Iguana Island and delicious blue water

Monday 20 Jan, BHS day 21, Exumas: Grouper yesterday, mahi-mahi today.

At last we are in the Exumas, our planned destination in the Bahamas. It was a wonderfully peaceful night, anchored in just 3m of water in the north bay of Highbourne Cay. We wake to virtually no wind and a cloudless sky. A combination we haven’t had this season yet. But oh-boy is it ever hot. Even at breakfast we are already sweltering in the cockpit (apologies to anyone reading this from Newfoundland, where they just had a record snowfall!).

In these still conditions, the water surrounding us is the amazing sparkling blue, like you see in all google images of the Exumas. Before the light gets too intense we fly the drone. Lovely view from up there but the glare from this bright blue water doesn’t make for true colours on the camera. Next, a dinghy ride is in order. First we go to the very nice north Highbourne beach, but as our pilot says, it’s private, so we don’t land. We just take a few snaps of the clean beach and crystal shallow water.

Next, we go 1.5nm NW to Allen Cays, famous for its iguanas. Last night there were 12 or so anchor lights in the channel between Allen and Iguana Cays but most yachts have departed already, only 4 left. As soon as we are alongside the western Iguana island beach we immediately see many large Iguanas on the sand – no doubt waiting for the next batch of day-trippers from Nassau to feed them.
We land the dinghy and stroll among them taking photos. They seem very tame. Occasionally, one will do a fast waddle up to you, thinking you must have food, get within half a meter, then stop and just look at you. A bit disconcerting at being approached by an iguana like that. When we have seen the odd one or two in other Caribbean islands, they usually can’t get away from you fast enough. It really is a beautiful and naturally peaceful spot. The island, the blue water, the iguanas and bird song. We could be in the Galapagos!

We venture back to Cloudy Bay and decide what to do next. It’s damned hot now. 30degC inside the boat, and that feels cool compared to outside. Later today thunderstorms are forecast, with a northern wind. So we move on southwards to find a more sheltered place to anchor for tonight.

We take the outside route, meaning east, into the deep water of Exuma Sound. As we motor along the drop-off where shallow reef plummets to ocean depth, we put the fishing line out. As we go over the drop-off, we watch the depth rapidly increase and the moment the depth instrument shows “—“ (=too deep to read) the fishing line spools out , bzzzzzzz and almost immediately we see a colourful fish jump out the water about 100m behind us. As we reel it in we are very pleased to see it has the amazing bright blue and yellow colours of a mahi-mahi, our favorite fish. But just as it gets near to the boat, it gets itself free. And we are sad to see that it has somehow managed to remove the hook and lure from the line. Poor thing, it won’t last long with that in its mouth 🙁
I feel bad for it and was ready to call it a day, but Oana already had the taste of mahi-mahi and insisted we put another lure back on. What are the chances of catching another Mahi-Mahi? I say. But what do you know, that’s exactly what we did! Just 10 minutes later. And this one stayed hooked right till it was safely on the deck. Just like Turks & Caicos, these drop-off zones are clearly highly fertile fishing grounds.
With Mr. MM secured on deck, we get ourselves back into the islands and anchor behind Lobster Cay – a very small island elongated east -west, that will give us protection tonight. Once anchored, the fish is dealt with and soon packed in the fridge for the next two dinners. Then we hide from the heat till later in the afternoon.

At 3pm we take another dinghy ride, this time 1nm south to Exuma Sand Bar (go google it). It’s a pristine white sand bar that sticks out of the water at low tide. And the area around it is renowned to have the brightest blue water in all the Exumas. And not surprisingly we find several day-tripper boats from Nassau already in the vicinity.
Unfortunately, it’s almost high tide so the top of the sand bar is 30cm under water. But it doesn’t stop us taking a few photos. For one of the shots I leave Oana standing on the sand bar while I take snaps of her from a distance. She looks like she is standing in the middle of an open sea. I ask her what it’s worth for me to come back and get her and she replies “dinner”! So of course, I have to get her 🙂

On the way back to Cloudy Bay we see a large ray and also chase a medium sized shark…. but he’s much faster than us. We then see two guys free diving with spears. And realise we are going over some lovely reef. So once I’ve dropped Oana off I go back with the dinghy and have a quick snorkel over the reef while I hold onto the dinghy painter line. The reef is not bad, but far from the best we’ve seen.
Then I realise there are two rather large sharks (maybe 2m long) below me and they are steadily coming up to me. Should I scream like a girl and jump in the dinghy or should I brave it? We’ve had several people tell us sharks won’t bite unless you have fish on a spear, so I brave it. They come quite close, maybe 3m from me, circle around looking at me, then gradually descend again. I’m glad I was brave, it was a nice experience…. once my heart went back to normal. Funny, I’ve scuba dived with sharks before and not felt any anxiety. But somehow I feel much more vulnerable snorkeling. Why is that? Back at Cloudy Bay, Oana is not quite sure whether to believe my story or not. What? Me? Exaggerate? Surely not 🙂

Dinner, of course, is grilled mahi-mahi, which is just as delicious as anticipated. Much nicer than the grouper of yesterday. Then the clouds come over and lovely cool breeze comes in, replacing the heat. And soon after dark there is light rain. But nothing as aggressive as forecast. And no lightening, thankfully. At least, not up until this blog entry ends.