Honey Moon Harbour

     We were anxious to leave Bimini to see the wreck "The Sapona" which has become a coral and fish reef.  The plan was to snorkel around it, then cruise on down to Honeymoon Harbor to anchor for the night and thus stage our departure for 75 mile trip across the Bahamas Bank to Chub Cay.
                                                                                 

                                                                  Leaving Bimini 


     Lucky One left before us and by the time we got there Linda, Huen and Lucky were beside the Sapona and getting ready to enter the water. The currents around the wreck seemed moderate but  were obviously too strong for a poor swimmer, like me and Beth still coughing from her upper respiratory infection couldn't snorkel, so we watched.
                                                                             

                                                 "The Sapona" (Linda, Huen and Lucky in dingy).

    Linda being the adventurous soul that she is, put on her full face mask snorkel and dropped off the side of the dingy to swim toward the rusting wreck.....excited, 70 lb Lucky jumped in on top of her! Yes, we thought she was going to drown but she and Huen managed to pull him back on the dingy. She did get to go over and view the wreck and told us about the beautiful colored fish swimming around and in and out of the holes in the wreck.

                                                                                
     The locals run snorkel tours to this spot and have a much safer way of getting people in the water. They put a bow and stern anchor out so that people can hold on to a solid line while viewing or getting back to the swim platform to re-board.
                                                                                 

   
 A leisurely ride got us into Honeymoon Harbour.  This is an idyllic spot on Gun Cay which is protected from a south and east wind by low bars that are visible at low tide.  We anchored in beautiful shades of blue water and white sand.  A cool breeze kept the temperature comfortable even after soaking in the buoyant clear salt water.
                                                                                 

   
      Serene setting, warm sun, cool breeze , easily floating on the top water I felt relaxed....when Beth calmly said,  "Ralph, look around you in the water."  I thought she was directing my attention to another star fish or coral head.....but no....I saw several triangular dark objects floating toward me.  They were about one to two feet across... and then I saw it.....it was huge! ... black in color, triangular shaped and at least 4 to 5 feet across...and racing directly toward me!  Crap! It was the biggest sting ray I had ever see....and it looked hungry.....It is possible for a guy to turn blue water white and guess what....this made all the stingrays come faster.  It turns out that this area has been a popular place for many years to come and feed the stingrays.  We watched as children on the shore slapped the water to get the rays attention, than feed them fish.

                                                                               

   
    I'm two for two in picking rolls spots to anchor.   Even though this is a fairly well protected anchorage from the winds, the flood tide caused the water to curl around through the entrance  and roll us from beam to beam all night long.  There was a 100 foot motor yacht anchored directly in the path that had to move because of the rolling.                                                                           
     Spencer, Sophie and Lucky enjoyed chasing each other on the beach.  I think Sophie has a crush on Lucky from the way she teases him and maybe Spencer is just a little bit jealous, but they all seemed to have fun .
    Beth blew up her new paddle board and is trying to get enough balance to stand up on it.  "No problem. Let me try it", I joked as I kneeled on the board and paddled out to a little deeper water.
    Immediately, my audience saw me splash awkwardly into the water when I attempted to stand...cruel little brats! Linda didn't last much longer.

                                                                           

   

Cat Cay to Bimini

     We left Dania Beach Marina at daylight and slowly made our way out the shipping channel (Port Everglades) at Fort Lauderdale.  Rocky -rolly with all the fishing boats, cruisers and Cruise Liners leaving but once we cleared the entrance marker, not too bad.  There were swells coming from the north and a 10 knot wind on our nose but the Betsy handled it well enough to push the speed up to 16 knots and though somewhat choppy, even Spencer and Sophie settled in and seemed to enjoy the fresh breeze coming through the open side doors.
                                                                                 

     Two and a half hours into the crossing I looked down at the helm gauges and watched the pressure on my starboard transmission jump up to over 350 psi, jump around and stay high (occasionally locked hard over!) The port transmission was running at 250psi.  Crap....I immediately cut back the throttles to run at 9 knots with minimal change in the transmission pressures.  So!.....down in the engine room I go, while Beth took the helm....little did she know she would be at the helm for much more than "just a minute".  I could see nothing amiss and the infrared temperature gun read 134 degrees on both transmissions. Needless to say I was worried about blowing a transmission hose or seals in the transmission, so we shut down the stbd motor and ran on one engine until we could get some place where we could work on the problem.
     Nauseated and dizzy from rolling around in the engine room and trying to get our navigation system functioning so that Beth could avoid the container ships traveling across in front of us in the shipping lane, I had to lie down.  Waves of dizziness and nausea swept over my profusely sweating face as Sophie tried to help by licking my cheek.  When the nausea started to pass I would go back up to the helm to help a very nervous Admiral.
      Running on one engine caused us to be out in the gulf stream an hour longer but we made it into Cat Cay, tied up at the fuel dock, gathered all the paperwork Beth had painstakingly prepared and rode in a golf cart with the Dock Master to the Customs and Immigration to get cleared in.  $440.00 lighter  including cruising/fishing permit and "tips", ( but still nauseated) we anchored out just west of the flight path for the air landing field and waited for "Lucky One" to clear and anchor nearby.
                                                                           

                                                                                  

                                                                               

                                               Quarantine Flag until we clear customs



                                                                                 

                                                                    Bahamas Flag  
                                                                                         

                                                            Anchored off Cat Cay
                                                                                  

                                            Captain Ralph in the water with starfish.                                                                             
          

   




     They had mechanical problems as well with water and oil leaks from the starboard engine.  Huen has attempted repairs on these and had two different mechanics assure him "Everything fixed" but it appears he is going to have to tackle the repairs himself.  Nevertheless, he and Linda seem to be in good spirits and accepting of their issues.
     The wind came up from the east and all the anchored boats banged, bounced, rolled and hobby-horsed all night long.  I was so dizzy in the morning I had to hang on to tables, counter tops, hand holds just to move from the stateroom to the couch.....and the boat wasn't even moving...UGH! 
                                                                                 

  

     We hauled anchor in the morning and headed to the closest port where we might be able to fix our mechanical problems... Bimini.  As we came back out the Gun Cay pass, there sat several yachts and sail boats slowly bobbing on the lee side (down wind side ) of the island.  Crap!...first Bahamas lesson learned.  For a comfortable night at anchor, get on the downwind side of an island.
     The cruise up to Bimini was only about 10 miles but our transmission pressures didn't improve, so we retained a slip at Blue Water Marina for a much needed rest and recovery from sea sickness.
     Bimini is a beautiful island from the water side.  Calm turquoise water, brightly painted boats and white sand.  You sink up to your ankles in the soft sand on the Florida side beach and it is scattered with different colored conch shells.  The shallow water slowly swept in and out, but a surge surprised all of us, soaking our shorts and drowning Huen's shoes with wet sand.  I couldn't contain my laughter when I saw the surprised look on his face.  Unperturbed, he slogged his way down the beach and back to the boat without a whimper.
     The girls gleefully picked up conch shells, discarding one when they found a bigger or better colored one. They finally settled on the one they were going to keep and we headed back to the boat.
      The Island folk are polite and friendly and the marina is tidy, has clean bathrooms and is a bargain at $1.00/foot. They charge .75 cents/ gallon for water and 7.5%  VAT but all in all it is a comparable price to what we paid in Dania Beach.  The rest of the town though, is dirty, dilapidated, and obviously not well respected by its inhabitants.  There are no side walks along the very narrow streets down which golf carts careen , the drivers concentrating more on their cell phones than on the traffic. The street is littered with plastic cup, straws, paper and garbage.  Malodorous fumes waft from the garbage that is piled up on street corners and littered between buildings.
     Remnants of a more glorious past exist in the burnt buildings (Hemingway's) and the boarded up hotels and enclaves that line the beaches, but I suspect those times will not return until the island folk clean up their act and show some pride in their island.
     I remember when this happened in Antigua.  From my childhood, I can remember that Antigua was the  winter vacation destination for my Canadian relatives.  When the Antiguans began to resent the tourists, treating them with disrespect and having riots, the tourists stopped coming. The Island folks suffered greatly with a depressed economy.   Beth and I visited there several years ago and things had changed. We were welcomed with open arms. The Island was clean, tidy and reasonably priced.  We will go back there.  We will be unlikely to return to Bimini for anything other than a "waiting for good weather stopover."
   A call to Justin at Huckins Yacht in Jacksonville led us to the solution of our transmission worries.  He suggested we get a mechanical gauge to measure the pressures directly at the transmissions....VOILA!  The readings for the pressures were right where they should be.  The electrical gauges were incorrect!  Now I know the 250 psi rating is actually 325 psi.  Cleaning up the electrical connections solved the high pressure reading.
    We will be leaving Blue Water marina today to snorkel the wreck Sapona and later anchor out at Honeymoon Harbor ( maybe relive our honeymoon...if I don't get sea sick!!) Tomorrow, its on across the Bahamas Bank to Chub Cay in the Berry Islands.