I'm very overdue for an update. We are on the move again after spending almost six weeks in the Raggeds. We did move around a little visiting several of the islands close by. Most of our time was spent at Hog Cay. What so you do for six weeks in a remote area like the Raggeds? Once we arrived our good friend Rita gave us a refresher coarse on basket weaving using the local silver palm fronds. We jumped into that and so far I have made fifteen baskets of varying size and Cori has made six and has four more started. I will admit that there is a difference in quality and appearance between my attempts and what Cori has been producing. Many days were spent in the tiki hut just working away on them. After Rita left we took on the role of teachers and spent many days teaching the skill to new arrivals. We also spent some of our time hiking the many trails that the cruisers have built on the island. Evening sundowners are always fun with many new people arriving and departing and watching for the elusive "green flash" as the sun goes down. Mostly we spent our time just enjoying the solitude of the area.
Eventually it was time to move on. We pulled anchor and moved a short distance up to Buena Vista Cay to stage for the next jump which was a forty-two mile jump to Water Cay. The next morning we pulled anchor at sunrise and continued on to Long Island, forty-four miles over very shallow water. We draw five and a half feet and we spent a lot of time in seven feet of water. Both days were enjoyable sails instead of having to motor. Once we arrived at Thompson Bay on Long Island we made a run to the grocery and liquor store. We also treated ourselves to a meal out. We spent time with some of the other cruisers we had met in the Raggeds that had moved here also. Our last day in Thompson Bay we went ashore to check out the local mutton festival. Each island has their own unique festival and Long Island celebrates raising sheep and goats. There was a petting zoo with a variety of sheep and goats, craft vendors, food vendors offering a variety of food choices, centered on mutton as the main ingredient, music both live and recorded and of course adult beverages. We spent our time there visiting with many of the visiting cruisers.
It was time to move on again. We sailed up to the northern point of the island and dropped anchor in Calabash Bay. This bay has an amazing beach but the reputation of being very rolling and unsettled in a variety of winds resulting in the phrase "getting bashed at Calabash". From here we wanted to go out to Conception Island which is about twenty miles out into the ocean. These groups of islands are know for the fact that they were the first islands Columbus arrived at on his first trip to America. Conception is a small island that is part of the Bahamas Land and Sea Park and is uninhabited except for a variety of birds and sea life. We spent two days here checking out several of the beaches and taking a dinghy tour of the inner lagoon spotting many turtles. Checking the weather forecast we were informed that the day we planned to depart would have light winds and we may have to motor instead of sail. We prepared for an early start planning to move up to Cat Island for the night. As we got the boat ready it was flat calm with no waves or wind. As I stepped to the bow to pull the anchor the boat shifted and we were hit with twenty knot winds from the north. We pulled the anchor and started out. The waves went quickly from flat to bashing into four foot seas. After about an hour the winds started to drop and the seas began to settle down. Several hour later we had a light breeze under ten knots but directly on the nose. We continued motoring along allowing the batteries to get a good charge and running the water maker. When the seas calmed down Cori put out a fishing line and after several years of no luck we had a nice mahi-mahi on board. Fresh fish for dinner and enough for several more meals. We arrived at Cat Island in the early afternoon and decided to continue on to Eleuthera Island. We continued into the night and set our sights on arriving at Current Cut in the morning. During the night we had a problem with the engine and by then we had enough wind to continue under sail. Current Cut is a narrow cut that has a strong tidal current. We arrived near low water and as we motor-sailed through the cut we had a push from about two knots of current. Once through the cut the winds came up. We had continued through the night in order to be further north when the winds picked up and we were almost there. The forecast was for winds from fifteen to twenty knots and it quickly started blowing twenty. We sailed up to the protected anchorage at Meeks Patch just outside of Spanish Wells and dropped anchor. Our next move will be the jump from Eleuthera to the Abaco's but first we need to wait out the front coming through over the weekend.
While waiting out the weather we have been taking care of some boat maintenance, troubleshooting the engine issue and troubleshooting the refrigeration. It appeared that we no longer had a refrigerator but with some help troubleshooting from the factory tech's it looks like it will continue to run.
It looks like we will be waiting for a couple of days to make the jump to the Abaco's where we plan to spend another month or so before returning to the States.
