Traveling North for the First Time in a Long Time

 We left the Chesapeake Bay back in November of 2022. We have been traveling mostly south ever since. Our visa for the Bahamas was a three month cruising permit that started on January 17th. It was now March 24th. We had plenty of time, but the weather had been bad for moving north. I had been watching a weather window with some comfortable Southeast wind that would be perfect for moving north. It arrived on March 24th as predicted. We decided to take the opportunity to get moving. We still had plenty of new places we wanted to see on the trip back north up the Exumas chain and then we wanted to spend some time in the Berry Islands before making our crossing back to Florida. 

The weather looked good when we got up, so it did not take long to get the main sail raised and lift the anchor. As always in the Exumas on a good weather day, we were not alone. Before long we were sailing in the company of a number of other boats. Some were power and some were sailboats, but all had the same idea, take advantage of the good weather, and make some miles. 

The wind was at a good angle as we left the anchorage at Black Point because we had to sail to the Northwest to clear Harvey Cay that sticks out to the west of the rest of the Exumas island chain. Once we cleared that we turned more north. At that point, the wind was almost directly behind us and about 8 knots. We were not in a big hurry, so I set us up with a wing on wing and we cruised along at about 4 knots. As the day went on, the wind got lighter, and we ended up motoring for an hour or two. It was a very chill day. 

We were looking for a good place to stop, and it looked like Hawksbill Cay in the Exumas Land and Sea Park was a good option. They have mooring balls there, so we pulled in and hooked up. It was a very nice place with a great beach. We got the dinghy down and went for a cruise. We went to the beach and found two very nice beach party spots all set up for a party, but no one there except the serving staff. There were two Super Yachts that were anchored off shore. We watched as they ferried supplies to shore for their guests. The crazy thing is their guests never came ashore to enjoy the food and drinks that had been prepared for them.  

We went on our way and did some snorkeling. We saw some huge fish, but you can't shoot them in the park, so we just enjoyed watching them. The night turned out calm and we rested well on the mooring ball. 

I will never get tired of this beautiful clear water. Easily the best thing in the Bahamas.

Kim on the beautiful beach. You can see the tents at the other end all set up for the party that did not happen.

That is the mooring field with just a few boats in it.

The only shot I have of one of the Super Yachts. Could you imagine spending over $100,000 per week to rent a boat? Crazy...

We ended up traveling 33 nm that first day. When we got up on the 25th, we decided to take advantage of another beautiful day and make some more miles north. We had pretty close to the same conditions for the morning, but the wind picked up and shifted more to the Southwest in the afternoon. We did not go as far on the 25th and stopped at Highborne Cay. There is an anchorage on the West side of the island, but with the wind shift it was pretty rough. I saw a good place to anchor on the north side of the island, so we decided to move over there. The chart showed that we had plenty of water, but at one point it got pretty shallow and we just touched the bottom. That was a bit unnerving, but the boat seemed to be fine. The good news is that SHIFT has a very well designed Keel and a very protected area for the prop. We motored on and took the long way around a second reef and dropped the hook on the north side of Highborne Cay. 

We had some more Wing on Wing sailing for this 20.1 nm trip up to Highborne Cay

Every day I take pictures of the water tying to show how clear it is. 

This is a shot of our anchorage at Highborne Cay.

Highborne Cay is private and you are not allowed to go ashore. The island, like most of the Exumas, is rough limestone rocks.

The wind died off in the evening and we had a nice calm night. 

We had another good night of sleep that second night. That was a good thing because we had a big day planned for our next day. It was now time to leave the Exumas and go to the most populated island in the Bahamas. I will write all about our long sail to New Providence the following day in my next entry.