Sunrise on Monday, April 14
The nearly full moon was visible for quite a while after sunrise.
We again faced the same dilemma that we’d faced last week. The wind was changing to a direction that had no protection in this anchorage, and we needed to move someplace more protected. We’d picked Spanish Wells, to the north. But, due to strong currents and shallow depths in an area called “The Cut,” we could only go through “The Cut” at high tide, which on Tuesday would be 1000.
Continue readingOn Sunday, April 13, the full moon set at the same time the sun rose. Here was the moon setting.
And the sun rising, though it was mostly blocked by the cloud.
Continued from yesterday… We reached a sign that said “Cathedral Caves and the Boiling Hole.” It was a short walk down a paved path to the Boiling Hole.
The sign said that it was one of many blue holes on Eleuthera Island. This hole was connected to another blue hole, located offshore about 1/4 mile west. They were connected via a network of underground caves. As the name implied, the water in the hole bubbled and churned as the tides changed. When we walked by, it looked calm.
On Wednesday, April 9, we were awoken at 0330 by thunder and heavy rain. The wind was 20-knots. Eric got up and monitored the lightning storm for a while, concerned that we might drag. After about 45-minutes, he felt comfortable that Kosmos was secure and went back to bed.
Later, when we got up for the day, it was still raining and the anchorage had become a little bit rocky. The wind had already started shifting from the south to the west, and it was forecast to continue to shift west and then to the north. This anchorage was going to be very uncomfortable by late afternoon.
At 0800, there was a break in the rain. We quickly got the dinghy up and Kosmos ready for sea. The forecast was for heavy rain and more lightning, so we wanted to move before the rain resumed. At 0900, we moved 3 nm northeast within the bay to Rock Sound West (from the red dots up to the purple dots).
We anchored in 7 feet of water. It was pretty calm when we anchored, and it got even calmer as the wind continued to shift. The other three families who were in South Rock Sound with us all eventually came, too.
The rest of the day was low key. In the evening, Haste Away invited us over, and we had a nice time with them.
Dawn on Thursday, April 10
Monday, April 7 — As mentioned yesterday, we’d gone to bed extremely late. And, thanks to the uncomfortable motion in the anchorage, we didn’t sleep well. Eager to get out of Fernandez Bay ASAP, we were up at 0600 and were pulling up the anchor at 0630. This was captured the moment before the sun peeked over the horizon (taken while we were underway).
The red dot on the lower right was Fernandez Bay, and the red dot in the middle left was the anchorage that we were going to in southern Rock Sound. It was a sunny day with scattered clouds. The ride over was pleasant, but only because we were going with the wind and waves. The swells were 2 – 4 feet at about 2 – 5 seconds and the wind waves about 1 – 3 feet. There were some white caps in the bay from the wind chop. Had we been going the other direction, it would have not been a fun ride.
