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| Flotilla of four |
When we arrived at the anchorage at Joe’s Sound it was empty but over the next few days more boats arrived and a few departed. By this morning when we left there were about 12 boats counting our group of 4.
We arrived in Joe’s Sound last Thursday and all went in for a bit of a ‘happy hour’ on the beach at sunset. We had the place to ourselves.
Friday morning while ‘the guys’ went lobstering on the coral reef, ‘the girls’ (led by Leslie) headed off to explore the island. We cut through between a couple of uninhabited beach houses, hit the road and flagged down the first vehicle we saw and hitched a ride...all 4 of us (5 girls if you count Leslie’s little pug “Sadie”). s/v Dulcinea is the only boat in our group that is not Canadian...and Sherry being from Texas was a bit hesitant to get in a strange man’s vehicle (something none of us would ever do in Texas...or any other state) but our good Samaritan was a very nice older gentleman from Ottawa. He and his wife had taken up residence on Long Island and he was heading home...where we all piled out of his SUV and walked back to the crossroads (maybe a quarter mile) to the restaurant/bar and had a beer and shared some plantains before heading back the way came.
We flagged down another little van on the way back but it was already full of 3 guys and a lot of tools...so we covered the 2 or 3 miles on foot.
When we got back to the beach where our boats were anchored the guys were so busy lobstering they didn’t answer us on the radio and didn’t seem to see us until we walked way down the beach toward the reef they were snorkeling/hunting on. They had snagged 4 lobster...and Doug had a big one but he wiggled off the spear just as he was putting him in the dinghy. Doug went after him and chased him but he was quick and hid deep in a hole.
We all went out again in the afternoon – snorkeling and hunting for lobster but came up empty on the lobster, but spent several enjoyable hours watching all kinds of beautifully coloured fish swimming in and out of the crevices and holes in the reef...and I’m happy to report that my snorkeling is much improved but I’ll never be the ‘fish’ that Doug is.
Our happy hour on the beach that evening included appetizers - which of course included some of the day’s catch.
Saturday morning we were all excited to search for more lobster, but the long and short of it is the only one we caught was the poor lobster that escaped Doug the day before.
But the day wasn’t a total loss. For the first time I managed to haul myself back into the dinghy after snorkeling without assistance...a skill that had so far been eluding me...not that it was at all graceful...but I did it by myself. And there was another dinghy lesson. I managed to start the finicky outboard and then maneuver us back to the boat from the reef with absolutely zero finesse...but I’m sure that will come with practice.Happy hour turned into a pot luck dinner with still one lobster remaining from the day before and one
more big one (as well as other contributions from the group) we had quite a feast on the beach.
Sunday was a ‘work day’ as we were all heading for Rum Cay bright and early Monday morning. It’s amazing how quickly and completely things work their way out of stowage whenever we stop for a day or two...so the day was spent tidying, stowing, route/waypoint planning, preparing for docking in Rum Cay (rather than anchoring), hauling the outboard off the dinghy and tying the dinghy on the foredeck, and doing some general maintenance.
A number of ‘new’ boats had taken up residence in the anchorage. One was a boat from Lakeshore Yacht Club that we conversed with (on the VHF radio) as we were crossing the Great Bahama Banks just after landing in Bimini, so when we saw them on the beach we went in to finally have a face-to-face chat.
It was a fairly early night for everyone as “anchors up” at 7:00 AM means you are up by 6:00 AM to make that happen...and as planned we were all “anchors up” at 7:00 and on our way to Rum Cay.
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