We staged the boat over at hurricane harbour and inched our way out at 5am following our boat buddies. I had not yet figured out how to turn down the power on the new chart plotter so was temprarily blinded. Brenda sheilded the screen from me and I focussed on following the leghts of our buddies. We made it past all the anchored boats and out of the Key Biscayne Channel. We had a great crossing, despite the N/NE winds of 10-17 knots. We had the advantage of the night lees with the early morning departure and were more than halfway accross before the seas could build to anything. We landed exactly as planned by about 2pm at North Bimini channel, Alicetown and checked into the Big Game Club Marina - a 5 star resort catering to the sport fishing crowd but virtually deserted this time of year. We had full use of the facilities including a nice pool for our dockfees @$1.75 per ft. After checking in with Customs and Immigration where we obtained our cruising and fishing permit9$300 for a 40 ft boat), we walked around this quaint Bhamian town. Houses are brightly coloured and small. Transportation is by 16 seat Golf cart train, which also takes the smartly uniformed children to school in the morning.
As the weather looked like we may be staying a few days we moved next day over to the Bimini Sands Condo/Resort/Marina which is has a more protected harbour and is cheaper - about $50/day dockage all in for the use of the same facilities others pay much more for when staying at their condo or renting same. Brenda woke up to an aquariaum of fish at our dock behind our boat with dominoes, angel fish barricuda, sting rays etc. We went out the beach a short dingy ride away and had it to ourselves. Here we cleaned the barnacles off the bottom of the dingy that had accumulated while moored in nutrient rich Boot Key Harbour. We noticed another local man in distress as his motor had quit & he was a ways out. He had a shark circling his boat and poured a bit of gasoline on it to chase it away. We put the motor back on our dingy and went out to rescue him and give him a tow...we found out later from another local the man we had rescued Maggio, was in fact an ex US Marine and he likely could have swam to ashore and fought off the shark as he told us he was about to do.
On Wed. we went to the weekly local get happy hour and Karaoke get together at the end of the Island Sand |Bar owned by the same complex. The transportation was provided by a rickety old bus, steel on steel brakes which made us glad it was a flat road and whose door would not close so the dust blew through. Our driver, complete with shiny Rasta braids just turned up the Bob Marley music and we bumped along and enjoyed the short trip. We quickly made friends with the bartender and he was the first singer to kick-off the Karaoke. He did a credible rendition of Hotel California and we and the whole bar sang along. Subsequent singers got progressively worse and the bartenders continued to ring a large ships bell to try to get them to stop -- they ignored this, the place got noisier as it filled up and everyone had a fun time. The beer was cheap at $9 for a bucket 6 of the local Bahamian beer and the food was great. We left at 10:30 (late bedtime for boaters) just as the place was getting full...same driver got us safely back to the resort at the other end.
After five days of strong winds we were glad to see a 2 day window for our trip to Nassau. We had to wait for the tide to rise a bit so Ron & Jan could get out of the harbour as they draw 5 1/2 feet so we left at a respectable 9am. We got to NW Channel light at about 7pm and anchored just at dark on the Bahamas Bank, with no land in sight. Next day we finished our perfect crossing to Nassua where we are now. We will likely leave here on Wed or so, weather permitting bound for Rose Island then southward. Seems communications and wifi may be a little more scarce in some places so we will post when we can. Wifi in Nassau is harder to come by, we had to lug the computer to the Texaco where it is free but I am running on battery alone (no place to plug in) so can't upload the many great pictures - will try to do this later for the Miami and this post when technology and time allows.
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