After not docking for close to three weeks we docked two nights in a row at Green Turtle Club and Spanish Cay Marina. And, after not plugging in since we've been in the Bahamas, even splurged for power the first night.
Since leaving Marsh Harbor, we spent one night on a mooring ball in Hope Town and a second night on a mooring in Man-O-War. Between Hope Town and Man-O-War we did an afternoon sail down to Tahiti Beach to hit one of the few bars in the Abacos we had missed up to that point - Cracker P's. The house rum punch (a screwdriver, or shotgun?) was excellent, Ben tried some very smooth Cuban rum, and my fish sando was pretty good, but they do some awful things to conch. We first had the grilled conch, which clearly on the menu describes the process - marinated in coconut rum, wrapped in tin foil and grilled. It was pretty bad, so Ben decided to try the conch sandwich, which we incorrectly assumed would be more of a standard Bahamian fried conch sandwich. Unfortunately, it was the same coconut rum marinated affair, just on a bun. We cut our loses and headed to Man-O-War.
The excitement in (the dry town of) Man O War: I bought a very cute shoulder bag souvenir of the trip made by the old women at the Sail Shop, and we ate ice cream cones. Good thing we got those ice cream cones in because since then, it's been cold!
Thursday we had an uneventful passage (the best kind) through Whale Cay. The 1 - 2 ft rollers looked flat as a lake compared to the trip in December, but we missed Skeedadle braving the trail in front of us. We turned into Black Sound to have Abaco Yacht Services change the upper unit oil changed in the prodigal son motor (because of the new power head, Yamaha recommended that be done at about 20 hours).
The wind picked up while we were having lunch and getting the oil changed and was sustained 20 - 23 knots, gusting to 30 as we headed into White Sound. We should have taken that as a sign to anchor, but we were lured into the Green Turtle Club by their Dining for Dockage Winter Special - the price of our dockage would be applied to our meal, so basically we had an expensive but tasty meal at the restaurant which also covered our dockage and electricity for the night. Because of the wind, the docking was possibly as bad as anything the entire trip, except Charleston. We managed not to hit anything and learned the best way to pull a boat up against a dock in 30 mile an hour cross winds (two lines, on the same cleat, one person on the dock taking up slack on one line and one person on the boat taking up slack on the other line). We almost had a second disaster after dinner. As we were just walking out of the restaurant it started to sprinkle, which turned into a downpour just as we made it to the boat, were closing all the hatches and zipping up the windows. A few minutes later and our bunk and electronics (all charging on the chart table) would have been drenched.
Since that cold front the wind has been from between the NW and NE, which is not great for heading towards West End or for crossing the gulf stream. Many of the anchorages between the Sea of Abaco and West End are exposed to the W and NW, and crossing the gulf is not recommended when the wind is from any part of the north. Now that we are out of Cruiser's Net range, we have been waking up by 6:30 every morning to tune into Chris Parker on 4045, but as of Saturday it looked like the first possible crossing date is Wednesday.
Friday we sailed/motored 15 miles from Green Turtle to Spanish Cay, which is one of few places in the area protected from the northwest. Protected is a little bit generous, there is a marina, with a breakwater, which during low tide cuts down on the chop. During high tide it's a bit of a washing machine. Since we only had 15 miles to travel, we stopped for lunch at Powell Cay, and as suggested by the guidebook, walked up to the top of the "bluff" to get a view of the entire anchorage.
At Spanish Cay it looked like we might be the only ones in the marina for the night, but were joined by Maciek and Christina on Calypso, which was very exciting because not only did we have company, but they were young! They are on the second half of their year long honeymoon - the first six months were spent backpacking in South America, and now they have until June to sail the Bahamas. We are jealous!
Saturday we weren't quite sure what to do, it was still raining and there were some pros to staying put - we didn't have to worry about the weather (too much) and we could go inside the restaurant/bar/game room to escape the damp boat. We also had (very spotty) internet. We decided to stay for awhile and do two loads of laundry (for a total of $20! It was necessary, someone was out of essentials). After the laundry finished up, the weather started to clear up and we decided three nights of docking in a row was just extravagant so we headed to Allans-Pensacola.
The guidebooks all tell you that Allans-Pensacola was formerly two islands, but as the result of recent hurricanes it is now one. The guidebooks also tell you about a signing tree, where cruisers can leave signed momentos of their trip. Sadly we could not find the signing tree or the path to the beach on the east side of the island. We knew we were pretty close since we could hear the waves crashing, on what is supposed to be a beautiful beach, but it was still cold from the rain so we decided to give up on our search and occupy ourselves with more important tasks like (re)checking the anchor, depth and tides and blowing the conch at sunset.
After Allans-Pensacola we headed to Great Sale Cay (on Sunday) where we spent our second night in the Bahamas back in December. We had a beautiful sail. We ran the motors to charge the batteries, but the wind was perfect. Ben caught a beautiful snapper. He was a little worried about fish poisoning, so we just had a little bit last night and are planning to have a fish dinner tonight for Valentine's Day.
This morning (Monday) we heard more bad news from Chris Parker. It sounds like it will be more like Thursday, Friday or Saturday for the window for crossing the gulf stream. The good news is that one of his official customers is waiting in Nassau to cross and called in for more detailed crossing information, which he then broadcasts live on the SSB. Since it's going to be a few days, and there is no where to anchor in West End, we decided to stay put in Great Sale for Valentine's Day and do some dingy exploring, read our books, and relax. We figure it's our last day doing nothing for a month, so we might as well take advantage.
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