Wednesday 29 Jan, BHS day 30: From Compass Cay to Bell Island (via Staniel Cay, for fuel and food top-up).

Our mission today is to a) get out from this tide locked anchorage at Compass Cay b) buy petrol and fruit and veg at Staniel Cay, then c) get back as far north as we can before dark and be anchored with protection from a small weather system that will pass tonight.

The day starts as it ends, with the clearest blue skies and gentlest of breezes we have had yet. A perfect Bahamian day. The high tide is at 10am so after breakfast I go and survey the depths for our intended route out of this anchorage to the deep water. Rather than going the long way around, same as we entered, I have a hunch we can get directly out… just. I wouldn’t dream of taking Cloudy through this shallow area just on chart data, but with the mobile depth sounder in the dinghy and my recorded track on the iPad, we have confidence to try it.
At 9:30 we are on our way, easing through my surveyed channel. Shallowest we see is 2.6m, so it was another “only just made it” moment. And we joke that 8ft draft is just fine to cruise the Bahamas, but 8.5ft would be a problem 🙂
Once safely in the deep water we round the headland and anchor in that marvelous bay with the pristine beach which we walked on yesterday. Being on the exposed east coast, we are the only yacht there. The view from the drone, with us anchored next to the beach, is awesome.

Half an hour later, pics taken, we are on our way south to Staniel Cay, which is pretty much the only Cay in Exumas, outside of Georgetown, where you can buy anything. We try sailing and our speed ranges between 3 and 5kts. A very gentle sail. As we are sailing over the drop-off, where the coral depths quickly plunge into hundreds of meters depth, we try fishing. Last attempt was very prolific with 2 fish in 5 minutes. But today, nothing.

As we enter Staniel Cay we have a bit of a drama. Remember yesterday I warned myself, with regards to these shallow depths, that our new confidence must not turn to complacency. Well, it kind of did 🙁
I aim to anchor in the outer bay. It will be a longer dinghy ride to Staniel but a much simpler place to anchor. As we come in, my eyes are glued to the iPad using sonar charts and Oana is watching the depth. For some reason I allow Cloudy to slightly cut a corner when suddenly “BANG”, we hit the top of a coral head quite hard, then bounce over it. I’m furious with myself because even though we are heading into the morning sun, if either of us had simply been looking where we were going, the colour of the water clearly showed the reef. And of course, all the boats in the anchorage appear to have seen us hit because they are all looking at us! Ever wished the cockpit floor would open up and swallow you?!

As soon as the anchor is in, I’m over the side inspecting the keel. Luckily, it only seems to have hit right on the bottom, not the front. But the gouging is pretty harsh. There are small coils of lead jutting out, like someone had run a sharp chisel over it. Cleaning that up will take more than a bit of wet’n’dry sandpaper! More like a grinder. Inside, we thankfully don’t appear to be taking on water. So it seems we were lucky this time. Again, by the skin of our teeth. I remain inwardly mad with myself for several hours, despite Oana’s comforting.

Our first stop is Staniel Yacht Club to get fuel for outboard. Price is $4.60 a gallon. By all standards, these islands are very expensive, but fuel is still cheaper than Europe!
Then we try the “yellow” store for fruit and veg. But they pretty much have nothing 🙁 Apparently, a delivery boat arrives today, but that food won’t be on the shelves till tomorrow. Hmmm not good timing on our part. We also try the “pink” and then the expensive “blue” convenience stores. Same story. Nothing fresh left on the shelves. But we do manage to buy 12 eggs, a small packet of processed ham, 2 packets of biscuits and 4 limes, all for the grand sum of $32! Certainly would not like to do big provisioning here. It would definetly bust our budget.

As we walk back through the yacht club, we are quite taken with it and decide to have a drink at the bar. A beer turns into beers and a club sandwich, which all went down very well. This is our first civilized eating out for two weeks, since we left Spanish Wells. I think that’s a record for us since crossing the Atlantic. Even mid afternoon the bar is quite lively. We imagine the evening scene would be even better. We’ll have to come back here.
But today, it’s time to leave. We retrieve the dinghy from the cutest dinghy harbour we have ever seen, and zip back off to Cloudy. Within a minute of lifting the dinghy, the anchor is up and we are off, back out to the deeper water, giving that nasty little coral reef a wide berth this time!

There is no wind so we motor along the drop-off zone with fishing line out hoping to catch dinner. Meanwhile, Oana catches some sun rays on the aft deck. We are about half way back when I suddenly spot a whale. Oana jumps up and starts to film immediately, she is only wearing the camera and that seems to work! The whale’s next breath is taken just a boat length away. Wow, what a spectacle (the whale that is… I see Oana like that all the time 🙂 At one point it even shows us it’s whole tail when it dives down. We spend the next half hour trying to guess where it will next pop up. But each time it does, it is several hundred metres away. There may be even more than one whale out there. We really don’t know what type it is, but I think it’s a humpback. Eventually, we give up and carry on our way. But what a lovely experience on this beautifully gentle day.

We decide to anchor for the night to the east of Bell Island, where we did “follow me” with the drone a couple of nights ago, and where Pete Goss has anchored. We edge our way in on a dead low tide and anchor in 2.8m over pure white sand. I don’t really need to dive in to know the anchor is well in. But I just can’t resist it in this crystal clear water. It’s such a pleasure being able to clearly see the whole hull and beyond from where the anchor landed.

Before sunset we fly the drone trying to capture some of the early evening light. But we are not very successful other than breaking the peace of the anchorage with the buzzzing sound.

The last few days we really can not get enough of capturing all these beautiful colours, scenery and wild life. The downside is having to sort out and edit all the photos and videos. It take us all evening to only partially process the data from just the last day or two. Maybe we are getting into that mode again where the cameras are running our lives. We need to throttle back again or it will do our heads in again, like it did this time last year when we abruptly stopped video editing.

Tonight a wind should come, with some rain. But we hope to get back further north tomorrow to meet with Pete and Tracy. Fingers crossed the forecast is right.