Waiting for Craig

4 March 2019   Georgetown to Elizabeth Island, Exumas
After breakfast, we nipped into town to buy a few more provisions and top up our SIM card.  Back on the boat, we pulled up the anchor and motored down to Elizabeth Island, where we anchored at 23°30.29N 075°43.75W in 7 metres on good holding sand and weed.  We went snorkelling on a reef just outside the anchorage, picking up one of the four yellow moorings.  The snorkelling was pretty, but a little too shallow for us.

We headed to the south end of Elizabeth Island where we found another couple of moorings in the channel north of Guana Cay.  The tide was approaching low water and the snorkelling was good, but I would imagine that the tide rips through the channel at mid-tide.

Glassy Calm in Elizabeth Island

We had a quiet afternoon.  This is a lovely, quiet anchorage, with only three boats at anchor.  It’s only about a mile away from the crowded anchorages off Stocking Island, there’s good protection from the north-west through to east, so I don’t know why there’s nobody here.  

5 March 2019   Elizabeth Island, Exumas
There’s a front due to pass over us tomorrow, but today was nice and calm with a 5-10 knots south wind.  We waited until mid-morning to get better light and then motored a few miles south to Fowl Cay, where we anchored at 23°29.57N 075°42.41W in 3 metres on good holding sand and weed.  

We hopped in the dinghy and picked up one of the many snorkelling moorings.  It was nice snorkelling in depths from 1 to 4 metres with some nice soft corals.  It’s a very popular place to go snorkelling, so there weren’t that many fish.

After lunch, we motored back to Elizabeth Island and picked a nice sandy patch to drop our anchor ready to wait out the forecast strong winds tomorrow.

6 March 2019   Elizabeth Island, Exumas
The sea was glassy calm this morning, but the wind gradually picked up during the day as the front swept over us.  By mid-afternoon, we had 20 knot winds from the north occasionally gusting higher.  Despite the strong winds, there was very little rain and it turned out to be a nice sunny day.

Front Berth ready for Guests

I took advantage of the light winds in the morning to clean the hull.  We’ve picked up a lot of small barnacles somewhere along the way, so I spent an hour snorkelling down to scrape the little buggers off.  Craig and Kristen arrive on the 8th, so Glenys spent most of the day tidying up and clearing a couple of lockers for them to use in the front cabin.

Glenys advertised a few things on the morning cruiser’s net and by lunch time had sold her ukulele and 6 metres of Sunbrella.  In the evening, Ross from “Kohina” came over for a beer or two.

7 March 2019   Elizabeth Island, Exumas
We had a nice peaceful night – it’s a great anchorage in these strong north east winds.  Nick from “Opus” came over after lunch and bought our dive compressor, but had changed his mind about buying the rest of our dive gear.  We had a quiet day pottering about tidying up ready for our son’s arrival tomorrow.