Wednesday 16 Jan, BHS day 17, Eleuthera: Good findings in Governor’s Harbour settlement.
It’s a beautiful morning so we set off for the 5 mile leg to Governor’s Harbour. The wind is 10-12 kts in front of our port beam and we have a wonderful tranquil sail on the flat water, right next to the coast. It’s a great feeling to be slipping along at 7-8kts under sail. Feels like we motored everywhere recently.
There is only one yacht anchored in Governor’s Harbour. We drop the anchor next to it and pull back. Just as the pilots warn, it dragged. I dived to check it while Oana engaged reverse gear, but it still would not dig into the hardened sand. Luckily, the wind is very light so we decide to chance it as we go ashore.
With the dinghy anchored out and bow tied to some steps, we are ashore. It’s a very pleasant outlook into the bay. First stop is the public library where they do book swap. It’s a wonderful historic building (1897) right on the edge of the bay. A very well stocked library on the ground floor and a community computer room upstairs. Oana manages to find 11 books to swap and some of them are so thick they may even last her 2 days to read! The view out from the library over the turquoise palm lined bay has to be the best view any librarian could have.
From the library we wander inland to find the bakery. On the outside it just looks like a house but inside there is quite a huddle of people. We buy a few goodies at very cheap prices. Their beef patties are the best I’ve ever had. We walk the rest of the town, which is very small, in just a few minutes. It’s a bit shabby but the people are very friendly. After a short stop in the mini market, where the prices are surprisingly cheap, we head back to Cloudy Bay to deposit our books and food, then set off to the north of the bay, to what looks like a very nice resort.
The French Leave Resort used to be the dock for a much larger Club Med resort on the Atlantic coast side of the peninsula. But that resort was demolished by a hurricane in 1992 and now lies abandoned. So they seem to have created a small resort here instead. Once ashore we realise it’s deadly quiet. We doubt they have more than 3 or 4 guests. No one by any of the infinity pools and only 2 people in the terrace bar. The resort itself is very nicely done. Pristinely tidy and very modern. Just how do these places make their business work? The $500 per night could explain it. We take our photos and sit for a beer on the terrace. The waitress says it was busy at new year and will get busy again from February. Although it’s a very pleasant resort you have to wonder why they built it here, with no beach, when you consider all the lovely beaches down this coast.
Once back on Cloudy Bay we decide we will again move on. Another very pleasant 5 mile sail finds us in Pineapple Cays by 4:30pm. Three small limestone islands shelter a small bay with sandy bottom, beach and dinghy dock. We learn from comments on Active Captain that there is a pizzeria ashore that must not be missed. So as soon as we are anchored we are off in the dinghy to go find it before it gets dark.
And few meters away from Cloudy we spot a dark moving patch on the bottom of the sea. At closer inspection, it is a manta ray. Allthese times we have been scuba diving and never saw one, yet here it is now, welcoming us into this bay.
The so-called dinghy dock is a demolished jetty. So we have to do a beach landing and anchor the dinghy. A 10 minute walk inland finds us in front of a shabby building with a faded sign “Mate & Jennie’s Pizza”. Visually not nice, but we go in anyway. Maybe their pizzas are in fact special. Inside, the decor is no better than outside and a rather rude lady takes our order. We also order a locally made rum punch which really does have a punch!
We sit outside on hard broken chairs and our pizza duly arrives. It’s OK but certainly nothing special and we are surprised the price is the same as pizza was in the wonderful Dunmore Hotel – not cheap. Feeling a bit “done” we head back to the dinghy before it gets dark. And for the first time this season we get chased by mosquitoes. We fight them off to the dinghy then we race as fast as the outboard will go (that’s pretty fast!) back to Cloudy. Thankfully the mossies didn’t manage to keep up with us!
For the evening we barricade ourselves in (hatches open, mossy nets closed) and complete the Herrington Harbour video. At last! We will try to upload it to YouTube when we are in Cape Eleuthera Marina tomorrow.
