The Adventures of Monk's Vineyard - The Great Loop and Beyond: Plan B

1/29 - Jana arrived back in the Exumas around 9:00 p.m. on Friday. It had been a very long traveling day for her that started when she left her home in Colorado around 5:00 p.m. Thursday night. Other than very long waits in a couple of airports and an immigration officer at Nassau that only wanted to give her a permit for 30 days (remember we’d all just gone through the process of getting a 120-day extension) she arrived safe and sound, albeit pretty tired. (Immigration finally agreed to give her 90 days.)

Our plan for today was a short run, around 3 hours, to Lee Stocking Island. The forecast wind was 11 knots with waves around 3.5 feet. Gerry had his fishing poles in the water right after leaving the entrance to the marina. As we got out into the Sound we soon discovered that the waves were higher than predicted and the ride was pretty bumpy. Linda’s not too keen on having Gerry fish in conditions like this on the off chance he’ll catch something and we’ll have to stop the boat. So guess what – Gerry caught two fish – one Wahoo and one Pompano Dolphin. About the time he was reeling in the first one, Second Star called on the VHF suggesting we go in through Rat Cay Cut to get out of the wave action – this was Plan B. Sounded good to us, so we told them we’d meet them there (they were a bit ahead of us because we’d slowed down considerably for Gerry to reel in the fish). Once inside the cut, they said the wave action was negligible and there appeared to be plenty of places deep enough to anchor with good holding – so the decision was made to anchor for the night.

Once anchored, Gerry went about cleaning the fish and then Michael and Jana came over and Michael filleted it for us. We ended up with plenty of fish for both couples.

With that task accomplished, we set out to explore the area. Lots of interesting shoreline (rocky overhangs that look good for lobster hunting), beaches, and blowholes. Back at the boat we watched a nice sunset and Gerry grilled some fresh Wahoo. Pretty tasty and Linda even admitted worth the rockin’ and rollin’ in the sound to bring them in.

1/30 – We spent the morning exploring the area again by dinghy. We had the look bucket with us and went in search of lobster or conch– unfortunately no luck. The areas that looked prime were a little too rough to get close to with the dinghy or snorkelling. After exploring a few beaches we headed back to the boat for lunch and our planned departure around 2:00 . Our trip to Lee Stocking Island was only 5 miles, but since we were going on the inside we had to wait until the tide was rising. Some spots along the route are only 1.5 meters (5 feet) and we draw 4 feet so we waited for the foot or two extra a rising tide would give us. The other option was going back out into the Sound, but the weather conditions were still creating big waves, making the slow but shallow route our choice for today. On our short trip we passed by Children’s Bay Cay and Williams Cay, both very picturesque, and then to Lee Stocking where we dropped the anchor off the shore of the Caribbean Marine Research Center (CMRC).

After settling in we dropped the dinghy, grabbed a bottle of wine and went over to Second Star to watch the sunset and plan our exploring adventures for the next couple of days.

Once through Rat Cay Cut, we were greeted by nice
tranquil water

Second Star anchored in a sea of blue

Half a fish is better than no fish at all.
While Gerry was bringing in the fish, another ocean critter
decided to take a bite. Still plenty of fish left for a couple of meals though.