Do We Stay or Do We Go

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May 30, 2023

Here we sit in a strong thunderstorm at Tilloo Cay. We’ve been wandering around the lower Abacos enjoying what we’ve seen but feeling a bit apprehensive. I think our minds are telling us we are about ready to go, but there are a few places still to visit that we have yet to.

This is the sort of view we have daily, or not. Much of the time now the waters are not quite this calm, or it is raining, or threatening to. Very unsettled weather. this was before the storm reached us. But, the clouds are and the scenes are beautiful.

However, there is this low pressure system in the South Atlantic off the coast of Florida up to Bermuda that appears to be hanging around for the foreseeable future. The forecasters can’t decide if it will turn into a tropical storm or not. The highest probability culprit is in the Gulf of Mexico right now but no one can agree if it will become a tropical storm or not. If it does, it is a week or maybe more out and for now, it is too early to tell for sure. We had planned to leave the Bahamas in about 2 weeks. Thus, do we stay or do we go?

Before we hightailed it back to the boat, we walked in 3 foot waters clear like this and had a few fish following us. And, we’d see star fish such as this guy. This sand bar is about two miles long.

Part of the challenge is where would the Tropical Storm go? It could come over the Bahamas, but then again, it could be on the Florida coast and bypass the Bahamas. I just don’t know how to read tropical weather but don’t really want to get into it if I can help it. No one is thinking hurricane but it could become a named storm with lots of rain and wind.

So, we are going to work our way towards Florida over the next week, seeing the missed spots from our trip east and south, keeping safe harbors in mind as we move that direction. It is possible we’ll cross earlier than the 14th (our planned crossing date) if we get that direction and there is a good weather window. So, what have we been seeing?

The Rest of Hope Town

We had a couple more days in Hope Town after my last post.

Meeting Great People

One afternoon I decided to clean the swim platform on the back of the boat. All the tannin in the Intracostal Waterway leaves our swim platform a dirty orange. I’m scrubbing away and a dinghy comes up and introduces the inhabitants, Jeff, Sarah and Tim. Jeff and Sarah own a Krogen which has just come into Hope Town. How fun! New playmates!

We get together for drinks the next day and really hit it off. Like minds and lots of common interests. Jeff and Sara own a flute repair sales company and Tim is a flutist and composer. As I worked for many years in a music store there was lots to talk about the industry.

It turns out it was also Jeff and Sarah’s wedding anniversary and ours was the next day! We agree that the 5 of us will go to dinner at the perhaps only pseudo fancy place on Elbow Cay (The Abaco Inn) the next evening.

Not an easy task as it turns out. We’d arranged for the restaurant to pick us up as it was too far to walk. They don’t show and they are not answering their phone. Finally, Jim and I catch a ride with Vernon in his slowest golf cart on the Cay, a 7th generation local who will take us to the restaurant. Then we’ll get the car to come pick up Jeff, Sarah and Tim.

I mentioned the Loyalists who came to the Caribbean after the US revolutionary War in my last post. Vernon’s ancestors were some of those folks. AND, he knew Myrtle the Aunt of my friend from the last post. We had lots to chat about in our very slow ride to dinner.

As we were on our way, we saw the Abaco Inn van heading the other direction. Jeff, Sarah and Tim arrived about 5 minutes behind us. The restaurant has a beautiful view of the crashing waves on the Atlantic and the food, and company were great.

We tried to sync with Vernon the next day to chat more about growing up on Elbow Cay and Myrtle but his store was very busy. Alas, this is my only memento of Vernon.

Sadly, I did not get a pic off Vernon. But, he has these little signed taped up around his store that give you a sense of him. This was on the case with produce in it.

Our Southern Most Stop

Our farthest south boat stop was at Little Harbour. It is on the Island of Great Abaco, not even half way down the island. When we went birding from Marsh Harbour, we were much farther south on Great Abaco Island. It has a very protected, small harbour close to the ocean and the famed Pete’s Pub. The harbour also has skinny water entering, only about 4 feet at low water and thus, we have to enter at high tide with our 5 foot draft to give us an extra foot under the keel.

It does not look that skinny, but there is a small piece of water that is just deep enough. The rest shallows out into limestone edging through the entrance.

We arrived around 3 PM, got the dinghy down and headed to shore to visit Petes.

The bar at Petes. It turns out visiting the Bahamas is about snorkeling, shelling, swimming and visiting bars. everyone seems to have a special rum punch. They all taste the same and are a bit too sweet. But, Sands Light Beer is pretty tasty.
They did have live music on the beach. The bad was decent. You can see one person in the water to the right and I notice in the far distance on the left is Rincon. Beyond Petes, there is no business in Little Habour as far as we can tell except for vacation rentals.
The guys who owns Petes is also a bronze sculptur who does casting on site. Sadly, the foundry was not open when we were there. Notice the bronze sword fish on the wall, one of his pieces outside the gallery. He is quite accomplished but a bit pricey. The architecture of the gallery has a stong Spanish influence to it.

We met a couple on a small trimaran who had also just arrived and struck up a conversation. Turns out they are from Park City, UT. We have crossed paths with quite a few boaters from Colorado and inner Texas locals. And everyone thinks it’s just coastal people who boat! Their boat is tight quarters and as Catherine likes to say, it is camping. I think she really enjoyed visiting Rincon Feliz and seeing all the amenities and space we have.

Waiting for High Tide

As I’m mentioned we needed high tide to get in and out of Little Harbour, we puffed up the paddle board (I’d yet to use it on this trip!!!) and I paddled around Little Harbour harbour. As with all my other water skills, I am not a great paddle boarder. It was a bit breezy but I managed to make it to shore where I was more protected.

There were some nice caves opposite Petes. Apparently Pete and his family lived in one of the caves when they first arrived in Little Harbour by sail boat many years ago.
It was so pretty over in this non-windy corner of the harbour. About 3 – 4 feet deep.

On to Snake Cay

The winds would be changing direction to out of the west and thus, a stop at Snake Cay seemed good. Not often visited but I wanted to do the mangrove ride in the dinghy. The weather was rather unsettled when we arrived with funny swell coming across the Sea of Abaco. We were not sure we were going to be very happy, but it settled. Yeah!

Rincon at Snake Cay. More of those clouds that are a part of our every day now.

The next day, we had to wait until mid-tide which was about 1 PM to begin our mangrove journey as apparently it is shallow, even for a dinghy. There are times when having the clouds is nice as it was much cooler.

There were some wind driven waves bacy in the mangroves. Pretty rocks back here with palms on the higher ground.
When you got back into the mangrove snickleways, it was calm and we saw lots of turtles and small fish. They love the mangroves.
Sadly, the fisherman love the mangroves and back areas as well and their line gets snagged on the mangroves.
We found this turtle tangled in the line from the above stick. Sadly, we were not able to save him as he was already dead. But, we did cut all the line off the stick and have disposed of it in our garbage. It was so sad to see this as we’d heard about turtles getting tangled in lines back at Jekyll Island when we visited the turtle rescue.

We woke this morning to total calm. Finally in pure clear water 12 feet where we could see our anchor. Crazy!

Ideally one does not want to see your chain crossed back over itself as we do in this pic. But, not much wind and we just turned around as the wind direction changed. We were in 12 feet of water.

Moving a Whole 3 Nautical Miles

We pulled anchor and moved across the Sea of Abaco directly east to Tilloo Pond. We’ve yet to visit the pond… more thunder, lightening and rain, but did make it down to the Tilloo Bank. This is a cool spot. 3 – 6 feet deep, pure sand that is about 2 miles long protruding into the Sea of Abaco.

Motoring across the giant sand bar in 3 – 6 feet of water. That gorgeous turquoise water!
The storm was just starting th build across the way where we’d been the day before at Snake Cay. We did not get enough time at Tilloo but the weather did not cooperate and was not going to for multiple days int the future for more exploring here.

We hope to spend a bit more time on the Tilloo Bank then tomorrow then head north a few miles and anchor off Man-o-War Cay for a visit back to civilization. We are closely watching the weather preparing to make a mad dash if needed.

To close out, back at Snake Cay. The clouds were awfully pretty and the seas were calming. Yeah!
And one more cloud pic from Snake Cay. One has to love the clouds even when they make you nervous. Unlike in New Mexico where I KNOW how to read the weather, here, one minute the winds are out of the west but the clouds are coming out of the east and bam, you are in a rain storm. The weather is all around you and very hard to read (at least for me). I guess because we are currently between several “competing” lows to the east and west, being stuck in the middle gives us all of it. Whew!