2017 Life Logs, Day 120: Great Guana Cay to Elbow Cay
Date: Sunday, April 30, 2017
Weather: Mostly Sunny; Strong Trade Winds E 20-22
Location: On a Mooring in Hope Town, Elbow Cay, Bahamas
Today was a sailing morning . . . tacking down the Sea of Abaco to Hope Town. The afternoon was spent ashore exploring on land in the most picturesque Hope Town. I’ll get to the description of Hope Town, but first I’ll go back to the morning. We had a delightful sail most of the way and then had to motor sail the last bit. We still have strong easterly trade winds blowing, and due to wind and current, if we had gone in a direct line from Fishers Bay on Great Guana Cay to Hope Town on Elbow Cay, we were going to have to motor. So, Sam and Dawn decided that they would set a course to sail by tacking our way there. Doing this doubled our mileage but was probably as fast as motoring into winds and current. We didn’t arrive before high tide, but we did get to the entrance to Hope Town just after high tide and had no problem with the shallow entry. As you head toward the channel leading into Hope Town Harbor, the candy-striped lighthouse built in 1863 greets you. It is still lit by a kerosene-powered mantle that fuels the rotating fresnel lens. You can visit the lighthouse from 9 to 6 on any day but Sunday. We didn’t know that and when we went there to see the sunset, the grounds were closed. So, we’ll go back tomorrow morning before our noon time departure for Marsh Harbor on Great Abaco Island. We need to leave here at high tide as there are 5 and 6 foot spots to transit. Today, coming in just after high tide, we saw nothing lower than 7 foot 3 inches. That gives Windbird a foot to spare. So, we will try for a successful repeat of today’s entry on our way out tomorrow.
There is no room to anchor in the harbor here, so we picked up a mooring ball. We no sooner anchored than Dawn served a lunch incorporating various left overs. There was taco salad, kabobs, and grouper and rice and beans from last night’s dinner at Nipper’s. Fat and happy, we dinghied to the Lower Town Dock. Sam took Piper for a walk and returned her to Windbird while Dawn and I walked the “road” to the Upper Town Dock to meet Sam. I put “road” in quotes as it is just a double-wide sidewalk serving walkers and golf carts. And since almost everything in Hope Town is closed on Sunday, we basically had the sidewalk to ourselves. There are little shops, bed and breakfast type places to stay, a couple of restaurants, and a sprinkling of private homes. Each and every one is painted in sherbet colors of pink, yellow, blue, orange, and white. Everything is crisp and clean and multi-colored flowers from Bougainvillea bushes drip over the edge of every fence. Sam joined us at the Upper Town Dock and we kept walking. We had read that there are pink sand beaches on the ocean side of town and we wanted to compare them to the ones we saw on Eleuthera. Ever since Dawn and I saw the pink sand ornaments and bowls on the Eleuthera island tour, we have both wanted to try to make some of the things ourselves. I did collect a gallon bag of sand, but today Dawn brought three bags to collect some for her projects. The beach we found on the ocean side of Hope Town did not disappoint. It was immediately pinker than the Eleuthera beaches, so we bagged it up. That meant we had to carry it in our backpacks the rest of the afternoon, but ‘crafty’ women don’t let a little weight stop them. We continued walking the beach and Sam noticed a bar on the hill above the beach that was open. As we walked up the hill, Dawn and I stopped to take photos of hedge with beautiful red seed pods. I’d never seen this tropical treasure before and would love to know what it is. And while we were admiring the local flora, Sam went ahead and was shooting baskets with a kid at the Hope Town School. Finally, we found the Reef Bar & Grill at the Harbor Town Harbor Lodge. We enjoyed a cool drink while soaking in the beautiful ocean view and talking to a particularly ‘lively’ cruiser who bought his catamaran in France and sailed it to the Caribbean and on to Florida. He now spends his winters in the Bahamas, sails the boat back to Florida and then summers in West Dennis on the Cape. On the way back to the dock, we discovered that there is an upper “road” and a lower “road”, so we walked to the end of the lower and return on the upper making a stop at Munchies to pick up some conch salad for dinner. We went back to the boat to drop off the heavy sand-laden bags and took our sundowners in the dinghy to go visit the lighthouse. As I said previous, that didn’t work out, but on the way home we stopped to talk to some cruisers from North Dakota and Punta Gorda, Florida. Mike on Fair Winds, the Lord Nelson from Punta Gorda, also flies small planes and has a brother who is a commercial airline pilot, so Sam and Dawn enjoyed talking to him. We ended the day with grilled steak for dinner and are spending a quiet evening reading, writing, and making plans for tomorrow.
Almost forgot to mention dinner at Nipper’s on Great Guana Cay last night. We all had grouper and it was great. Nice spot with beautiful ocean views. I’ll post photos when I get home.
