Christmas at Warderick Wells Cay 12/23 - 12/26

We spent another couple of days at Highborne Cay but it was not super eventful with the high winds and storms. We headed on to Warderick Wells Cay on 12/23. It is our new favorite. It is one of about 20 Cays (pronounced keys-by the way) which make up the Exuma Land and Sea Park. It is basically like a National Park so there are extra rules like no fishing or taking anything off the islands. Because of this, there is a lot of pretty stuff to see. This cay had a huge open shallow area with sand bars and the water was awesome. Still kind of a cool wind going on, but otherwise perfect.

 

 

We walked on many trails and enjoyed visiting boo boo hill (supposed to be haunted :)) and to see blow holes too. The park warden has an office on this island and they have kayaks and stuff we got to use too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We checked in at the office on Christmas eve morning and it was the craziest thing. There was another family there at the office from Utah and we started chatting and about 5 minutes later another family walked in and when they overheard us talking, they said -we are mormons too, we are from Idaho! How strange was that to have us all out here in the same place. The park warden said that was pretty unusual. Both families are out here just for a couple of weeks for the holidays, but it was fun to meet new people and have some instant friends. Everyone we meet out in this life is so nice and friendly.

Christmas day was nice and relaxing, but definitely didn't feel a ton like Christmas. We had told Santa that he could have a break this year since we might be hard to find, so we just got a few family board games (travel size of course) for the kids that we had brought back from Utah, and we had homemade gifts for each other that we had drawn names for.  That turned out to be really cool. We all worked on our gifts a lot this past week and they included things like: artwork, poems and letters, coupons for service, shells, and simple crafts. It was really cool.

After those gifts, we went to the beach and met up with some other cruisers for yoga on the beach. Very cool. We played around in the water a little, the kids threw sand balls -since there weren't any snowballs around they had to improvise, and then we had a big Christmas dinner in the afternoon. Apparently, this park office warden does a big Christmas dinner every year at his home and all the cruisers sign up for potluck stuff and the warden provides ham and turkey. It was so nice to have a big yummy meal and it was really fun to visit with a big group of people from all over the place. It was a very unique Christmas that we will have great memories of.

 

 

 

We have really enjoyed this island. We have done a little snorkeling, playing on the beach, kayaking, and walking around to explore. Our inverter also broke, so yes some more boat stress, but otherwise we are ok. This is a pretty crazy life.  Everyday is filled with ups and downs. Some things are really challenging -the boat, the weather, trying to conserve water, food, power, etc, but then also getting to be in a really beautiful place and see amazing things is so cool.  It is a roller coaster.

Next stop is Staniel Cay.

Allen's Cay and Highborne Cay, Exumas 12/19-12/21

We have made it to paradise!  The past couple of days have been beautiful and we are so happy to be here. This is what we had in mind! The ride to the exumas went smooth and the water was so calm and glassy. It was also much more shallow, so the water was a beautiful turquoise color.
We got to Allen's Cay late afternoon and found a great anchorage tucked between three small islands- Allen's Cay, Leaf Cay, and SW Allen's cay.

These little islands are popular and known for the iguanas. There are tons that come running out to you when you bring your dinghy up to the beach. Apparently, everyone feeds them, so they come running out to meet you. It was pretty funny. There were tons of them.

12/20 We got up and the kids did school while Paul got himself hoisted up to the top of the mast (yes, Jack and I are really strong) to check on the antenna which is not working so well for our long range radio. The antenna is still not working, but Paul took some really cool pictures while he was up there.

After our school and work projects, we went to visit the iguanas. Then we took the dinghy to some reefs to snorkel and do the hooka diving. It was really pretty and we saw lots of coral and cool fish.

 

 

In the afternoon, we decided to take the boat over to Highborne Cay. We loved our spot at Allen's, but several more boats came into the anchorage and it was getting a little crowded. So we came to Highborne and that only took about 45 minutes. We anchored in a nice spot at the northwest end that is a little quieter. We then swam over to the beach here and walked around. It is very peaceful and beautiful here and we are feeling so grateful to be here.

12/21 After school work and cleaning we all went for a little swim for some exercise. It was getting pretty windy and the waves were getting bigger, so we couldn't go dinghy to the good snorkeling spots. We decided to move down to the southern part of highborne where it is more protected from the wind and bigger waves. Glad we did this. Just after we anchored this afternoon, the wind got really strong and it has been raining a little. It will probably be very windy and a little rainy for the next day or so. We might be doing some much needed inside boat cleaning projects tomorrow. We will see how the weather goes.

Nassau, Bahamas, 12/18

I don't know when I will be able to get a connection that will let me load pictures, so for now I guess this will just be like my journal and I will keep trying and add them in when I can.

We left Chub Cay early (4 am) on 12/18 so we would have time for some fun in Nassau. The sail went well and we got there around 11 am. We went through more super deep water like the gulf stream- the soundings said over 9000 ft. That is just crazy.
When we got to Nassau, we decided to splurge just a little for one day and stayed at the Atlantis Marina which let us use the Atlantis resort facilities -the aquarium and water park on Paradise Island. We thought that could kind of be a Christmas gift for the kids since we aren't really doing gifts this year. This year we have drawn names and are making homemade gifts for each other. Should be interesting. We are all having fun trying to come up with ideas for these gifts.

Atlantis is a beautiful resort and we loved the aquarium.  They had huge manta rays. The water park was fun too and it was nice to get off the boat and just play and relax.
That evening we took our last chance for a little while to do laundry and to take hot showers and that was nice.

We could have stayed in Nassau a few days because it is a big bustling city, but we decided to head out to the Exumas the next morning because some high winds and possible storms are heading here and this looked like the best day to cross over that last 30 miles. We took the chance to get some more groceries before we left too. Ouch, food is expensive here. But it will be much more expensive and we will have few options in the exumas. We have stocked up the boat pretty good though. We are eating mainly rice, pasta, soups, and cheap stuff, and then get limited amounts of milk, fruits/veggies, because they are pricy here. Milk was $4 for a half gallon here.  Too steep for us. Eggs were cheap though, so we bought a ton. It's ok, though, it is worth it to be out here having this experience. Next stop is the exumas and we are really excited!

Bird Cay and Chub Cay, Dec 16-17

I am having trouble getting any pictures to upload. I have a good internet connection, but for some reason it's not working. I will try again soon.

The latest: We were at West end for 2 days because of the generator issue but that is fixed now. yea! We seriously have had something break at least every day and I am not exaggerating.  Anyway, we left West End, Grand Bahama on Saturday morning and headed out. We were planning to go to Great Harbour Cay but our plan changed a few times in the course of our sail. We had great wind and were sailing fast, so we decided to keep going further southeast to Elethura. After a few hours the wind suddenly changed and we were going super slow because it was coming at us and was strong (12-16 knots) and didn't work for sailing. So we changed plans again and headed more south for a different route. We crossed the Northwest Providence channel south and went through the northwest channel. When we were going south, we were able to catch the winds great and sailed at 8-10 knots/hour.  That is fast for us. We sailed like that several hours -into the night making good time and were excited to be getting down closer to our southern destinations. After turning east through the channel we had to go much slower however, so we didn't get to anchor until we got to Bird Cay at about 5 am.  The sailing had gone well much of the time, but there were some stressful times and we were pretty exhausted.  This past week and a half of intense day and night sailing and multiple boat issues has been very challenging.  Everyday I feel totally out of my comfort zone and it has been hard.

Sunday morning we were ready for a much needed break. It turned out pretty nice. It was overcast and rainy occasionally but still a nice day. After we had our little family church meeting, we dinghied over to the little island of bird cay and walked around and explored it. It was pretty. Then the gang found some conch and we got excited about trying that out for dinner.  Paul and the kids put on the snorkel gear and had fun finding starfish and more conch.  We made fried chicken and fried conch for dinner and everyone even tried it. It was really fun. Paul, Jack, and I fixed the baton cap on the sail that had sheared off during the previous night's sail and we were feeling happy that nothing had broken yet on Sunday when suddenly one of our ceiling light fixtures just fell to the floor and shattered. No surprise sadly.

 

 

Monday morning we decided to go for a short ride to Chub Cay to check it out. It is really beautiful here. We anchored in front of a pretty beach and had a beautiful sunny day. This was a day that we needed! We snorkeled tons, jumped into the water from the boat, went in the dinghy to check out the island a little and were able to relax.  We saw starfish, stingrays, crabs, and some fish. The kids found lots of sand dollars and were so happy today. Our minds and spirits are feeling rejuvinated. It was nice to get some physical exercise swimming too because that hasn't been easy on the boat lately. We have some great cross fit exercises to do on the boat (thanks Will) but it is kind of hard to do them when we are out sailing- too rocking and rolling. They will work great for anchoring though. Anyway, it was a really much needed, lovely day!

 

Now the plan -if we don't change it multiple times- is to head to Nassau tomorrow. It is about 30 miles away so that will take us 5-7 hours depending on our luck with the wind.
I will try to get the pics to upload again from Nassau. I don't know what the deal is here.