Our Last Tropical Hurrah!

We had an uneventful sail to Eleuthera with Bear following a few miles behind. We had a reservation at the Cape Eleuthera Marina and had a busy afternoon – once we’d had a late lunch and some sweet treats. Air conditioning and wi-fi in the laundry room as well as Margaret’s company made that chore enjoyable. While Alison and I were in the laundry room, Jeff and Cameron went on a snorkel and came back with stories about an affectionate nurse shark that seemed to want to give Jeff a hug. The next day the 6 of us got in the rental car and, and once we received an extension on our visas, did some sightseeing (including finding an ice cream parlor with an amazing selection of vanilla, vanilla and vanilla ice cream – it was cold, creamy and delicious nonetheless), provisioning, and tried in vain to find some of the caves mentioned in our guide books! Oh well! In the late afternoon while Kathleen did more laundry and Austin did chores on the boat, Jeff, Margaret, Cameron and Alison tried make it to the southern tip of Eleuthera to see a lighthouse but the road called for a skinner vehicle. They did see some interesting beaches and a ton of red land crabs. That night was our last night with Jeff and Margaret and we met them in the restaurant and after our meal had a rousing 6 person multiple solitaire tournament. It was a great way to end our cruising time together. The next day we said our final goodbyes and we were all a bit melancholy the rest of the day! We will miss them!

So, the really bad thing about Eleuthera was it was plagued with no-see-ums. The started to attack around 6pm until late in the evening and then started again at 6am. Not sure it would have made a difference but the first night we didn’t get our bug screens up early enough and they got into the boat. Three nights later, Kathleen and Alison looked like they had the chicken pox. The itching was so bad that we ended up taking Prednisone. Anyway, we had planned to explore the island for the better part of a week but instead, had three long sails to just a few anchorages and stayed as far from land as we thought possible to avoid more no-see-ums.

One of the really fun thing at two of the anchorages was, during our snorkels, we were followed by small fish that continually swam by our masks and said hello. The first day there was only one and Alison named him “little guy”. The next day there were three. They were only 1 to 1 ½ inches and it was so strange to have them so close and interactive. The weather looked good for our crossing to the Abacos so we left on Sunday (Mother’s Day).

A 50 mile sail in unusual wave patterns and a close hello with a 1,000ft cargo vessel – Kathleen decided that was not the way she wanted to celebrate Mother’s day so we “postponed” our celebration until Monday.

We had a lovely celebration lunch at a place called Pete’s Pub – Pete is an artist who works making bronze sculpture using a 5000 year old wax process. The pieces that we saw were amazing! Our plans for the next day were nixed when the winds piped up in the 20-25 knot range so we missed our planned snorkel although the kids passed the time jumping off of Pegasus into the water.

That night we had a really good natural light show!

The next day we arrived in Marsh Harbour. Kathleen truly appreciated the large grocery store and we found real ice-cream shops with a variety of flavors!! We thought we had a good weather window to leave so as a last hurrah we signed up to try an introductory scuba dive (Austin and Kathleen did dive in the Pacific many years ago but since it was 15+ years ago it was worth starting over). It was a great experience. That afternoon in checking the weather again, our window had closed. So, we have spent many days exploring some of the anchorages and twice went out to the reef where we dove to do some snorkeling. We have seen some amazing fish (and oceanic trigger fish and multiple purple and green and orange rainbow parrot fish (@2 feet long) and Cameron was able to follow (or is that chase) a reef shark and get some amazing underwater video.

We are all sad that our snorkeling adventures will be over soon.

We have been consoling ourselves with afternoons at Grabber Beach Bar! As of this post, we are planning to leave the Bahamas on Sunday (5/26) bound for Beaufort, North Carolina. Happy Memorial Day!