to the Abacos

The weather finally looked right for a crossing of the 10,000 ft deep Northeast Providence Channel  from Spanish Wells to the Abacos.  We decided to prepare for the trip by leaving Spanish Wells and moving Latitudes to a vantage point that would give us a nice run.  There were a couple of options - a little "island" so small that it is called Meeks Patch. We anchored there and decided to walk the island.  Luke did a nice panorama of the shoreline.

Here is Latitudes and our dinghy, waiting patiently while we explored the shore.

Cruisers visit here often.  One has left a wonderful hammock.  It was lovely - wish I had it on the boat! (in shade, of course...)

Once we returned to the boat, we decided that there was not enough protection from the wind and sailed an hour southwest to the second, better spot, along with 9 other boats preparing for the same crossing.  This new anchorage also gave us a good vantage point to begin our trip the next day.

Before daybreak, we left.  About 9 hours later, we finally crossed into the Little Harbor channel, into the islands that make up the Abacos.  It was a long trip - Smokey had on her "are we there yet???" face.  I think I did, too.

En route, we began talking to another boat, as we both dragged fishing lines in hopes of catching the big one.  Well, we didn't, but they did!  And then they were nice enough to invite us over for dinner to share their catch! mmm!  The next day, we all 4 took a little day trip and sailed on Latitudes from our anchorages to Little Harbour, home of Petes Pub and Gallery.

Little Harbour is just that - a little harbor.  It has a shallow entrance that prevents us from taking Latitudes in unless it is high tide.  So, we just anchored outside of the channel and took the dinghy in.  Here is an overview of the harbor from Pete's.

The pub itself is a tiki hut, built on the sand, and with a few shaded tables. Wonderful!

Both Pete and his father, Randolph Johnson, were/are sculptors. Randolph Johnson settled in the abacos in 1951.  Their work is beautiful.  Check out this wonderful webpage for the background on the foundry and pictures of their work.  http://www.petespub.com/randolph-johnston.html



Besides the foundry, there is a gift shop (of course!)

 From Little Harbour, we set sail for the 15 miles to the beautiful town of Hope Town, with it's famous lighthouse.

 Unfortunately, the electronic gods were on strike and both our chart plotter and our back-up chart plotter on Luke's tablet failed.  Fortunately, the back-up back-up navigation app on Luke's phone worked!  Luke spent a lot of time today doing a factory reset on both of the evil chart plotters.  They seem to live!

But, back to Hope Town.  Pretty little houses and shops, all painted bright colors.

Luke was outside, in the cockpit (working on the evil chart plotter) when he noticed a Bahamian style racing boat sailing past, full of happy sailors.  Calling to ask, he learned that there was a race to be had today!

We jumped into the dinghy and zipped the two miles or so to the race site.  But we were disappointed.  This was not a Bahamian race, but one for any cruising boat in the harbor that wanted to race.  The one above was the only Bahamian style boat.

Back to Latitudes for us.  I gathered an amazing amount of dirty laundry and headed to the Laundromat at the nearby "resort", spent $25 and several hours, and now we have clean clothes.  Ahhhh, the luxury!

Tomorrow, before the heat of the day (low 90's and some humidity), we will go across the mooring field to the town of Hope Town and do a little sightseeing.  Taking the camera!