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Sometime in the middle of the night, the anchor alarm goes
off. The wind has completely died causing the boat to swing
around on the anchor. Nick goes topside to check. A few minutes
later, he comes back to bed. "You should go look at the
water. I've never seen anything like it," he says before
dozing off. As I step into the cockpit, the image before me
is surreal. The boat appears to be floating in the stars.
The water is a perfect mirror reflecting the sky above. Twinkling
stars appear above and below the boat, which seems suspended
between the cosmic and aquatic worlds.
On Wednesday morning, January 17th, we motor out of Royal
Island headed for Eleuthera by way of Current Cut. The strong
current in this cut can make it impassable, so we time our
arrival at the high tide when the current should be fairly
slack. Ahead of us are Pegasus and Irish Fever,
behind is Civil Twilight. As the lead boats make the
turn out of Current Cut through a shallow area labeled "Visual
Piloting Required," they radio back to us that they're
seeing a little over 5 feet of water. This is not good! Our
boat has a draft (depth) of 5 1/2 feet, and Civil Twilight
is a foot more. The lead boats have drifted to the left of
the course and suggest that we stay closer to the rocks in
this area. "Oh great, another white-knuckle day!"
I sigh. The drama is short-lived and we pass through without
any problems in 10 feet of water. The remainder of the trip
is a relaxing motorsail to Governor's Harbour, where we anchor
behind Levy Island with Civil Twilight.
On Thursday, we travel to Rock Sound where we hook back up
with Pegasus and Irish Fever. Civil Twilight
arrives the next day. As we walk through town, people say
hello and motorists honk. There's not much to do here, but
the town seems more authentic than some of the places frequented
by tourists. We refill our fuel jugs and buy a few groceries
in anticipation of our departure for the Exumas tomorrow.
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Rock Sound
Dakota gets a Sun Shower on deck
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