Hope Town on Elbow Cay

It was an easy run up from Lynyard Cay, 12 direct line miles and, maybe, 16 or 17 travel miles. Along the way we saw this sandy beach on an unnamed bit of land. Everyone says that the beaches in the Abacos are the best. We also saw this house with an annex made up to look like the Hope Town lighthouse, although we did not know that at the time.

We had no reason to hurry north. Hope Town suffers from the same issues as does Spanish Wells, very shallow depths on the approach, some less than 4-ft. at mean low water. So, we timed our arrival for 1230, dead high tide. Despite the extra 2.94 ft. of depth, it was challenging approaching the channel. The channel itself is remarkably well marked; the approach is not marked at all so you take your best shot and hope that you're right. We made it without mishap but much of that was luck; there is a shoal where the channel enters the harbour of which we were unaware. I'm not sure why we did not hit it but we didn't. Now, it's noted on the chart. We also found out, after the event, that a tethered red fender was actually a navigational aid marking the closest approach boats should take to a small coral island. Not knowing this and thinking it was somebody's anchor marker we went on the wrong side. Had it not been dead high tide we would have been hard aground.

Mooring balls here are different from from any other place we have visited. The harbour is very small, so to cram more boats into the limited space the tethers attach directly to the bow cleats. This has the effect of making the swing radius for any boat much smaller. When first we arrived we picked the worst possible mooring spot, only one tether and that was in terrible shape. So, with the approaching winds we decided to move to another spot, maybe three boat lengths from where we first were. The new mooring was in tighter quarters, with boats all around so a nice couple came by in their dinghy to hand Carol the tethers making the whole process much easier and less nerve wracking for her, anyway. I had to turn the boat around once to head into the wind and then back up because we wanted a different mooring. So, my nerves were properly wracked.

We went ashore our first evening here for dinner, Carol having cooked for at least seven straight nights. Carol loves to eat and loves eating even more when she does not have to cook.

This is a place which Carol has wanted to visit ever since we first started thinking about the Bahamas. It is charming, quaint, and, Carol hopes, suitably romantic. The old town, around the harbour, is beyond belief. It looks like Disney theme park for how a Bahamian island town ought to look. Or, maybe it's the movie set for some Bahamian version of The Truman Show except here Truman Burbank would likely be Truman Pindar or Truman Rolle. If either of those two clans ever had a family reunion it would take a huge island to accommodate all the attendees. Several islands in the Exumas have a Rolletown. The houses are all old, some dating to the late 1800's; they are all immaculately maintained; the profusion of bougainvillea astounds. Most have shutters and these are not decorative affectations; when closed for hurricanes they will completely cover the doors and windows. The Queen's Highway is a concrete oxymoron; it is one wagon wide or two abreast for people on horseback. It seems that many of the houses are for vacation rental and not being lived in by the owners. There are golf carts but most people seem to take shank's mare and hoof it from place to place; the distance around the harbour cannot much exceed one mile.

The amazing thing is that all of the old town around the harbour looks like these pictures except with more colors.

And, dominating the island and the harbour is the lighthouse. It sits on a small rise and is 120-ft. high although I don't know if that is the height of the structure or the height above the water. It is the last manned lighthouse in the Bahamas, lighthouses everywhere falling prey to the ubiquity and accuracy of GPS.

Going up the lighthouse was an experience. The front door is open to all comers; the rules are mainly concerned about matches and lighters, there being lots of kerosene about. There are no warnings that falling could be hazardous to your health; there are no yellow and black safety lines on the floors or stairs. All the hallmarks of our overly litigious society are absent, the Bahamians trusting the common sense of adults. From the outside there is a clear wedding cake design where each higher tier is somewhat smaller that the one below; inside the walls were even, allowing a smooth surface for the circular stairs. At the windows the wall thickness must have been at lest three feet.

The kerosene fuel tanks that feed the flame for the light.

After almost five years on the boat Carol learned that lighthouses each have signature light patterns to distinguish one from another and that they focus light through fresnel lenses.

Prrof that I have been there, done that, and I did get a t-shirt.

Having already visited Russell Island I now got the chance to walk on Russell Lane.

At Brunswick Landing Marina I met Bob and Gail F. who had sailed their boat, Tulum III, around the world, taking ten years to accomplish that. Bob said that when he returned he had 200 t-shirts, which is about 1.7 t-shirts per month. I am on a pace to eclipse that number easily. I guess the existential question is: if you don't have a t-shirt were you really there. I saw one I liked for Hope Town, and then saw one I liked even more. Forget the stars, my Michelin guide has this as the only two t-shirt rated stop on the trip so far. I cannot imagine why I would want to live here but this is the first island that I could imagine coming back to visit after the boat.

Carol & the Dinghy:

• We have had this dinghy and motor for well over a year now and Carol had not once started or driven it. So, this being a small and sheltered place, it seemed like a good time for her to learn. I reduced the starting to four simple steps which even she could master and, hopefully, remember. Since the engine was already warmed up from earlier use, starting it should have been pretty easy. Watching Carol pulling the starting rope was like watching her try to throw a baseball overhand for a strike: it was a painful and unnatural motion. To her credit she did get it started, drove it across the harbour, stopped the engine and got it restarted and back to the boat.

• The only thing worse than watching her try to start the dinghy is to watch her getting into it. She seems to have no confidence in her balance and the dinghy rarely stays stationary to accommodate her fears. She has only fallen all the way into the water, once, at Vero Beach, maybe two years ago; the times she has almost deep sixed herself are too many to count. Watching this, which I have done a lot, is painful and time consuming.

• The dinghy is our pickup truck carrying us, trash from the boat and provisions to the boat along with our several jerry cans. Carol divides the dinghy into halves, the front being hers and the rear, since I usually drive, mine. The rear section gets the 3-gal. fuel tank, the swing radius for the O/B motor handle, the pump, all the cargo, oars, me, etc. She gets all of the front all to herself needing a larger targeted landing area for her graceless landings, flops, and plops, frequently loud and always awkward.

• But wait, there's more! On Friday morning, Carol, now deeming herself both accomplished and expert with the dinghy having twice started the already warm engine, decided that she was ready to run some errands all by her big girl self which was fine by me. She left and I remained below reading that day's edition of the WSJ when I heard my name being called, presumably by Carol. I went up to see what the deal was. The deal was that Carol had violated rule #1 of dinghy-ing, one which I have stressed with her many times: never free the dinghy from whatever it is tied to until the motor is running. To make matters worse, when the dinghy is attached to our stern I tilt the motor forward, removing the motor stem from the water to prevent marine growth in the small water circulation cooling channels. Carol did not even know how to lower the engine so that it could be started. So, there she was drifting to the windward shore of the harbour with the engine still in the up position. The oars are attached and easily have been used except the seat has to be in to actually row and she doesn't know how to put in the seat. The solution turned out to be simple: I put on my bathing suit, jumped into the fairly foul water, swam to the dinghy, hauled myself in, lowered and then started the motor. Too much stress on an old body that early in the morning, too much reminiscent of the lobster pot debacle and not what I imagined would be part of the for better, for worse deal to which I agreed several decades past.

There is room for about 40 boats to moor here. Since there is the prospect of weather there's no room at the inn. We saw David and Alice this morning before they headed over to Marsh Harbour. Wind Dust was here and Megerin arrived this afternoon. Dharma, which was traveling with Debbie, is here; Dharma and Wind Dust are both nominally home ported in Oriental, NC as we are. In our travels this year we have seen a few of the other boats moored here but we have not met their owners. French Kiss is somewhere in the area since we have heard them hailed in the VHF radio. It is a small cruising world, collapsing up to the Abacos as a staging area for folks to head home a thought that was much on my mind until I saw the 31^o temperature earlier this week.

Carol and I toured the island on another golf cart. Once we left the old town the island was just another place being developed with some fairly big homes and, certainly, pricing native Bahamians out of the market. Just in case our dear friend Moose decides to move to the islands there will be an opportunity for him to serve in the VFD.

The weather has been a little breezy and will stay that way for another day or three. We have paid for the mooring through Sunday night and hope to move on Monday, maybe to Man-O-War Cay. The nice thing about this stretch of islands is that going from one to the next the miles are measured in single digits easy, non-stressful days. The only near term trick is getting out of here on a high enough tide. Having been to the top of the lighthouse, I was able to see the water and where to go to avoid the biggest problems.