12 feet above the water. We knew the mooring was not made to hold a yacht that size. What were these guys thinking?
The bowmen
disappeared as soon as they had the lines secured. The boat swung on the mooring and we watched
the big ball submerge. We continued to
observe as the captain went below while crew members scampered around the aft
lower deck preparing the table for dinner.
A few minutes later, we saw the yacht break free of the mooring and
start drifting away. However, no one
aboard seemed to notice as they kept scurrying around the aft deck preparing
for sun-downers and dinner. It took
several minutes before someone noticed the boat was adrift. Then, it was the Keystone Cops routine. The stewards on the aft deck sounded the
alarm. The captain emerged from the main
salon. His arms were soon flailing in
the air and deckhands appeared running down the side decks toward the bow. Soon, the vessel was under power and
eventually anchored. What a show. Too bad we could only watch it all through
our binoculars. I’m sure it would have
been better on wide screen.
We then
decided to drop off our mooring ball and anchor out. We have great confidence in our ground tackle
and the holding here should be excellent in sand. We moved to a spot just outside the mooring
field and joined the rest of the crowd at anchor. Just in time for dinner.
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