Saturday March 20th

We left Highborne Cay by 8:30AM to make our final stop in the Exuma Islands. Kinvara travelled apx. 3 miles to Allen’s Cay. This is a beautiful anchorage between 3 small islands, Allen’s Cay, SW Allen’s Cay, and Leaf Cay. When we arrived there were only 3 boats anchored there. Once our anchor was set we sat to relax and take in the beauty. It was a warm sunny day with little wind and very clear water. Within 30 minutes of anchoring we packed our dingy with grapes and lettuce and cameras to go to the beach to see the rock iguanas. They live on the smaller 2 islands and will come out of the bushes as your dingy comes close to the beach. We had Pretzel with us so we did not land. Dogs are not allowed ashore for obvious reasons. The pictures speak for themselves!!
We dingied to a smaller beach with fewer iguanas. Peter was able to get out of the boat and get some great pictures. While there we saw a small seaplane land, taxi into the harbor and pull right up onto the beach so the passengers did not getting out. Later in the day as we sat on Kinvara relaxing we saw “tourist boats” pull in, another larger seaplane land, and numerous large tenders from the mega yachts at Highborne Cay. By the late afternoon our quiet anchorage had 10 boats anchored for the night. There goes the neighborhood!!
Sunday March 21
Overnight the wind picked up and Kinvara rocked around fighting opposing winds and currents. Both of us did not sleep well. By the time 7:30AM came we decided to move on to Nassau and back to civilization. Our course was a straight path NW to the outskirts of Nassau Harbor. The sun was shining and winds blowing 15-20K. Our sails came out and we sailed a beam reach for about 2 hours going an average of 6K SOG with water depths of 20’. We had to cross an area called the Yellow Banks where the water depth falls to 12’ or so and there are numerous shallow coral heads. We were very happy that the sun continued to shine and the clouds disappeared. It gave us great visibility in the water. You have to keep watch ahead of you but you can’t miss those shallow coral heads. They are very black spots in the water so you just navigate around them. We pulled some sail in and turned the motor on to give us more ability to maneuver. We had not come this way south so it was a little exciting to pass through the scattered corals. This is the main route to the Exumas so everyone has to do the same. We made sure we crossed on a rising tide with good visibility. On the charts it says “This area navigated by VPR (visual piloting rules). That means you don’t set a course and auto pilot and leave it. You have to “read the water”, watch for hazards and hand steer around them. It actually sounds scarier than it is. The ICW was worse for navigating around shoaling. We have found that if you have the current guides, plan ahead, and mark your charts with notes that you will be fine. We used Captain Bob & ICW charts and calling Sea Tow along the way for local shoaling conditions on the ICW. For the Bahamas the Explorer Charts are the best along with Stephen Pavlidis guides to the Bahamas for background and tips on all the islands. Our GPS is a Navionics chip and it is not as detailed as we would have liked. Before each trip we have to go through the Explorer charts & guides to program in the waypoints for our route. There have been places on our GPS where there is no depth charted but it is shown on the Explorer charts. A lot of people have used Garmin GPS which uses the Explorer chart info for their Bahamas programs.
Once across the Yellow Banks we kept motor sailing. We had following seas of 6’ (waves coming from behind) and it was quite rolly! We made it into Nassau by 1PM, just after high tide, and pulled into our marina, the Nassau Harbor Club. Peter’s friend, Dr Ian Kelly, met us at 6:30 and took us to the “Fish Fry”. This is a series of small brightly painted & decorated buildings along the waterfront which serve Bahamain food with lots of loud music. It is a gathering place for locals and tourists, where you will experience lots of Bahamain culture and wait an hour to get get your food!! The rum punch is very good though!