Abacos – MV Simple Life

Marsh Harbour

Kelly & I spent some time in Marsh Harbour (3rd largest city in the Bahamas behind Freeport & Nassau). Marsh Harbour is every cruiser’s reprovisioning stop in the Abacos. We stocked up on the items that we needed and frequented the local restaurants by dinghy.

Enter Susan

Kelly’s sister Susan was nice enough to plan some time off and fly into Marsh Harbour to join us for the week. It’s so nice to have visitors aboard. We picked her up in the dinghy at the Union Jack Public dock on Marsh Harbour and the sisters were all smiles.

We wasted no time setting out for as many islands and cays as we could hit in a week. First stop …

Treasure Cay

It was coming up on high tide and we made the trip over at 8.5 – 9 knots with the hopes of finding a mooring ball inside the harbour.

TC harbour actually locks the boats in with a cable at night so be careful if you attempt to enter after 10PM!

Success. We grabbed one of the dozen or so mooring balls.

Anchored in TC with Toys still on fly deck

The water is so clear you can see the mooring block on the bottom.

Be careful not to ding a prop on the mooring blocks

We craned down the toys.

Kayaks were a new addition for the Bahamas

The girls wasted no time in trying out both kayaks.

Kayaking is hard work bring a cold drink
Paddling Susan
Sea turtle head

Treasure Cay Beach Marina & Golf Resort

A beautiful location and it’s for sale!

TC Marina
TC Homes
TC Marina Resort $59M

Tipsy Seagull

Frozen Drinks & Margaritas
A local IPA!
Morgan Freeman’s Brother

Kelly swears this is a baby Godzilla

Treasure Cay Beach

Treasure Cay has one of the top 10 beaches in the world so just a 1/4 mile walk and we had our toes in the sand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTI2z0rATwU

TC Beach

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOzy0oiGKVE

360 Beach Selfies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yivhxnt8shk

Gentle waves

Coco Beach Bar

Coco Beach Bar is here to serve you frozen drinks while you lounge under tiki huts.

Coco Beach Bar
CBB View

We spent two nights in Treasure Cay and I know why many spend their whole winters here. We had places to go so out the harbor’s entrance channel we went.

Sea of Abaco

Once in the Sea of Abaco you are just blown away by its beauty.

SoA View from Pilothouse
Brody likes the breeze when the PH doors are open

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhLevVKM__0

Sea of Abaco

No Name Cay – AKA Piggyville

The seas were calm and we made our way through Whale Cay Cut and anchored off No Name Cay. Here we found others like us wanting to spend some time with the piggies.

No Name Cay beach is beautiful and home to some friendly pigs and roosters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7k1HgCYwDzA

Piggyville Shelter

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6k-JVqrEFx0

Feeding the Sow

Green Turtle Cay

We weighed anchor and headed right next door to GTC. We passed many boats anchored off GTC and proceeded into White Sound. The narrow channel opens up and there are moorings inside if you call Donny.

However, looking around the harbour it seemed a bit quiet and with a little investigation we quickly learned why all the boats were anchored outside the harbor next to the town of New Plymouth. Out we went, dropped the hook with the rest of them and dinghed our way into the public dock in New Plymouth. We walked the narrow streets following the sound of a saxophone humming out some jazz.

Sundowners Bar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9v0CR0Tyxo

https://youtu.be/tslDWLKYSbQ

Sax at Sundowners

Next up Nippers Beach Bar…

We weighed anchor in North Palm Beach at 4AM. It was dark as we made our way down the ICW and out of Lake Worth inlet.

Ambient light from shore makes navigation easier

We welcomed first light but soon our due East direction had us seeing spots as we stared into the sun.

Crossing over the West edge of the Gulf Stream.

Position of the West wall of the Gulf Stream, about 18NM off the coast.

Here is a video while underway in the Gulf Stream.

https://youtu.be/q3tygH5uI2o

The ocean temp was a tropical 78 degrees.

While it would take us about 8 hours to arrive at our custom clear in location in West End on Grand Bahama Island, others would pass us along the way.

https://youtu.be/lOPwU5z2GUw

Soon we tucked between the rock jetties of West End, hailed Old Bahama Bay Marina for temporary dockage while we cleared in through customs.

The water inside West End Harbour was cloudy but had a beautiful green color.

There was a 10 foot long shark in this photo but I snapped it a moment too late as he swam beneath the murky green

Things appear from the green as the come up to the surface.

We had our yellow quarantine flag & Bahamas courtesy flag flying when we arrived in Bahamian waters. Now docked, only the captain is allowed to leave the boat to checkin at customs. The customs officers were very friendly and helped me sort through the required paperwork & $300 USD yacht entrance fee.

I first got the desire to sail after graduating college. I had dreams of dropping out of life, buying a sailboat, filling it with beer & Campbell’s soup and sailing away. Some 23 years, 3 sailboats and a trawler later we are finally realizing a dream. Time for some selfies in West End.

Yellow building behind us in the West End customs office

Old Bahama Bay marina is the only dockage in West End and a private party bought many of their slips. They were not able to offer us dockage so we had to use the remaining daylight to run to out the breakwaters of West End, around Indian Rock and use VPR (Visual Piloting Rules) to navigate to Mangrove Cay for the night’s anchorage.

Out of West End, around Indian Rock and onto the Little Bahama Bank.

Crossing the Little Bahama Bank is like nothing I’d ever experienced.

https://youtu.be/iYyyT84eqOA

The water is so clear you can see everything on the bottom. Where the blue sky meets the green ocean is captivating.

When you pay for your cruising permit it include a Bahamas fishing license so we wasted no time in trolling lines. Kelly caught this amberjack and was quick to return it’s freedom by throwing it back in the water.