We had a quick crossing from Nassau to Highborne Cay,

our first stop in the Exuma island chain.  Much of the center was in about only 10 feet of clear water.  I went forward to the front escape hatch and could see about 10 feet of the other bow come completely out of the water and then the hatch would be underwater and I could easily see the bottom.  A little eerie but unfortunately, none of the bottom pictures turned out good. Snorkling was good at Highborne Cay Rocks and while at the beach, we met an owner of one of the mid sized yachts, only 100 ft.  We told us he charters it out for only $55,000 per week plus expences, crew of 3 included.

We moved south to Normans Cay, famous for the drug smuggling in the 70’s and we disappointed to see the whole of the southern island is completely changed.  The small airport is greatly expanded, now with wire chain link fence all around, the tall casaurina pine trees are all gone and a huge new marina has been cut into the center of the island.  The old drug smuggling beach club is gone, we were glad to have seen it as it was several years ago.  It was too rough to snorkle the crashed DC3 airplane.

This time we stopped at Shroud Cay ( part of the national land and sea park system) and took the dingy up into the mangrove  creeks and were very surprised to meet our friends Marybeth and David on Regina Maris from Northwest Creek Marina in New Bern.  We had actually passed them before any of us realized who we were!

WE moved south again , anchoring in just enough water off O’Briens Cay . We took a LONG dingy trip to explore the underwater caves at Rocky Dundas, the Coral Garden at the south of Cambridge Cay and the small plane in 20 ft of water south of Johnny Depp’s island and the “Acquarium” with its great concentration of fish.  Cheryl and Brian saw a large ray, a turtle and a shark at the “Acquairum”

Time was getting short to get to Staniel Cay so Brian and Cheryl could fly back so we motored past the narrow channnel at Compass Cay, tru the intricate pass at Pipe Creek (narrow and shallow) and then a nice sail to visit the swimming pigs at Big Major.  It was jam packed full of boats and people and the pigs all looked very well fed.  We never saw so many large (100ft-200ft) yachts in one place in the Bahamas before.  We are still too cheap to pay $5 per bag to dispose of trash so we walked up to the dump  ourselves and visited the still closed Club Thunderball.  Of  course we had to dive the Thunderball Grotto and feed the fish with stale bread.   Early Saturday morning, Ed took Brian and Cheryl and all the luggage up the creek for the 100 ft walk to the airport for their early morning flight.

  We really enjoyed their long visit with us.  As it was New Year’s Eve and Staniel Cay was having a big fireworks display, we stayed the evening, set the alarm and got up to watch the fireworks. Next morning, we were off at high tide to thread our way thru the very shallow and very difficult route past Staniel and the coral reefs at Lumber Cay Cut.