50 Shades of Blue...Georgetown to Staniel Cay

On January 27th, around 8:30 a.m. we left Crab Cay in Georgetown following our new buddy boaters, Chris and Lisa on Wild Rumpus, a 50’ Lagoon. (Their sailing plans are similar to ours. They also hustled to Georgetown missing a lot of the cool places in the Exumas that we did. And they are also eventually heading south towards the Caribbean, stopping in the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico etc… ) On our way north, we had to make a quick stop in Emerald Bay at the Sandals Resort and Marina, 2 hours out, to get fuel. Wild Rumpus did not need fuel so they planned to meet us at the anchorage.

We arrived at Lee Stocking Island around 2:15p.m and oh. my. goodness., it was so gorgeous and amazing…the water and it’s different hues of blue were out of this world! On January 28th we woke to a beautiful sunny day! To take part in this beautiful day, we all went for a dinghy ride and ended up at a sand bar and trudged around in the waist high deep water.

Later that afternoon, we went snorkeling just off of the Rudder Cay Cut, at Copperfield Bay (the islands in this area are owned by David Copperfield) to see the life-sized stainless steel sculpture of a mermaid lounging on top of a baby grand piano in about 13-15’ of water that David Copperfield had sunk originally for guests at his resort to enjoy. It was a bit worn and weathered but still the same interesting to see! We sadly did not bring the GoPro with us to get any first hand photos. So the picture posted is one that I found online. Shortly after getting into the dinghy after our brief snorkeling experience, a big Nurse Shark swam right by us and underneath our dinghy. I’m so glad I saw it while in the dinghy instead of while we were in the water! Even though Nurse Sharks are said to be harmless and only would harm a human when provoked, it IS still a shark!

The following day was too rough to get off of the boat for any kind of sight seeing or snorkeling. The winds were gusting to 30kts and the chop from the wind was about 2-3’ all day. So we didn’t do much of anything other than read and relax. It was actually a good excuse to do nothing and catch our breath for more exploring down the way.

January 30th we motored over to Black Point Settlement and anchored. Once there and settled, we dinghy’d to shore with Chris and Lisa in their dinghy, walked through town to see a blow hole, had a bite to eat at a hot dog stand and got a few groceries at a small market. In the evening I got a tutorial on how to make Chris’s guacamole recipe on Wild Rumpus! I even video taped his preparation… that’s how good it is! If I don’t duplicate it exactly, it just won’t taste anything near as good as his. I’ve already tried and...no Bueno!

January 31st we got up early and motored to the south anchorage of Staniel Cay near Pigeon Cay. Beautiful little anchorage and only a couple of other boats anchored! A couple of hours after anchoring we dinghy’d around to the other side of the point, tied up to a dinghy dock in front of the Isles General and went for a hike along the waterfront and quaint little town. We ended up at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club. After a quick look around, we decided to go for a little hike towards the beach in search of a cafe that is no longer there (we discovered later when we arrived at the remains of a condemned structure). In search of the cafe was a long walk but what we stumbled across was a gorgeous beach surrounded by steep limestone cliffs with waves crashing around them and breathtaking views of deep blue ocean as far as you could see.

February 1st we took a different route to town to have lunch at the Yacht Club. We brought Harley with us and asked the host if we could sit outside on the patio because of the dog. He asked if he was a service dog. I nodded a slow yes, smiling, knowing I was caught in a lie and Chris also smiling, backed me up by saying that he was ‘serviceyish’. The host knew we were making this up but he grinned and said to go ahead and eat on the patio. We all enjoyed a delicious lunch! And Harley was a perfect boy! He laid quietly under the table without a peep or any movement. A perfect ‘serviceyish’ dog.

After lunch we walked the docks to see the Nurse Sharks swimming around apparently waiting for the fisherman to throw their leftover catch of the day into the water. Not all were swimming. Some were lying in wait. We also saw an enormous Stingray swimming slowly in a wavy stealthy motion underneath the docks. We took photos and headed back to the dinghy. After returning from our little outing, Rick, Harley and I got on the paddle boards and took advantage of the calm, flat, smooth anchorage knowing that with the predicted windy week ahead we would not be able to. As we were paddling along we saw another huge Stingray! Rick quickly paddled back to the boat, got the GoPro, took a picture of it and then we continued to meander along. We soon cruised down a nearby narrow channel with beautiful homes with docks on one side and the airport strip on the other. The water was super gorgeous with it’s different shades of blue throughout. We were paddling through a bit of a current but I wasn’t too concerned because I knew on the way back we would be able to just relax, which we did, and we just sat on our boards and glided back to our boat. So peaceful!

Harley is enjoying it all..the sailing, the dinghy rides, the beach, the hikes, searching for lizards or anything crawling around in the shrubs, the paddle boarding and occasional brief dips in the water! He's also become quite fond of Chris and Lisa especially when they arrive in their dinghy maybe because he knows it could be an opportunity to go do something fun off the boat. And....he usually gets the best seat on the dinghy sitting between Chris and Lisa under the shade of the canopy getting lots of pets. More on Staniel Cay to come...