YachtAweigh: In the Bahamas! – Eleuthera – Rock Sound to Spanish Wells

Apr 3^rd – It was a hot and sunny day with moderate winds. We are in an anchorage in Rock Sound and plan to explore the area by foot today. We headed into town by dingy and walked around and checked out the market, liquor store, hardware store as well as other local stores. We stopped in at Sammy’s for Conch burgers and Kaliks (Bahamian beer) and Gerald and Barb (Hard Dock Café) dropped in by bike thus we had one more cold one with them. We were thinking about biking with them today however everything is starting to seize up on our bikes due to the exposure to salt water/air thus each bike needs TLC before they can be ridden. A job for another day. When we got back to the boat we rested from our long walk and did a few boat jobs to prepare for our move North tomorrow, however the winds are supposed to increase tonight which may hinder us from leaving our anchorage.

Apr 4^th – It was a hot sunny day with moderate winds. We left our Rock Sound anchorage and travelled 30 miles north to Governors Harbour Eleuthera and set an anchor. I believe Governors Harbour is the capital of Eleuthera. This anchorage has very poor holding which we experienced ourselves since we tried to set an anchor 3 times. On the 4^thattempt we went all the way up to the beach and dropped the anchor in sand. It seems to be holding thus I grabbed my snorkel stuff and checked out the anchor to ensure everything looked OK. The only issue is that we could blow into the beach if the wind reverses direction, however that’s not expected. We then went by dingy to town and walked around to check out the area and local stores. The markets weren’t as large as the one in Rock Sound and we didn’t feel as safe walking the streets as we did in Rock Sound. Afterwards we returned back to the boat to catch up on internet related stuff. Our Bahamas internet provider just texted us and is offering an unlimited data plan for a month for $35 … this seems pretty good thus we’ll have to look into it further to determine if we should purchase this for our last month in the Bahamas. While we sat on the boat we saw our first Bahama dolphins … it’s seems strange to us that you don’t see many birds or dolphins in the Bahamas … perhaps since the islands are so desert like?? The winds picked up in the early morning and we were rocking & rolling … I was worried about the anchor thus I got up a few times in the night to ensure we were still in the same spot.

Apr 5^th – It was a hot sunny day with moderate winds. We left our Governors Harbour anchorage with Hard Dock Café at 8am which was the required departure time to make it to Current cut at low tide. We hear it’s important to pass through this cut at either low or high tide otherwise the current is very strong. We travelled 46 miles to an anchorage in Royal Island Harbour. Once there I went snorkeling to cool off while Hard Dock Café went for a dingy run to Spanish Wells … we opted out since it was going to be a bumpy ride. It appears that the boats are going to be rocking and rolling again tonight due to the SE winds which will be changing to S. We plan to leave in the morning to Spanish Wells to stay in a marina … yes, you read this right … we are going to actually stay at a marina … it’s been a while since our last marina stay.

Apr 6^th – It was a hot sunny day with moderate winds. We left our Royal Island Harbour anchorage this morning to travel 7 miles to Spanish Wells to stay in a marina called Spanish Wells Yacht Haven. It’s a nice marina with a pool and excellent facilities plus the town is beautiful. When we arrived a 90 year old man named Edison stopped Maria and I while we were checking out the Marina and convinced us to get into his golf cart so he could give us a tour of the island. He made it quite clear that he wanted nothing in return for the tour. What an amazing fellow … he was born here and worked as a boat captain on boats up to 160 feet in length. After the tour he would not take any money for gas but he would accept a hug from Maria! We then went on a bike ride with Gerald and Barb into town to check out the area and stopped at a restaurant called Buddha’s for lunch. We then did some shopping at a local market and returned back to the marina to cool off in the pool. At the end of the day we headed to the marina restaurant for happy hour and ended up ordering pizza for dinner. There is a weather front coming in over night so we will be checking our lines and fenders to ensure that everything is secured properly.