Cruising Log: The Bahamas with Annabelle 2: Part 1

Cruising Log: The Bahamas with Annabelle 2: Part 1

submitted by Bob and Karen McMullen on their Hunter 420 Passage

Join Bob & Karen McMullen for a 3 month cruise of the Bahamas aboard the Hunter Passage 420 Annabelle 2. Detailed log entries, great photos and local insights make for great educational entertainment.

Part 1 of this 4 episode series starts with the departure from Whitney’s marine in Orange Park, FL and includes a Gulf Stream crossing and stops in Mangrove Cay, Yankee Cay, Powell Cay and Green Turtle Cay.

Sunday, March 26th Whitney’s Marina
Departed 10am weather clear temp 60- wind NE15 – Debbie, Richard, Joan & Ken saw us away. All of Nicky’s fine sewing, cookies from Linda & Gordon and a decanter from Debbie. No Rum on board yet to put in the decanter, but we will fix that soon. Anchored at Back River 2pm. We will decide on ICW or offshore in the morning.

Monday, March 27th/ Back River
Up anchor 7am- Beautiful Morning Temp Cold , winds & seas light, so out Mayport we go. Saw a tall ship “Gunilla” as she came in. 5’ NE swell built during the day combined with a 3-4’S10 wave made for a rough night.

Tuesday, March 28th./Offshore
7am – Cleared Cape Canaveral. The seas and winds have laid down some. A beautiful off-shore sun rise. Arrived Ft. Pierce 5:30pm, Just in time to get fuel and water before City Marina Closed. Anchored on the East Side of ICW for the night.


Wednesday, March 29th
At anchor in Ft. Pierce – Used last day in US to check Sat Phone & other technology. Found they do not work as advertised. We left Ft. Pierce at 6:30pm to cross Gulf Stream for the Bahamas. Crossing started well, still had 5’ NE swell but winds are light. By midnight wind increased
to 15 E with a 3-4” E waves. Of course there were two tugs towing barges, but we never saw the barges. And had to dodge a couple of freighters. A flock of 7 sail boats coming off the bank really had us going, green over white in a crazy pattern.

Thursday, March 30th 7am
Arrived at White Sand Ridge, Bahamas Bank. With the wind and wave if it had not been for the depth finder we would not have known we were on the bank. Had a 5ft swell from the NE and 3-4ft wave from the east with a 15nt wind on the nose to go along with it. We had planed to anchor at Great Sale for the night, but we opted for Mangrove Cay instead. Dropped the hook at about 2:30pm, then we laid down in salon on couch- next thing we knew it was three hours later. We cooked steaks, christened Annabelle 2 with a bottle of champagne we had saved from our wedding, toasted each other, the boat, then off to sleep again- we were exhausted.

Friday, March 31st – Mangrove Cay
Stayed at Mangrove for the day- it’s a nice spot. We can see the glow of lights from Grand Bahama Island at night, otherwise nothing but the small island and water. Five sailboats pulled
in to share our anchorage for the night. They were all headed North (snowbirds). At sundown
we were eating dinner in the cockpit when the other boats started blowing their conch horns at
the setting sun.

Saturday, April 1st Mangrove Cay – 5:30am
Up anchor to head for the Carter Cay area. Light winds out of East 5-10 & cool. The ocean
swells have quieted down. Sailed to first waypoint off Great Sail Cay. Then motored to
Yankee Cay off Carter, arrived mid-afternoon. Bob cleaned the bottom that he could get
without Scuba and I swam laps around the boat. This is a beautiful place- we saw no one else,
like we were the only people on earth. At night there were no lights- only the stars and a sliver
of moon. It was wild.

Sunday, April 2nd- Yankee Cay
Light winds out of the west, still cool. Bob got out the scuba and cleaned the rest of the hull. Still no one in sight. There are supposed to be fishermen that stay at Carter Cay, but apparently not on the weekend. Generator shut down unexpectedly with over heating. Will have to call service tomorrow.

Monday, April 3rd Yankee Cay
Up anchor to move to Spanish Cay to clear customs, refuel, and get water. The place was creepy- no one there, just workers. The customs lady was nice and we had no problems clear in. After filling up the tanks and clearing in we walked around the island. We had not been on dry land since March 28th. Picking up a bottle of coconut rum in the store we looked around then
headed back to Annabelle. Decided to anchor off Powel Cay for the night. Very pretty place, plan to go to Coppers Town in am to see if we can get online and provision. Unfortunately, we learned a hard lessonnever buy water without tasting it first. The water was so salty we had to dump it and refill at Green Turtle. Spanish Cay charges 40 cents a gallon for bad water… God knows what the fuel will be like.

Tuesday, April 4th
Powel Cay During the night the anchor alarm went off. The anchorage there is poor holding/ thick grass, and the wind shifted and got stronger, so we drug, not a lot but enough that Bob got little sleep. In the morning we decided to move on. Plus, the generator is still broken, looks like
Bob will have to get parts shipped to Green Turtle. At Green Turtle we hope to be able to
get online and establish communications, something so far we are without.

Wednesday, April 5th – Green Turtle Cay
The Bluff House Marina. We were able to get a dock for the night so we could plug in to shore power and Bob could diagnose the problem with Northern Lights. Sat phone very intermittent and the Bluff House Internet Service is down. Met a nice seventy-five year old couple two slips down “Alice & Don” on ArB Fifie a 44’ Catch built in 1968. He is a Scientist from Rochester; they have been cursing for 40 years.

Thursday, April 6th – Green Turtle Cay
Bob and Nathan with Northern Lights have worked things out to ship parts to us. Now we need to go in to town to get a good address and route for the parts to come. Also we have still not gotten online. We dingied out of White Sound and over to Settlement Creek on the south end of the island, New Plymouth. We found a realestate office that has Internet Service when they are open. Bob spoke to customs about getting parts sent. And we checked out the local grocery stores. On the way back a lady on a small wooden sailboat anchored in white sound waved us over. Her name is Shirley. She and her cat Sinbad left South Africa four years ago and sailed across to South America, up through the Caribbean and the North American coast then back here to make repairs before sailing on to Bermuda.

Friday, April 7th- Green Turtle Cay
The Marina is almost deserted; ArB Fifie and some others left today to get south of Whale Cay Pass. A cold front is coming and this will be the last day to go through for a while. We took the dingy over to Green Turtle Club to see if we could get online there. We can pick up their site on our computer from the dock but we were told that their Internet is only for their guests. So we took a walk out to the beach on the Ocean side. It is beautiful! And it was a good long walk.

Saturday, April 8th – Green Turtle Cay
Bob is off to the Treasure Island Airport on the ferry to pick up the parts, they are finally in!!!***!!! We hope to leave as soon as generator is fixed. While he is gone other boats start flocking to the docks like crazy. I found out that the cold front coming towards us is going to be a
bad one. So I make a Command Decision while Bob is gone and tell the marina that we decided to stay put at the dock. Upon consultation, Bob has no objections- smart man! Smart man yes, but no luck as generator mechanic. He put in the parts and still no change- it keeps shutting
down after 20 minutes or so. Bob sulks for the rest of the day.