Marsh Harbour - Laundry, Street Walking, and a Rum Incident Courtesy of SV Waddington

Man-O-War Cay to Marsh Harbour – 6 nautical miles sailed, 2 miles in dinghy, 6 kilometres walked

After a fantastic sleep to catch up from the bad one the previous night, we were up early and met the gang at the coffee shop in town shortly after 8. The climate had completely transformed, as the heavy winds and rain had been replaced by calm and sunshine - paradise restored.

We took our coffee in the outdoor garden seating area, along with many others who were there for their morning java jolt. We’ve found preciously few places like this in the Bahamas - small cafes where you can get a good coffee and hang out, so this was a real pleasure and we had a leisurely chat with our friends from SVs Domino and Waddington.

By 10 we were motoring out the bay and on our way to Marsh Harbour, a mere six miles away, and the third largest community in the Bahamas. The ride was pleasant and uneventful. We dropped anchor in the harbour, gathered up our laundry and trash, then took the dinghy into one of the two free public docks and walked up to the Bubbles laundromat.

Marsh Harbour is not the prettiest town as there’s no main town centre despite having a beautiful waterfront, and it just seems to be a series of treeless commercial streets. But it does have a few things cruisers love, namely:

Free dinghy dock

Free garbage disposal

Sidewalks

Laundry

Seaside bar

While we waited for the laundry we explored the nearby area and found a huge hardware store with loads of marine supplies, a few general stores, some ladies clothing stores, an RBC bank, and a restaurant. We met an American fellow at the laundry who runs a small sailing charter company with his partner and told us a bit about the local scene. We’re hoping to catch up with them for a sundowner soon to hear more about life in the Abacos.

After loading the freshly laundered clothing in the dinghy, we continued our explorations of Marsh Harbour. We walked past the several marinas and found a medium sized grocery store where we picked up a couple of things then walked back to Snappa’s, the bar and restaurant at the Conch Inn & Marina. Ana enjoyed an Arnold Palmer (and free refill) while I had a pint of local ale, both delicious, as we looked over the beautiful harbour and chatted with the bartenders as they kept very busy making drinks for the many customers.

We were back to the dinghy around five and stopped by Waddington to see if we could score a sundowner with Kate and Ben, which we did, and we rewarded with the strong end-of-day photons and a magnificent sunset. Ben poured me a rum and ginger ale, the house drink. Then another. Then another. And it was all going very well until I wobbled up at Mariner’s Midnight, rolled off the boat into the dinghy and held on for dear life as it slowly slipped out from beneath me, leaving me hanging from the boat rails with my arms while my feet grasped the slippery PVC. I managed to twinkle toe the dinghy back underneath me, but in the process lost my sunglasses to Neptune, who was hiding under the boat, waiting for an offering.

I was disciplined and vanquished to the bow seat as Ana took over motor control (my own motor control was lost) and put-put-putted our way back to SeaLight for a light dinner of eggs on toast followed by a fumey night in the v-berth.

Spanish Wells to Little Harbour, Abaco

Spanish Wells to Abaco – 50 nautical miles sailed, 2 miles in dinghy

We said goodbye to Eleuthera as we sailed cautiously into the Ridley Head Cut, through the Devil’s Backbone, and out into the open sea. The strong west winds of yesterday had shifted north and weakened substantially but large swells remained on the ocean, still full of power from the many hours of driving winds. Fortunately, the wave period was quite long so there was only occasional pounding through the closer waves as we motored north north-west directly into the slight wind.

Several hours later we were out of sight of land and in over 15,000 feet of water but not feeling alone as there were intermittent calls on the VHR radio and a number of large container boats and freighters, most likely on their way between Europe and the US. You learn quickly that there only real difference between ocean depths of hundreds and thousands of feet is a slight change in water colour. I spent a lot of time just looking out into the ocean but did not see a single flying fish or dolphin, and the fishing line that trailed behind our boat went ignored by the fishes. We did spot a balloon floating on the surface and went to retrieve it to practice our boat hooking skills, but were unable to because of the large swell and inability to do 360’s without tangling the fishing line, so we gave up reluctantly and let that balloon float its way down to Nassau.

We arrived in Little Harbour, Abaco after an 8.5 hour run and dropped the hook at an anchorage just north of Little Harbour itself as the entrance depths were far too shallow for our six foot keel. We immediately jumped in the dinghy to have a look around. The water here looked more green than blue but was still quite clear. We rounded the corner towards the entrance and saw many boats in the harbour, a few outside of it, and at least four other dinghies motoring around. Busy place.

The harbour itself was idyllic, bordered by rocky cliffs on one side and lowlands on the other. There were many private homes and docks here, with mooring balls lined up like soldiers throughout the bay, all occupied by boats, providing for a rather congested feel. We circled the bay, saw Pete’s Pub and Gallery (a local institution for cruisers), meandered through a small secondary bay, then returned to just outside of the harbour entrance and anchored the dinghy close to a sizeable coral reef.

I jumped in first to check it out and it was excellent – hundreds of fan corals, waving at each other, schools of blue fish, and brightly coloured coral, thick and stacked, hiding ocean creatures. Ana dropped into the water and we snorkelled around, both surprised at the quality of the reef considering its proximity to such a populated harbour. She spotted a huge sea turtle and we trailed behind it slowly. I then spotted a small shark, moving at high speed through the shallows of the coral, as if late for an appointment. I pointed it out to Ana and she shook her head then took off swimming at race pace back to the dinghy. She’s been spooked from her online reading about recent shark encounters in the Bahamas and beyond that have ended badly for the humans, so didn’t want to take any chances.

We returned to SeaLight, did a couple of minor boat jobs (rust removal, bbq removal, unclogging of toilet), decided not to go back in for happy hour at Pete’s Pub, then made ourselves leftover chili and cornbread and had a relaxing, quiet night at anchor, our first in the islands of the Abacos.