Day 150, Year 10: Cruising Again . . . Feels Fantastic
Date: Monday, March 9, 2015
Weather: Gorgeous Day-Sunny, Windy, and 80 degrees F
Location: Anchored on West Side of Normans Cay, Exumas
It feels fantastic to be cruising again. I know we live on a boat, but living on a boat and cruising in a boat in the islands are two different things. Mark just said, “This is the way you are supposed to feel at the end of a day-a little exhausted after a day filled with fun activities.” So what is that we did today that we love so much? We took a long walk on land, most of it along the beach with beautiful views. We explored some old ruins, watched the construction crews busy cleaning up and building who knows what, went back to our boats for lunch and rest, set off on a dinghy exploration of the north end of the island, and then came back to our boats to jump in the water and cool off. Perfect day. But this is the short story. Of course, I have a longer version for those of you interested.
Windbird and Sea Turtle both started the day with a dinghy ride to the beach. We drug our dinghies above the high tide line, tied them to trees on the far side of the beach, and then walked down to Normans Cay Beach Club. From the water all we could see were two white houses on the beach, two boats on moorings, and a dinghy on land to get to the boats out in the water. There’s a little more to it than that, but not much more. There is a restaurant called MacDuff’s Bar & Grill that is part of the ‘club’. We had read that a hamburger, great as it is supposed to be, costs $25. So we skipped that. Behind the Beach Club there is a paved airstrip completely surrounded by high chain link fence. We’ve seen lots of little island air strips and this is one of the nicest we have ever seen. We had asked at the Beach Club how to get to the far side of the island and a young man told us to walk to the end of air strip and follow the beach. So we did. The views were beautiful and it was interesting to see all of the construction going on. Normans Cay has very few people living here, no villages or settlements, no stores. It is basically an uninhabited island except for a couple of resorts and a sprinkling of private homes. But with all of the construction going on, something new is obviously coming. On the other side of the island, we marveled at the colors of the waters and explored the ruins of the once prosperous domain of Colombian drug runner, Carols Leder. In the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, Leder ran a cocaine smuggling operation from Normans Cay. Since the island was basically uninhabited except for the cruisers who anchored offshore, Normans made a great place for the smuggling operation. But then there were supposedly a number of murders involving cruising boaters who came too close the operation and eventually it was shut down by the “feds”. But what a beautiful location Leder chose for his operation called the Normans Cay Club. After walking back to our dinghies, we headed out to Sea Turtle and Windbird for lunch and a little rest time. Then Mark and I picked up Lynda and Lee and took them in our dinghy about three miles north of the anchorage to Galleon Point at the northern end of the island. I had read that the colors of the water between the point and Saddle Cay were quite remarkable, and we weren’t disappointed. It was truly breathtakingly beautiful reflecting shades of blue that that look almost surreal. It was a bit of a wet dinghy ride home, so we all decided to go to our respective boats and jump into this crystal clear water. We put our snorkel gear on so we could check the bottom of the boat and just generally enjoyed the warm water. Then it was off to Sea Turtle for happy hour with a couple from another boat anchored next to Lee and Lynda. We arrived at 5:30, but the other couple didn’t get there until 6:30. Philip and Johanne of Majestic Phoenix are from Montreal and they had no idea that the time had changed here on Sunday. It was a full day filled with fun. I think we’ll see if we can replicate the fun tomorrow. We will sail six miles south to the next little island, Shroud Cay, and continue our explorations there.
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| 150309 Day 150 Bahamas–Exploring Normans Cay |
