Busy few days.  Have sailed each of the last 3 mornings in a row, hopping a bit farther south each day. Conveniently, there has been favorable wind plus a slack high tide each morning, perfect for heading out, to the Exuma Sound, sailing south, and heading back into the next cut. 

Yesterday we were at Rudder Cut Cay, home to an unusual submerged statue of a mermaid and piano. We also took the dinghy to the Darby Islands, snorkeling the channel between them and climbing to the ruins of a “castle” atop the hill. 

Today we hopped again, back out Rudder Cut and into Adderly Cut, anchoring at Lee Stocking Island just off the pier of the former CMRC marine research facility where one of Mike’s co-workers at Ford once worked.  It closed in 2012 but the coconut trees are still quite productive as you’ll see in the photos.  Get ‘em while you can because they’re the first we’ve seen since Eleuthera!  Henry and Emma counted 20 coconuts added to the 5 or so that we picked up at Rudder Cut Cay.  I think we’ll be well stocked for a while now!  We also hiked the trail up to see the views atop Perry Peak, named after the founder/funder of CMRC.  It’s no 14’er – the peak was at 39m (128 feet) – but it’s the highest we’ve seen since Colorado.  

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You have to check out Mushacay.com

Wow!

Woke up 4am ish to more uncomfortable conditions in anchorage at Little Farmers so by 7:15am we were getting the anchor up and we were outta there!  Musha cay, only 1.5hr to our south was the next destination – we’re alone in the anchorage with a few boats visible in the distance.  It’s a private island, owned by David Copperfield and often rented out.  Very high end.  The land portion of the island is private, but water and sand up to high tide mark is public in the Bahamas so we did a snorkel/beach circumnavigation of the island, taking care to avoid occupied beaches.  Gorgeous sunny calm day for our adventure.  We needed to feel those sunny rays after our last few days.

Milestone – today was the first day I didn’t wear a wetsuit, was in and out of water all day long….and was never cold.  Not once!  Even our solar shower was HOT for fresh water at the end of the day.  Kids thought it funny actually that on cold weather days we get a cold shower…and hot days…we get the hot shower.  Some things on land are missed…..

We found lots of “first time” treasures today – baby sandollars, black (living) sandollars, red skinny starfish,  new types of conch shells (with animals), neat new shells.  And we saw the GREEN FLASH at sunset.  WOOHOO!!!!!!

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It’s been a wet and wild couple of days at the Farmers First Friday in February festival.  The main goal was to see the Bahamian sloop races – which we did – in rain, squalls, wind, waves –we got it all except for sunshine!  Amazing to see these huge guys out on the planks balancing these small sailboats.  We also got to watch them take the sloops off the mailboat with a crane in 30knots of wind. Exciting. We are now soggy and tired (anchorage was very bouncy last night as winds shifted – felt like we were underway all night), but well fed.  Had the best conch salad (similar to ceviche) and several rounds of cracked conch (Henry’s new favourite food – we are going to go broke keeping this boy fed!).  We fit in some school work this morning in the pouring rain – but boat was so bouncy it made Emma seasick poor girl. We unfortunately woke up this morning to our dinghy out of air.  We have a leak.  Eish. Thankfully Reid and Rheta keep a spare dinghy on board.  The lazarettes on Amel are HUGE – it’s like Mary Poppins purse – you wouldn’t believe what we can pull out of them!  Mike spent the morning in the rain inflating the 2^nd one and transferred the outboard to it.  When the rain stops we will try to patch the tear in dinghy #1 while we have it up on our front deck.  Mike had the 2^nd dinghy ready to go in time to chase the sloop race – fun to watch though we had horrific weather and high waves to dinghy through.  Henry and Mike still had smiles at the end!  A dry afternoon on land with 7 other kid boats was much needed by kids and adults!

Finally winds have died down, squalls have moved on, still grey skies but forecast is looking better. Boat is calm and peaceful at the moment. Fingers crossed for a good night sleep and no need to use the lee cloth tonite (it holds you in  your bed when rocking).  Tomorrow we will be on move….somewhere!
PS = Be sure to look at the photo of the GREEN sign for Ocean cabin where it talks about “our hours”. fun read!

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Emma sends a big thank you for all the birthday messages – she had so much fun reading them all!  She continues to celebrate her birthday – one night with boat friends on Thomas Cay and then this afternoon At Little Farmers Bliss surprised us with a cake to celebrate along with Cassidy on Mohini who has a birthday next week.  The party continues!

Yesterday we passed through Staniel Cay quickly to pick up our propane tanks (we had dropped of 2 weeks ago – they go out on the mailboat to be filled up then returned “at some point”!!).  Got to see many of the sharks at the docks that hang out near the fish cleaning table. 

Enjoyed nice sail from Blackpoint to Little Farmers this morning.  All ready for the 5F festival this weekend (First Friday in February at Farmers Festival)

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Great visit with a great friend – Sarah is now on her way back to CO and we are on our own again on Amel.  It was a super fun week – Sarah got a little bit of everything – sun, cloud, rain squalls, calm, high winds, flat seas and 3-5ft seas with waves crashing into the cockpit. Some good sailing and some motor sailing too.  We snorkeled, swam with 12 eagle rays, chased turtles, fed the fish, had a shark visit, hiked to isolated beaches, floated on the paddle board to land on sand bars only exposed at low tide.  Ate well and baked bread in the solar oven.   Emma and Sarah had lots of fun goofy times in the water and we all had many good conversations each evening. Sad to see her go and hoping the travels all go well.  She has a somewhat wet wetsuit in her bag so she’ll be sure to bring that unique salty ocean smell with her when she unpacks in Carbondale!

We are now hunkered down near Little Pipe Cay.  We had to drop Sarah and run yesterday to get some protection from the front which arrived last night.  It was very windy and quite lumpy in the anchorage, huge rain squall this morning which was awesome to collect almost 45gallons of water!  Tanks almost full again.  Kids had fun playing on deck, naked, in the rain.  “That rain hurts” they laughed about – “what would you expect at 25-30knots?” I shouted back!!!!!.  Boat was much more comfortable when wind clocked this afternoon.  Mike and kids went for a fun kid gathering all afternoon –beach play, hikes to wild beaches.  Good cloudy day activity. Lots of new boat kids to meet.   Tina got some quiet uninterrupted laptop hours in to catch up on work.

Another front arrives tomorrow but should be a calmer one.  

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It was blowing like stink but we still decided to pick up anchor and head out.  Big Majors must have had 50 boats or more – everyone hunkered down for the blow.  Despite the 25-30 knots with gusts to 35 we were happy to get out and get away on our own.  Pulled into Little Pipe Cay which we have all to ourselves.  The sail was fast and only needed a little scrap of main and mizzen sails to go 7 knots. Spent the afternoon exploring all the sand flats that are dry at low tide with lots of baby conch and shells.  Great fun though the wind has us pretty tired by the end. Still howling out there though it is forecasted to calm down a little through the day tomorrow.

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Busy start to Sarah’s visit!  Lots of fun taking Sarah on her first ever snorkel trip to Thunderball grotto – literally minutes after arriving on Amel yesterday (had to catch the slack tide!).  Lots of fun with kid parties on the beach, baking (and eating!) fresh bread, beach walks and watching ocean waves crashing.  

This morning we did the “tourist must see” attraction of seeing the swimming pigs at Big Major’s Spot. We are anchored right off this beach right now. Sarah has seen many pigs on farms….but seeing pigs swimming in the ocean is just an odd sight to see!!! Our bread bakers were also hard at work today. Yesterday was sunny and great weather – today very windy (25-30knots) with sun and cloud.  Strong winds in forecast for tomorrow.

So many photos to edit – here are a few!

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Woohoo!  We have data and cell connection! Anchored now in Staniel Cay (Big Major’s) with guest Sarah on board and am sending this update written from Warderick Wells yesterday:

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Wow – how to sum up last week?  Sun, sand, snorkeling, new friends, kid boats, hiking, turquoise waters, turtles, eagle rays.  Bahamas as advertised!  J  Only 1 day of squalls/rain/cloud but otherwise settled and nice.  We volunteered in the Exuma Land and Sea Park for a day, ate fresh coconuts often, kids created a “shell garden” in the sand flats at low tide (since park is a no take zone they couldn’t keep the shells). We loved watching the spotted eagle rays swimming up and down the anchorage at slack tide each day.  Magnificent.  There are 10…amazing 10 that are seen regularly.  Some of them are huge – must be 8ft wingspan.  One turned to look up at me while snorkeling – I think my heart stopped beating in that moment as we looked eye to eye!

More boat projects – VHF radio wasn’t able to hear others past 3 miles away though it should be 10-20 miles – Mike pulled wire, investigated connections, went to top of mast doing experiments.  Soldered a new connection in a few places including with a torch at the top of the mast.  Installing a spare antenna from a neighbor boat fixed it!  Huge success to now be able to reach over the horizon to speak to other boats.  Then while paddleboarding one morning we discovered a chain plate had 2 of 3 bolts come loose (chain plates hold the wire rigging that keeps the mast standing!!). That was an all day project to figure out what to do.  Other boats provided tools parts and ideas on how to approach the issue and Mike was able to to cut through just the right spot in the interior in order to access the backside of the plate.  By nightfall on the same day the kids reattached the nuts in the tiny opening with their tiny fingers as Mike cranked on the bolts on the outside of the boat. Another success!

We did get lucky with a little connectivity which was a surprise here in the Park.  Though it sometimes took standing one leg, while holding phone in the air, and having the sun/moon/clouds aligned!  Nice to be able to check on critical things and get weather data….but also probably spent more time trying!  It’s a challenge wanting to be disconnected…but yet still having so much going on that we need to be slightly connected.

Unfortunately yesterday – the day our guest travels and we were to pick her up  – a large cold front arrived from the north.  Whenever the east coast gets hammered, we get rough wind and have to seek protection.  Sarah had made it to Florida but then her Ft Lauderdale to Staniel cay flight was cancelled.  It was still sunny here, but the airspace between us was already full of squalls that the aircraft could not get around.  The front was so strong with west winds that we were not able to anchor safely at Staniel Cay so we had already decided to stay at Warderick Wells and helped her find a room in Staniel to stay in Sunday night.  As it turns out she stayed in Lauderdale an extra day and got the 6:30am Monday flight.  We will sail down Monday morning to pick her up by midday hopefully.

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Today was an awesome day.  Sunny, calm, warm. Most boats are off to other places but we stayed put, embarking on a big dinghy exploration from Norman’s Cay cut up towards Norman’s Pond in the north end of the island.  We explored the Beach at Whale’s Tail, swam the narrow coral-filled cut into the pond with 2 spotted eagle rays!!!  So large and majestic – swimming with these animals is magical!  Lots of sandy beach playing and swimming.  The water felt like bath water – but probably the hot sun and lack of wind helped out!

Calm day = up the mast day! Mike had some checks to do up there but then both kids wanted a fun ride to the top again too. It sure is a great view up there – took some work to convince each of them it was time to come down.  They would have stayed up there forever!

Tina got some more laptop work done on what we think is our last cell phone/data connection day until Friday night.

Until then!

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Winds calmed down at bit last night and everyone got a better night sleep. Yesterday’s storm clouds were replaced by nearly cloudless sunshine all day and the winds died completely by sunset today.  We moved the boat from the west side of Normans Cay at McDuff’s restaurant into the Norman’s cut to anchor for today and tonight. We arrived to many boats anchored but everyone left throughout the day so we are the only sailboat here!  How odd but nice and quiet.

An afternoon dinghy exploration took us to some beautiful beaches, small islands, sand bars, with the many varying water depths creating endless different colors of turquoise.   Emma had a brave moment and swam across the channel between two tiny islands to get to a new beach.  On some, the sand was soooo soft like baby powder.  Other beaches had fragments of broken coral and much more rough.

Today’s big excitement was snorkeling on the submerged DC-3 airplane that crashed off Norman’s Cay many years ago.  Huge schools of sergeant majors surrounded us (the cute fish with the yellow & black stripes), and many other fish too.   You could even swim inside the plane (the top was open – it was safe for kids to do).  There were also 2 HUGE stingrays napping in the sand which were awesome to find.

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