…………..
Today I write this sitting in a storm. This happens occasionally, I get stormy weather that kind of interrupts my day. I might have planned to go ashore and do something, but for whatever reasons it doesn’t feel safe to leave the boat. Today it’s because the wind is blowing hard, and I’m anchored way on the west side of the harbor. It gives the east wind a lot of space to build up some big waves by the time it reaches me. Wouldn’t be a big deal, except that I’m suddenly feeling real close to the beach and a big pile of rocks just right over there….
So I don’t need to leave Simplicity alone. Already as evening is approaching the wind is starting to slack off. I really have nowhere to go/ nothing to do anyway. No need to buy anything. Not a bad thing at all to be stuck here!!
Just enjoying paradise.
….3/18
I left Staniel Key at the first sign of light in the sky. The wind was from the north, hey, it should be good to get me south! I went way out into sea with the motor, turned it off and sailed!
I sailed great. Cruised around a rocky island out there, and not long after… possibly in the lee of this island, the wind just sadly died. I tried getting myself back out to sea, I sailed slowly for a long time. And it died more and more as the morning went on. Then it was dead.
Nothing, no wind. I sat there for a while, had some breakfast. Slowly the gentle swells carried me over to the town of Black Point. It encouraged me to go to shore and explore that town…
Nah!!! I got places to be. I cranked on the engine.
I was following down the coast of Great Guana Island, a long one with small dark hills edging my horizon. The sea had slowly become completely calm. The sun wasn’t shining today… which is a very rare thing out here. It was grey and overcast, reflecting the same strange darkness in the still ocean. Like I was in a complete haze above and below me.
I wasn’t going too much farther today and I just motored there. Easy, until I started approaching Little Farmer’s Cay. It seemed the wind was strengthening suddenly, and the current kicked up, pulling me faster to the small island.
I arrived in an interesting area, a shallow bay between Little Farmer and Great Guana Island. Just around the corner was Farmer’s Cut, a gap between the islands where you could cross out to the open ocean. I was planning to anchor here around some other sailboats.
I caught a glimpse of the cut as I made a u-turn around the bay. Little Farmer’s has a tiny town on it I would go and explore. As I came to my anchorage, the water became very shallow all of a sudden. There actually was only a narrow channel in this area between otherwise shallow water and sandbars.
The completely clear water became a light shade of turquoise at 4 feet of depth. I could see the bottom had ridges of sand that were a little too close to the surface for comfort. I went and dropped the anchor quickly before I continued further into these shallows. I used it to abruptly bring the boat to halt!
I was anchored now, but a little too close to this catamaran, and maybe a tad shallower than I would like. So I pulled the anchor, reversed the boat a short ways to slightly deeper water, and re-dropped the hook. Now I was happy. I was still around 5 feet of depth, and I honestly love anchoring in shallow places. It is calmer. Something about looking around at the bright water color and knowing you could stand next to the boat is very awesome.
…
I was settling in when I saw a boat crash into a sandbar and obviously got stuck. Ok well, that gives me something to do before going to shore! I got in the dingy and went to help them out.
It was a group of Canadians who had sailed their boat across the Atlantic from Spain. Now they were coming north from the Caribbean. They mentioned they had lots of experience with the boat, but this was their first time taking it in the shallow waters of the Bahamas. With a 6 and a half foot keel on this very large boat, they were completely aground in 5 feet of water. So we tried to get the boat unstuck.
I grabbed the halyard which is coming down from the top of the mast and pulled on it. I ran the dingy while holding the halyard, the idea was to tip the boat a little sideways so it would float off the bottom. That didn’t work. They got in their dingy and we tried pulling the boat off with a couple ropes. This also didn’t work. They were totally stuck. We also tried ramming the boat with the dingies while they motored in reverse. It looked like we would have to wait for the tide to come in.
It eventually did. Meanwhile, a bunch of other people showed up in their dingies to try and help. As the tide came in, the current got stronger and stronger. It started gently, but I noticed as I sat in the dingy I was drifting away. Before long the tide was like a river!
Now as I motored in the dingy I’d either be barely making headway into the current, or flying with it in the other direction. All the other dingies helping out were in the same situation, and it made for a chaotic scene as they were trying to coordinate ramming the big boat, or pushing against with their engines on full blast. You could see the keel where the boat was stuck just a few feet below. You could also see there was a reef and rocks not to far. Then as the water became deeper with the tide, the boat would slide sideways for a moment, before becoming stuck again.
Eventually the captain became sick of this and told the other people they could leave. I had been hanging out with them for a few hours now. He figured it was just a matter of time before the tide would solve this. Then finally another dingy came by. They rammed the boat at top speed and I watched as it became free from the bottom. The captain kind of yelled at them, he said ‘don’t bother it’s not helping!” Then I said to him, ‘I think you’re free!”
He scrambled and got the engine in reverse, and off they went. I was going to try and help them find a place to anchor. Then I watched curiously as they went out the harbor, then out the cut and back into the ocean…
Oh ok, bye! Well that was fun. I went back to Simplicity and relaxed a bit in the now fine weather and then went to shore.
On shore I docked at a little restaurant/bar with a gathering of boat people. I was trying to just walk passed them, but they were too curious of my story how I got here so I had to sit and have a beer with them. I then at some point met a drunk and outspoken English woman. She wanted to know my sailing plans to get to the Caribbean.
What happened was I told her I planned to go to Haiti. She was shocked by this and thought it a terrible idea. There’s this famous book, a cruising guide by Bruce VanSant called Passages South, it tells you VanSant’s opinion on the best way to get from Florida to the Caribbean. The route is called the Thorny Path, and I was traveling it here in the Exumas. Well Bruce VanSant says to take the north coast of Hispaniola, crossing from Turks and Caicos islands to the Dominican Republic. It doesn’t say anything about going to Haiti.
This lady was basically saying, just listen to VanSant, take the north coast route. The thing is, I had been feeling more and more that this would be a sketchy trip. The north coast is a rugged lee shore of cliffs and mountains, completely exposed to the raw Atlantic surf and wind. Although shorter than taking the south route around Haiti and the south coast DR, there are NO protected anchorages along the north side. I read another cruising guide online that said just this, which was already my assumption.
This other cruising guide instructed to take the south route around Haiti, where you would find more favorable winds, often calmer seas, and many different anchorages to shelter out bad weather.
My Dad agreed with me. It only made sense obviously to us that the south route would be calmer seas. We were still keeping our plans open, he was joining me for this final part of the trip, once I arrived at the southern edge of the Bahamas. We were leaning towards steering away from VanSant’s directions…
Well this rather belligerent English lady said Haiti was a dangerous and apparently horrible place. She became angry at me for planning to go there, saying something like it was people like me that she hated. Thinking I can just go to the third world for fun? Viewing these impoverished people like it was some kind of zoo? She wouldn’t hear my reasons why I planned to go, just telling me over and over listen to Bruce VanSant, or basically I’d be killed.
She didn’t seem to realize that I wasn’t going to Haiti for a pleasure cruise. I am really trying just to get through this whole trip and get to where I need to go. That is St. Thomas, and I believe the south coast route is considerably safer, political concerns aside… Either way I had a bad interaction with her, and she eventually said to me,
“If you go to Haiti, bad things will happen to you.”
The whole meeting left me very confused and upset as I walked away from her. To the point where I later emailed Bruce VanSant asking his personal opinion on the idea. He told me why he prefers the north route, but that the south route is a good option as well. He also gave me some directions if I was going to choose the south route.
“Watch out for the accelerated wrap around headwinds as you come to Cape Tiburon, when you first enter the Caribbean Sea.”
Also he told me, “due to piracy danger, do not anchor anywhere in Haiti, except for Ile au Vache.” which was already my plan.
That evening I walked all around the tiny island on the deserted beaches, feeling still shaken from the dilemma of my future. There’s no going back from here…
The sunset on Simplicity was a matrix of pink clouds, above the teal water which faded into the darkness.
….
In the morning I decided to take an adventure. The next important stop on my trip was a sailors mecca called Georgetown. A small town in the southern Bahamas, but a stop on all sailor’s journeys through this area. To get there from Little Farmer Key, I would have to leave the calm waters of the Exuma Banks, and head out into the bigger sea. This is called the Exuma Sound, and is notoriously rougher water on the opposite side of the island chain.
But that could wait for tomorrow!
There was a route through the next part of the islands I wanted to explore. It involves crossing some very shallow, very bright turquoise sand banks. It is a route only for small boats! This would take me to Lee Stocking Island, which has an actual mountain on it, the highest point in the Exuma Islands.
Always it is nerve wracking to pull the anchor when alone, no matter how many times I do it. I set myself in motion.
The islands passed as I ran with the motor this morning. Soon I was at Musha Key, which is owned by David Copperfield (who’s an ultra-rich celebrity I guess). It is the most expensive private island resort in the world.
And here I am hanging out in exclusive Copperfield Bay. Ha. It is highly illegal to go ashore though, and it’s sad to me. This is one of the most beautiful islands I’ve ever seen, with sandbars of all different shades of blue, turquoise and gold. Palm trees line the beach, and other parts of the rocky shore have deserted hills and sea cliffs of limestone with all sorts of awesome caves. No one is here, except a couple luxury mega-yachts anchored in the crystal bay. It’s a shame that it seems the Bahamians islands have MOSTLY been sold off by the government to the highest bidder, I’d say the majority of them are privately owned.
It gives me a sense of what people do with that kind of money. Live in their own little world, completely free of society’s confines. It must get lonely out here… I am doing the same thing as these billionaires though, in my own little floating home, and I’m nearly broke! But I personally can’t see the need to OWN these islands. This paradise should be shared, available for anyone who wants to go.
So from there I continued past beautiful Rudder Cut Key, where I saw a few people on a sailboat really enjoying life in that incredible place.
At Darby Island I was grabbed by the strong current where the banks met the sound. I flew along, but rather then crossing to the ocean here, I stuck to the shallow island route.
It was nerve wracking as the depth climbed up. I passed tiny islands staying in a narrow channel between the sandbars. Even in the channel it was only 4 or 5 feet deep. You could clearly see the edges beneath the brilliant turquoise water, where if you left the channel even slightly you would run aground.
But soon I had passed through that and came to one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. So many different shades of water, and the weather today was sublime. The islands dotted the landscape here and there, and I hoisted the sails to leisurely pass between.
Different currents affected me through the rest of the trip, but eventually I was there and saw the mountain at Lee Stocking Island. I took one wrong turn as I pulled in, and crossed a sandbar. Oh it was scary! As the water gets shallower, it gets lighter and lighter in turquoise hue. Then suddenly, at around 3 feet of depth, the water changes to yellow as you can see the sand beneath you like floating on air. The shadow of the boat became quite distinct on the bottom and I thought I’d crash, but Simplicity is so lovely and small that I sailed over it unaffected.
I dropped anchor in this serene place, in the calmest water behind Lee Stocking Island, and dived into the shimmering turquoise glass. I swam along the sea floor and checked the anchor like I always do. Then of course, I got in the dingy, went ashore and climbed the mountain!
What an awesome hike and view! There were a few other boats anchored here, mostly mega-yachts, but I saw no people ashore. Just a run-down ghost town and an abandoned air strip. The hike was exactly what I wanted, the view showcased the various colors of water around me, and all the islands in the distance.
Today, I thought, was among the most beautiful days of my life, if not the top #1.
I looked out to the Exuma Sound, the deep, vibrant blue ocean that carried out as far as the eye could see. I saw a tiny sailboat, bobbing in the huge waves. I watched it for a long time. I watched as it sailed into Adderly Cut to cross into the Exuma Banks. The ocean looked huge and the waves looked rough.
That would be my challenge for tomorrow. The only way out of here is through that cut and across that ocean- to Georgetown. Weather was coming in, the wind was predicted to switch to the north. But tomorrow should still be good. If I can’t make it out tomorrow though, I may be stuck on this lonely island paradise for 4 days, and only hope the weather improves after that.
I’ll wake up early and see what this journey has in store…
