1/28/20
We love it down here in the Ragged Islands! The beautiful water, sea life, remoteness...no boats loaded with
tourists going by any anchorages down here!
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| Taking a lunch break on Hog Cay after working on the hiking trails across the cay. |
The only problem is there
is no protection from westerly winds. Westerly winds come along with
the cold fronts that barrel off the east coast. When those cold fronts
are strong enough they can even make it far enough south to the Ragged
Islands. And the only thing we see when looking west from the Hog Cay
anchorage - water. No land for keeping the seas down with a cold front.
So,
with a cold front approaching, we hauled anchor and had a lovely sail in 8 to 15 feet of various shades of turquoise water 13 miles
north to Buena Vista Cay. Buena Vista has a little bit of a hook shape
at the south end so we can tuck in to try to hide from the seas the
westerly winds will stir up. When the front actually came through there were 5 sailboats and 4 Bahamian fishing boats hiding from the northwest winds.
The calm that usually arrives before the "storm" provide perfect days for snorkeling. Anywhere down here in these remote cays are reefs and ledges underwater to find fish and lobster. We load the dinghy with fins, snorkels and masks, spears, weight belt, gloves, water bottles and put on our wetsuits. We're out exploring for a couple of hours - me admiring the thousands of living creatures underwater. Jerry looking under each ledge, into every nook and cranny stalking fish and lobster. Every time we go out (as you'll see in the pictures) Jerry returns to Persephone with a bucket of seafood. Nothing like fresh fish! Fried in butter, grilled outdoors, baked.....I have a vacuum sealer onboard so we're able to preserve the excess.
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| Fish.... |
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| Lobster.... |
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| More fish..... |
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| Fileting the fish on the back of the boat. |
After the westerly winds we sailed north up to Flamingo Cay. A guy dragged anchor here at Flamingo earlier in January and ended up on the rocks. (If you want to hear more of the story go to youtube, find trekkers tales, and look at his shipwreck video.) The guy took what he could off his boat, was rescued by another sailor who just happened to be in the area, and abandoned the boat. By the time we arrived the boat had been pretty well stripped. And with the west winds the boat, that may have been salvageable, was ground up pretty good on the rocks. We salvaged the few remaining parts on the boat which were easy to access as the boat was pretty wrecked. Anything on the boat would soon be ground to pieces as much of it already was. We anchored there for the night and watched four local fishing boats, 2 fishermen on each boat, come in on their 25-30 ft cuddy cabin boats. They all had baskets full of lobster to clean up and put in their coolers onboard. They use an air compressor with something called a hookah for fishing. They're able to dive down deep to find lobster while breathing air from a long hose hooked to the compressor. We watched them clean their catch, shower by dumping salt water over their heads, and settling in for the night.
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| Flamingo Cay wreck |
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| 2 days before the boat was mostly in tact! The power of the wind and water! |
After checking out the wreck we headed back south to Double Breasted and met up with Bluejacket and the other boats that were at Hog Cay before the cold front. Double Breasted provides some protection from the south and west and more cold fronts were predicted.
The Bahamian Defense Force had been here in the area for the last week. A Haitian raft wrecked on the ocean side at Double Breasted. 31 people were rescued and taken by helicopter to Nassau. Our friend Barbara was walking the beach and came upon a body - one of three found that day. What a sad situation. Imagine the desperation required to take to the sea on a sailing raft to escape. It's amazing any of them survived with the strong easterly winds they must have experienced on the way from Haiti to the Bahamas. (link to a local new report: https://thenassauguardian.com/2020/01/27/bodies-found-in-ragged-island-chain/)
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| Bahamian Defense Force Ship |
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| Bahamian Defense Force on Double Breasted looking for survivors or bodies. |
So that's what's been going on here besides our routine visiting, games, reading, cooking, cleaning, etc. Yesterday, as another cold front passed through, the rains came down. Jerry was just finishing fileting his catch. We put up the water catcher to collect water for our tank and Jerry did laundry with water that filled up the dinghy. Right now the life lines are covered with our laundry clipped out to dry. Our current plans are to hang out down here in the Ragged Islands. I'm getting ready to go out to kayak. Jerry has his wet suit on ready for Jerry Luh to pick him up. He's asking what I want for dinner tonight - snapper, hogfish, lobster? Decisions, decisions..............
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| Heading into Double Breasted after a morning of snorkeling. |
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| Anchored off the west side of Buena Vista before the cold front. |
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| Persephone at anchor. |
