Chub Cay, an idyllic anchorage... maybe

Last night was awesome.  The wind was calm and the anchorage was dead flat.  The skies cleared and the moon was casting our shadow on the sandy bottom below.  The water was so clear that I could see the individual strands of seagrass and starfish in the boat's moonshadow, now imagine how clear it was in the moonlight.  As opposed to Andros, I've seen no bugs besides the ones that managed to catch a free ride on the boat... it cost them dearly though when they tried to bite me at night!

Dawn brought to my eyes one of the most idyllic scenes so far during this trip.  The clear glassy water lay interrupted only by the nearby islands and by Undaunted.  The morning was also very silent except for some seagulls scavenging on the beach under the high tide line, in the distance I could also faintly hear the rumbles of the generators that power the failed project also known as Chub Cay Marina.  I made myself some breakfast and once I finished, I could not tolerate the tower of dirty dishes so I went to work on cleaning them up.  I am philosophically opposed to any kind of activity that can be labeled as work, but I suppose it is the price one pays to enjoy yet another day in paradise.

I went for a swim around noon to manually reset my anchor into a safer direction in anticipation of the late afternoon northeasterlies being predicted by the different weather sources.  I also swam over to Undaunted and chatted with them for a while.  Then I spent some time cleaning the hull from all the nasty spilt fuel that inevitavely flows by your boat at the Nassau harbour.  I then grabbed the spear and went for yet another unsuccessful hunt.  I did see lots of fish and an easy lobster (but they are out of season).  As I swam on the edge of the abyss leading to the depths of the Tongue of the Ocean during flood tide, I could feel the rich cold water flooding the banks.  I managed to partially spear a good sized grunt but the barbs didn't go in deep enough and it managed to swim away.  Shortly thereafter, and at the same time, a 6-foot nurseshark and a barracuda swam over and paid me a visit... this spooked me enough to call it a day.

I swam back to the boat and started to prepare food for tomorrow's passage.  I had some lunch and now have a new pile of dirty dishes!

The wind picked up around 5:30PM and the anchorage doesn't seem as idyllic anymore.  I am a bit concerned about how my friends at Morgan's Bluff are dealing with this, hopefully the wind will turn sufficiently east such that the anchorage remains tennable.

Tomorrow, if everything stays as planned, I will be heading out across the banks for an overnight run down to Bimini.  I may end up anchoring somewhere in the middle of the featureless banks if conditions permit.