There you go .... Try to find that one on Google Earth. In a nutshell we're out on the extreme northeast end of the Bahamas. Lat: 26 40N Long: 77 07W Since I last sent out an update things have been moving along very quickly and most of my time was take up with repairing the steering system that broke. Since arriving in Marsh Harbour, the boat was tied up at the Marsh Harbour Marina. We departed there two days ago for a short jump over to Hope Town to check out the repairs and to check the place out. Today we departed Hope Town for Guana Cay and that's where we sit tonight. Our plans for the rest of this week are to head back to Marsh Harbour tomorrow as there is a huge storm coming in over the weekend Where do I start? ...... We departed Harbour Island on Easter Thursday bound for the Abacos, via the Devil's Backbone. As we'd made this run before without a pilot we thought it would be OK ..... until we rounded the point and ran smack into 8 foot northerly swells crashing over the numerous coralheads. Things were fine until about 10 miles out into the Northeast Providence Channel when the steering cable parted and the rudder wouldn't go past midships to port. This brought on a very long day. Dodging ship traffic got to be routine
We called this fellow numerous times but he just wouldn't answer us. The sea conditions were moderately rough entering the cut at Little Harbour but we passed there without incident. Once inside we ran up to a small protected anchorage called Snake Cay (26 27N 77 03W) and called it quits for the day ..... but not after a well deserved shower on the after deck that night. Gotta love those solar showers
Man that felt good!! Upon inspection, we discovered that the problem with the steering cable was that it had started to part up in the engine room and the broken strand had worked it's way loose and formed a knot in the rest of the wire. This knot would not pass through the conduit.
A temporary fix was to cut out this section of wire and tie the strands back in with red electrical. We did this and everything worked out .... for a while! Making a long story short, a new conduit was ordered from New England and it only took 3 days to receive it here. We then proceeded north to Marsh Harbour, in the Sea of Abaco (Lat 26 33N Lon 77 04W). Marsh Harbour Marina is quite small but it was very clean, had a pool, and the staff was extremely friendly.
We met a lot of wonderful people there and developed new friendships. Marsh Harbour itself is geared for the boater and has a NAPA, four marine supply and dealer stores, a great grocery store (Maxwells) and numerous restaurants, banks, etc. It is also the Abaco base for Sunsail ant the Moorings Yacht Charters. The harbour itself is kind of polluted .... somewhat like Halifax USED to be, and the water is not very clear. There is a large anchorage in the center and a good sized Sipping dock for the small container ships that arrive here.
You know you've been in one place far too long when you start to see amusing things like faces in dock pilings like this one.....
The bar scene also starts to scare you when you see these HUGE curly tail lizards hanging around....
The marina itself hold steak BBQ's every Saturday night with live "rake & scrape" and limbo entertainment.
Towards the end of our stay we took a local ferry over to Man-O-War Cay for a day of relaxation.
As you can see on the map this is a very small but populated Cay. It has an excellent sheltered anchorage as well.
The village is very quaint with all it's narrow streets and brightly coloured homes. No cars on this Cay.
While everyone was shopping for souvenirs, Ron had his own agenda and purchased the new davits for Wind Warrior 1.
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