at anchor in Mangrove Cay, March 16

photo: beautiful turquoise water!

[Hilde’s log]

Raven is bobbing at anchor in seven feet of water, about a quarter of a mile off Mangrove Cay. Mangrove Cay is a scrubby oblong of land surrounded by aquamarine water and blue sky, out in the middle of the Great Bahama Bank. Its claim to fame is that it is about half way between West End and tomorrow’s destination of Great Sale Key. We are anchored on the northeast side of the island, which gives us protection from the waves churned up by the southerly and westerly winds. The little wavelets rushing by lap at the hull and are barely strong enough to rock us gently.

It should be a quiet night, assuming the wind behaves itself and blows according to the forecast. There was a fishing boat anchored here when we arrived about 5 p.m., but they took off about a half hour later, blasting off toward West End. With those engines, it’ll take them about an hour, rather than the four and a half it took us to get here.

We left the dock this afternoon about 12:30, after showers and a farewell cup of coffee with Jay and Luisa on Airborne who are staying on at West End waiting for the arrival of their son on Tuesday. David wanted dead low tide to pass, as we took the Indian Cay Channel and parts of it are a bit shallow (5.5 ft, and we draw 5, but still). The water on the banks is gorgeous shades of turquoise and the surrounding deep ocean is dark blue. The sea is actually striped – blue, turquoise, aqua, and an almost neon greenish blue on the horizon. The waters here are very shallow – the Bahamas are a large mesa sitting in the much deeper ocean, with hills on the mesa sticking up above the waterline as islands.

We motor sailed the whole day, with the jib out, making about 6 – 6.5 knots over the clear water. I could see the bottom most of the way, either sand or clumps of grassy stuff on sand. A couple of dolphins rode our bow wake for a few minutes, but they didn’t linger and other than a sole cormorant, that was the extent of the wildlife. We have heard a few birds call on the island. No bugs so far, praise God.

We saw Mangrove Cay from about 5 miles out and also what appeared to be the mast of an anchored sailboat. It turned out to be a large marker, which we think is warning of the shallows between it and the island. We approached the island cautiously, as it is surrounded by 1 to 2 foot shallows.

Once anchored, we broke out two bottles of beer and some Triscuits for our anchor drink/snack, and kicked back in the cockpit enjoying the cool of the evening and our unimpeded view of absolutely nothing but water and sky (the island is behind us, on the weather shore). Utter contentment.

It’s dark now and we’re listening to a Bahamian radio station, which you can’t tell until the commercials and the djs break in with their lovely island accents. Pretty exotic! So far, all the music is American and English – Christopher Cross, the Spice Girls, and Rod Stewart so far, plus a current hit by someone I can’t name (“You’re Beautiful”). I'm off to the dishes.