Exuma Banks from Georgetown to Staniel

The locals are advertising St Patrick Day specials on the VHF radio, so it must be. We didn't exactly leave Georgetown as promised in the last report. We debated, talked to the weatherman, debated some more and then decided to wait for slightly better weather the next day. That didn't happen and Lee lamented about the bird in hand. So we had a few more beach sundowner parties and one last dance party with rake and scrape music. It's always intriguing to find out where the non-boaters at these gatherings come from. One large group flew in on two planes from their runway community in Texas. They were curious about the boating life and we marveled that they arrived from Texas that day at about 30 times our speed. It took them about two minutes to start dancing, with their teenaged daughter finally noticing and yelling "MOM!" in a scandalized voice. Another couple described taking an around-the-world cruise of 114 days and deciding to buy a house in Georgetown, the best place in the world. It must have been the fact that we were leaving the next day or else the beer, but we became incredible dancers on our last night there, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Rake and scrape, with a saw, wash tub, several guitars and drums, will get anyone dancing. I'm hoping we can find a CD to take home with us.

We headed north up the Exuma Chain of islands in Exuma Sound with 13 knots of wind on the nose and porpoised our way north for about six hours, heading into Adderly Cut to anchor near Lee Stocking Island. Once we got through the cut, it was peaceful banks water, seen above, a picture postcard setting with only our boat on the west side of Norman's Cay...except for the large barge and workboat (no picture included). We launched the dingy for our beach walk and noted other footprints on an otherwise uninhabited island. We tracked them for a mile or so and found four ocean kayaks, tents, beach kitchen, lounging people: more tourists off the beaten path. Seems you can get outfitted and kayak your way up the banks from Georgetown, who knew? In this uninhabited area, there are thousands of young Conch (Live) lying along the beach. It is said that in years past the whole Bahamas was covered with conch like this. The conch somehow migrate to deeper waters as they age, not sure how, we have never actually seen one move, we have seen trails left by them, but possibly only 50 feet per day may be their rate of travel, they are a huge snail like critter with one finger claw. Try a web search for "Queen Conch" for details.
In the interest of research, we decided to take the shallow banks route up the chain, rather than go back out into Exuma Sound. Another boat with our depth said they had done it several times. I marked the depth at each section from the guidebook and we left at high tide. It was still nervewracking with the depth sounder beeping and some concern that we might have to anchor and wait for the next high tide. Most of the tiny islands between Georgetown and Farmer's Cay are private and we've heard stories about over zealous caretakers who ward off cruisers. David Copperfield and country music stars are said to have enclaves on several of these islets. We didn't know where we could go ashore and had time/tide constraints, so we made no landfalls. But the pictures show what a paradise this area is.

So here we are at Little Farmer's with no damage to the bottom, ready to go out and eat corned beef and cabbage (not)! Later..an hour of walking took us to every corner of the island and we were ready for dinner at Ocean Cabin. Terry Bain, the proprietor, served us the most expensive dinner in memorable history, but it was worth it with his one-man comedy hour which followed, most of the jokes involving clergy. The rays were still eating the remains of our freshly caught dinner when we walked back down to the dock following dinner.

Lee's additions: Georgetown has a VHF marine radio net, 8AM every morning there is business, community and then general announcements. For my announcement, I advertised my lost Teva sandal, which fortunately floats, and it was found immediately, saved by another boat.

We have been motoring against the winds lately, which are at least moderate, but the sea motion is quite BAD, fuel use is worse than average at probably 1.2 gal/hour, as we need to use both engines to power against the wind and waves. Tomorrow (Sat) we intend to head for Rock Sound Eleuthera, light winds are predicted, but on the beam (side) which will provide a nicer ride, but will probably require a small amount of engine power added to the sails to do the 50 miles in daylight. Anytime the sails can be kept filled with wind, the ride is MUCH better, fuel use motorsailing is less, .5 Gal/Hour or less. Today (Fri)we are at Staniel Cay, we will be doing a circumnavigation of this small island by foot this morning. We bought a book about the history of the island written by a woman who came here with her husband in the early 70s. He disappeared from the narrative without another mention and we want to know the details. We will research that ashore today.

Above is the view over the shallow lagoon with the airport runway visible behind it, taken on our walk. We never solved the mystery of the missing husband. We stayed a few days longer than planned waiting for weather, but had dinner with friends on Salsa and had a calm ride to Eleuthera, so all was well.