Cambridge Cay and across to Eleuthera

Cambridge Cay sunset
June 11, 2009

June 8, 2009:

We headed for Cambridge Cay which is a part of the Exuma Land and Sea Park. We were approaching it by going around Bell IS. Unfortunately, we arrive at Bell Is and the location of a dangerous rock about low tide and could not get around it safely. there were shallow sand bars in front and it looked too shallow to go around at that time. By the time we could go around, the light was not good for safe navigation, so we anchored off the Bell IS house with it's own

beach and float. That night we had terrible rain storms all night long. Due to the

storms, it was pitch black outside. There were three large houses of steel or concrete and glass on this island, but evidently no one was present as there were no lights at all visible. We could see a freight boat anchored some distance from us.

June 9, 2009.

Near high tide this morning we went past that rock and safely around Bell Is to Cambridge Cay where we picked up a mooring ball. There were many beautiful beaches and rocks nearby to explore. We took the dinghy to one beach and discovered a path to the beach on the Atlantic side. It was also beautiful and had some reefs right at the beach which I snorkled. Although there were 8 boats on moorings, we had this beach all to ourselves. We explored several others before retuning to our boat. That evening we had a gorgeous sunset and no rain overnight!

June 10, 2009

We were off by 0900 on our way across the Exuma Sound to Powell Point on Eleuthera. We had absolutely no wind...under 3 knots the whole way so we had to motor across. We did not even run into

one of the rain squalls we could see out there. Someone

we had met told us that the Cape Eluthera Marina at Powell Point was very nice so we got dockage there. It is fairly new and clean, much like Bimini Sands or Sampson Cay. They have condos with docks in front of them. They have a nice restaurant/coffee house/bakery. There is also a small store on site. The manager used to be at The Bitter End in the BVI. The Amway family evidently bought this

island and is slowly developing it well. They even have recycling! We treated ourselves by eating out. It was very hot when we arrived so it was nice to plug in and have some air conditioning, but it cooled off some by night.

June 11, 2009

We are staying another day here at Cape Eleuthera. Charlie changed the oil in the generator and hopefully fixed its small fuel leak. We will probably try to go exploring in this area. They have two nice beaches and some snorkeling areas nearby. We met a nice couple with their children who were recently evacuated from Madagascar. He was a medical officer for the Peace Corp. They are cruising before relocating back to Pennsylvania. We had then over for cocktails tonight after another rainstorm.

We will go north to Governor's Harbor tomorrow. We hope to have some wind. Currently it is still under 5 knots. We will probably go to Spanish Wells after that.