There's more than one way to catch a fish

Before the winds came through Grand Cay yesterday, two other couples invited us for a drink at a raised pavilion at the end of our dock (and it's always BYOB). Even though the ladies stated that they do not like dogs I took Wilbur anyway and kept him far away from them. He was a very good boy and his feelings were a little hurt when no one told him how cute he was.

"Mama, why don't they like the pitty?" Wilbur wants to know.

This is where we sat and from here you get a bird's eye view of the harbor entrance.

While the sky continued to darken ominously and the winds began to pick up, one of the men said, "Here come the rays." I looked out over the water and immediately felt like I'd been jerked back in time to the Wild West.

Huge (at least 8 feet I'm sure) Manta (or Manta like) Rays could be seen gliding through the water of the harbor as they slowly headed toward the marina. It was like watching desperado's stroll into town complete with guns on their hips, spurs on their heels, and evil on their minds.

I didn't have my camera and probably wouldn't have gotten a decent shot anyway.

Those patches of white are sand, and at low tide stick way out of the water. They are very close to the marina and even though we only draw two and a half to three feet we were sure we were going to run aground.

The winds were still hitting hard this morning and even though we could have gone out I talked Hans into staying another day. But it paid off in the end because I'm grilling dolphin (mahi) tonight.

So how did that happen?

I call it a different kind of trolling (trawling?) and I didn't even need a lure. All I did was visit with the men in the boat next to us, and before I knew it I had a zip lock bag full of fish (Hans says he's glad now that he stayed below and out of the way). It reminded me of how years ago my friend, Michelle, and I would go out to a local bar for the evening and come home with our purses full of drink chips thanks to all the visiting out of town business men who were out for dinner. Oh, the good old days, and who'd have ever thought getting a bag of smelly fish would make me as happy as a free drink?!

Now all I have to do is find a beer boat full of slightly blind men and we'll all be happy!

Oh, how the mighty have fallen!

And I say that because after catching a fish so very easily the first day we threw out a trolling line, we haven't had a nibble since!

This is most likely because we've been on the 'banks' which is basically the same thing as trying to fish on flooded land.

We finally left Bimini and headed for West End on Wednesday. The winds were not what we'd been hoping for and this meant we had to motor nearly the whole way through the Northwest Providence Channel for about nine hours and even in these deepest of waters our lures held no interest for the Bahamian fishies.

West End was an interesting anchorage but we held tight and actually ended up dinhying ashore the next day. Of course this meant Master Wilbur had to go with us and as soon as we were in shallow waters he was the first one out of the dinghy and he had himself a wonderful zoomie time. Poor Wilbur (whom I swear would make an excellent Blood Hound) couldn't suck up all the new smellies at the beach fast enough and was completely enamoured of every abandoned Conch shell we passed. He would brace his body and dig each and every toenail into the sand, thus bringing me to a complete halt, and would then, with eyes closed in complete rhapsody, lovingly run his tongue over every inch of shell that he could. I would eventually end his love making by yanking him to his feet and unfortunately onto the next abandoned Conch shell.

When he was finally worn out we stopped at a beach side restaurant for a couple of beers (5 bucks apiece! Ouch!) and an appetizer, and were very thankfull that no one cared that we had a dog with us. Actually just as we were leaving a woman who was sitting nearby made some doggy loving noises and we just had to stop. It turns out she and her husband have an 85 pound pitty and like all pitty owners she wanted to gush over Wilbur. During the gushing session Wilbur found yet one more empty Conch shell and at one point I feared he'd dig a hole to China he went so nuts!

We finally moved on the next day and anchored in Mangrove Cay with a few other boats and enjoyed a quiet night. The next day we set out again and this time anchored in Great Sale Cay. We dropped our dinghy in the water and rowed over to another boat we'd been in contact with throughout the day. Jackie and Seldon have an Island Packet (we have and Island Packet Cat) and it is a beautiful boat indeed! That night at anchor was possibly one of the quietest I've ever experienced and looking out over the water was like looking at a smooth pane of glass. Never once during the night did we hear a thing!

But after two days of no internet coverage we decided our next stop would be Grand Cay. Our last weather info had told us that a storm with 25-30 knots of wind was due to move through at around midnight on Sunday and at least Grand Cay had a marina with internet access.

We sailed on into Grand Cay (Rosie's Marina) at a little after noon, and after jumping on to Passage Weather dot com we found the storm had been moved up to 6 PM. (BTW, don't go into the harbour at Rosie's during low tide if you draw more than 3 feet).

The storm hit at 6:30 PM (as the updated forecast told us it would) and as of 10:30 PM it's still blowing stink out there. But we honestly feel that if we were at Great Sale Cay we'd be okay. The bottom there is a really great kind of sandy clay with great holding power and is protected from everything except a South wind.

We do not have SSB and have to rely totally on the internet. And since I have absolutely no trust in NOAA, I will continue to honor Passage Weather until it's out of our range.



We saw this water spout just as we were getting close to Grand Cay. Hans pointed it out to me and my heart just jumped as all I could think was 'TORNADO'!!!!!! Luckily after a spell it just disipated but the other boaters here in the marina saw it.


















Low lying clouds here in the marina. Once the wind and rain started, it never let up and even though I'm pretty sure we'd be okay at an anchorage, I'm glad we're thoroughly tied up at a dock!

As I've mentioned before, Internet coverage is iffy but I'll post whenever I can.