A Week at Pipe Creek

A week ago we dropped our anchor in Pipe Creek, on the west side of Thomas Cay.  And we love it here.  The scenery is just beautiful.  The anchorage is protected and calm and no one is around.  The boat sits to tide, so we shift directions every few hours.  At slack we sit to wind, then when the current picks up we sit whichever way the current is running.  Most boaters hate this.  They don't like it when their boats change positions for fear of their anchor coming up and not resetting.  We have sat in tide current before and have not had a problem. So for us, we haven't minded the tide shifts.  In fact, this week we have loved it.  The current holds us abeam to the wind, so we have been getting a great breeze constantly blowing thru the boat, which keeps us nice and cool.  We have loved it.



At low tide there are a few sandbars nearby.  None of which are close enough to swim to, but make the scenery just gorgeous.  David hasn't minded running us to the different sandbars to play in the afternoons.  We love the one furthest west.  It is steep enough to land the tender on, piled high with soft white sand.  On one end the water pools in around some rocks and the colors of turquoise, light blue, and rock are just amazing to the eye.







The closer sandbar, in the middle of Pipe Creek, isn't steep, it is more low lying, but it is filled with shells. It is huge and you can walk and walk at low tide.   In the middle is soft white sand, and then as the tide runs out, the surrounding sandbar that appears is a treasure chest of sand dollars, tellin shells, and horse conch shells, but most of these have residents living in them. We even found some starfish. We found a few horse conch shells that had been abandoned to bring home.  In fact, I picked one up, took a quick look and thought it was empty.  I walked a little further, and out of the corner of my eye I saw something coming out of it.  I held it up, to see a white sucker laden leg come out.  Studying it, I thought, that doesn't look like a snail, what is it... and then I realized, it was an octopus leg, and sure enough it was fully climbing out of the shell.  I had never seen an octopus in a shell, and as it started spreading itself all over the shell, I screamed and dropped it.  It freaked me out!




The kids and Brittany came running over.  My camera was fogged up, so I didn't get any good pictures and I haven't gotten any from Brittany yet.  It was very cool it watch the octopus.  It didn't look like it was surviving well on the sand, so we found a broken conch shell to scoop it up in the sand and take it to the shallow water, where it changed colors to match the grass and plants in the sandy water to blend in.  It was very neat to watch.  Eventually it swam away while we watched.





The kids have enjoyed going to the close sand bar in the afternoons.  With the hand held Vhf they can radio us if needed, and we can keep an eye on them from the boat, while the little kids nap.  They build sand castles and sand forts, kayak in the shallows, hunt for shells, or walk and walk and walk. It's just them and the sand.  No one around to have to share it with.



Near the boat was a great snorkeling spot.  Best done at slack tide to make the swim back to the boat easier, but it is a shallow area full of coral, and sponges, and little colorful fish.  The kids also spent an afternoon on Thomas Cay hiking to the top of a nearby hill.  Its not very high, but it was fun to wave to them from the boat.  They hiked along the rocky eastern shore as the waves crashed on it.






Its been quite windy this last week, especially the last few days.  We have enjoyed being in this calm spot, you hardly notice the boat moving.  There have been only a few boats in the anchorage, mostly its just us and one or 2 other boats.  No one lives on Thomas Cay, and the other nearby cays have only a handful of private resort homes, so there really is no one around.  We get a few boats a day zooming past us going here or there, and a few going slowly appreciating the beauty of Pipe Creek.


Nearby is the little island of Overyonder Cay, with a pricey resort.  For $50000 a night, you and 12 guests can have the whole island and resort to yourselves.  They have their own seaplane, and it has been busy.  Sometimes it takes off or lands thru Pipe Creek, and we get to watch it from the boat. Alexander loves planes, so he gets very excited when the seaplane is nearby.




A few miles to the south is the small settlement and popular anchorage at Staniel Cay.  We spent an afternoon there, dropping our trash and checking out the 2 small markets.  Bananas were $3.00 a pound. A big box of cornflakes $6.00, and a litre of boxed milk $4.25.  I couldn't bring myself to buy any.  I did splurge on a big bag of grapes, that I thought were sort of reasonably priced. We paid a visit to the BTC, Bahamas cell phone office, to purchase additional data for internet, which is slow, but it works.


We have really loved the beautiful Pipe Creek area and would happily return.  In fact the only other place we have anchored this long, is Peter Island in the BVI's, and we also love that anchorage.  But the winds will die down on Sunday, and our time is ticking away, so we plan to leave the Exuma's behind to visit Eluthera.  Hopefully it will be as beautiful as here.

 

Little Hall's Pond and running aground

We left Shroud Cay and headed south.  We thought we would try and anchor near Little Halls Pond Cay, owned by Johnny Depp.  We pulled up the west side of the island and went to pull our tender in tight before heading up the narrow channel to where we planned to anchor.  In the process of pulling in the tender we drifted in the tidal current, and drifted over to the shallow sand where the current shoved us into a shallow finger.  Just as I noticed the drift, and attempted to move us away from the shallow hoping no fingers were caught in the tender ropes, the shallow ground grabbed our stern, and swung us around and trapped us.  We were aground!  David didn’t quite have the tender tied up yet and it started drifting in the current alongside the boat.  Lines were tangled and it became a chaotic situation. 

We were stuck in the shallow sand.  There were tangled lines hanging in the water, so I couldn’t try using the engines to pull us out.  We definitely did not want to wrap a prop with a line.  And the tender was bumping into the boat because it wasn’t tied up.  David climbed into the tender and was going to try using it to help pull us out of the sand but we had to get the lines untangled first or the tender wouldn’t pull straight.  I ran down to the back deck to help Calvin and Savannah who were working together to try to untangle the lines.  Instead we undid the lines so that only the tow line was left attached between the tender and the boat and we were able to just pull the rest of the lines in.

David then tried pulling us off the sandbar from the stern but as he did that I could feel our bow turn more into the shallow sand.  I tried reversing as he pulled on us, but still felt it was pushing our bow into the shallow.  I even tried using our bow thruster to help move our bow towards the deeper water.  I suggested we try attaching the tender to the bow of the boat and pull that way.  But we decided to try David pulling on the stern towards deeper water, with me using the engines to go forward rather than reverse.  This time it worked and we were free of the shallow water. 

I maneuvered the boat once again to face into the current, this time staying in gear, while David tied the tender upto the boat and the kids pulled the tow line in.  The current was tearing along that keeping us in gear with one engine pretty much just held us steady in place.  We did not move forward at all with the opposing current.  We were quickly tied up, and headed further up the island to a find a good anchor spot.  It took a couple times for us to get our anchor to grab the sand where we picked to stay, but finally it held.  We settled in for dinner and the evening.  I was still feeling a little overwhelmed from running aground.  The winds were blowing a good amount and that only added to my nerves.  They were also creating a little chop on the water which made it so an easy calm swim to and from the beach wasn’t possible. 

The next morning with the winds still blowing away, we decided to anchor on the other side of the island for a few snorkel trips and then move on a little further south.  We dropped anchor, still in the current, but a little calmer of a spot.  Everyone had finished school work and was ready to snorkel.  Except Savannah.  She opposed snorkeling these sights.  This would be our 3^rd time snorkeling this area, so I can understand her protest.  We were snorkeling a site called the “Aquarium”.  It’s a tiny grotto with plentiful fish and coral.  It is a great snorkel site.  There is a little current there, but with a rope tied to our tender it’s easy enough for all our kids to snorkel.  And with all the colorful fish there, it is rewarding and keeps even our 4 year old interested for a little bit.  I even coaxed the 2 year old in to take a peak under the water at the fishies with his goggles. 

After the aquarium site, we went to see a submerged plane that had crashed in the water.  It is a little 2 seater plane.  The reef and coral around the plane are pretty and fun to snorkel as well.  Calvin and I swam around for a bit, while the other kids were done after looking at the plane.

Back on the boat, after everyone washed up and changed back into dry clothes.  We pulled up anchor and headed south.  We checked charts for a good anchorage that would protect us from the slight swell running up the islands from the south.  The normal east winds had shifted slightly south, sending a swell running into most anchorages in the Exumas.  We decided to head into the Pipe Creek area, near Thomas Cay. 

We have not ever anchored here, but have tendered thru the area.  It is beautiful and very protected from all sides.  But it is narrow with a shallow entrance with rocks and coral.  After the excitement at Little Halls Pond the day before, and running aground in the sand, I was definitely nervous about this area.  We made it through the shallow area around Thomas cay, and then needed to pull the tender in.  The current was ripping thru the nearby cut.  We pulled out of the rip area, and were able to easily, smoothly pull the tender in without issue.  One problem down.  Now to head into the anchorage area and see how it goes.  It was low tide, and I was worried we’d hit bottom on our way in.  Not at all, we made it over the tight shallow area with no problem, and headed a little further in to drop anchor.

I was happy to see there was only one other boat.  I get nervous in crowded tight anchorages.  We picked a spot in 7 feet of sand and dropped the anchor.  Just then, a call came over the radio “RCABIN, RCABIN”  It was the other boat hailing us.  After a quick conversation on the VHF, we picked our anchor  up to move slightly more north.  They had out a lot of chain, so to stay out of their spin range, we moved another 75 feet north of them and laid out our chain… less than theirs.  I asked them why so much chain, and they felt the tidal changes, 4 times a day, necessitated more chain.  Maybe it does for them.  For us, we lay out our anchor, and use a 5 to 1 ratio for the amount of chain.  In this case, we put out a little more, about 45 feet all together.  Then we back down on our anchor, meaning we reverse and pull on it with our engines.  If that holds, then we rev our engines up a little, both engines to 800 rpms.  If that holds, we call it good and set.  We still use an anchor alarm for “just in case”.  Should our anchor flip and not dig back in, we want to know so we don’t drift away to somewhere we don’t want to be.  We feel the amount of force we apply to anchor to set it, is more than sufficient to hold us.  We like to sleep well at night, and not worry.  However that doesn’t stop either of us from checking if we awake in the middle of the night. They were here first, and that is the rule of thumb.  They were here first, so we have to anchor around them and stay out of their way.

After we set our anchor, a call to us came over the radio again.  The other boat, was concerned that we were maybe aground.  In setting our anchor, we stirred up the sand below.  It’s shallow, so running our engines, pulling on our anchor stirs up the sand.  They thought maybe we were aground.  We assured them we were not, but just making sure the anchor was good and set so we wouldn’t be running into them tonight. 

Again, we arrived at our destination just before dinnertime and sunset.  It was nice to sit down and enjoy dinner in a very calm spot, could hardly tell we were floating on water 

Shroud Cay, Exuma Park

Two years ago, when we passed briefly thru the Exumas I wanted to go to Shroud Cay.  But the north winds were blowing like crazy, which made the anchorages there untenable.  We day anchored at a small island nearby just to tender thru a creek on the north side of Shroud Cay to see the Eastern Beach, and hike the hill to the top.  It was a wet ride to the peaceful creek, but the sight at the end of the creek still lived in my memory.  It was beautiful...  2 years later, we had to go back.

We had east southeast winds, so it was perfect for staying at the northern anchorage on Shroud.  We pulled in slowly, near low tide, prepared to stop in case we bottomed out in the sand.  We closely watched our depth sounder, seeing 2.6, 2.3, 2.0...  If it hits 1.5 we're on the bottom.  Luckily, it never dropped below 2, and we made it into the "deeper" section with 3 feet below us, total depth of about 7 feet.  Sadly, it was too far from the beach to swim or kayak too. 

But the view from the boat was spectacular.  I couldn't stop staring.  The white sand in the distance... The rocks sitting in shallow sand, making the water around them the lightest blue, made them glow slightly.  It was truly breathtaking.  I loved just sitting on our back deck, feeding the baby, or reading a book, or watching the little ones play, and staring out at this amazing view.  With the winds blowing steady, the air temp was a perfect 78, which just added to the view.  

Late afternoon, the tide had come up and we all loaded into the tender to revisit the mangrove creek, as we had 2 years before.  After meandering thru the creek, we arrived at the eastern beach, with waves crashing in, and pools at the opening of the creek to the ocean.  It was just as beautiful as it was 2 years ago.  The kids grabbed their boogie boards, and were ready to run off.  We had a quick lesson on current and rip tides, reminding them to swim across a current, to not tire out trying to swim up a current.  And then they were off, running out to the waves to ride them in.

Matthew and Isabel and Brittany took the path leading up the hill to the "driftwood" camp at the top.  There is a pretty view from the top.  Matthew enjoyed the short hike so much, he had to drag Brittany off for a 2nd trip up the hill before we left.  The rest of the kids were having too much fun on the beach.

After a fun time at Driftwood Beach, it was time to head back thru the creek as the tide switched to head out.  The day was ending and we caught a beautiful sunset as we tendered back to the boat.  A perfect ending, to a great day.

We spent another day at Shroud Cay, enjoying the beach.  The winds were still blowing out of the southeast, but on the beach there was only a breeze.  Calvin and Isabel still had enough wind to fly a kite, and had fun figuring out how to get it in the air.  Savannah and Isabel took the kayak into the creek and snorkeled for a bit, but did not find that successful.  I snorkeled awhile and saw a few fish.  Mostly I enjoyed walking the beach with Alexander and Matthew.  Matthew would run up the beach, into the rocks and mark an X.  Each new section of beach, seperated by rocks, had to be marked with an X.  I asked him why he was doing this.  Thinking he would say something piraty like "X marks the spot" or "that's where the treasure is".   His response... "the people will know what it means when they find it".  He puts a smile on my face.

We decided to head out the next morning.  In hopes of finding something a swims length away from a beach, and a little more peaceful so we could put our floating dock back down.  It wasn't uncomfortable where we were, but because we had to anchor so far from shore, the water was slightly choppy.  There was too much wind where we were for the dock.

Before we left the area, we tendered around to see the nearby anchorages.  Had the winds been lighter, and more eastern, my first pick would be to move to the south Hawksbill Anchorage.  It was absolutely beautiful too.  But with the wind and south swell, it just would not do.  We even tendered around to the south end of Hawksbill cay, and WOW...  absolutly stunning.  I was sad we would not be enjoying that area this trip.  I guess it leaves something new to explore next year.

We decided to head a little more south and try anchoring off of Little Halls Pond, the private island of Johnny Depp.

Highbourne Cay, Exumas

Our first stop in the Exumas was Highborne Cay.  Since we arrived in the dark we anchored as close as we dared and could see in the dark, so in the morning we moved in closer so it was a good swim or kayak to the beach.  The kids were excited it was Saturday and could head to the beach as soon as chores were done.  No school work keeping them from the beach.  They played there for hours.

The tall tower on the beach is very important.  It is the only cell phone tower for miles.  With our Bahamas cell phone SIM card, we intended to make the most of our range of that tower with internet.

  After spending a little time at the beach, I swam back to the boat.  David said Matthew had a pet.  So Matthew showed me his new friend.  His pet dragonfly.  He caught it by the tail as it was flying around the back deck.  He wanted to put it in a container and keep it.  He would hold it and pet it.  He loved his little dragonfly.  Eventually it was time to let it go.  We were worried he had harmed it, but off it flew as we waved goodbye.

 Our new purchase this year is the floating dock.  It has been great in calm anchorages to tie up to the boat and use for loading/unloading from the tender, and for swimming on and off of. I, sadly still need a ladder or step to help hoist me out of the water.  Poor Jessie just begs to go in the water.  We put her in and she made a beeline swim to shore.  She ran around on the beach for a bit, then would look out to the anchorage.  I wondered if she knew which boat was ours.  Especially when she was swimming in the water again.  David eventually went to get her, so she wasn't lost to us.


Jessie is an old girl, 12 now.  These last few years she has started to shed.  Maybe a part of her Thyroid condition.  At any rate, she sheds, and we don't like it.  So we decided to shave her.  Boy what a difference that has made!  She hardly loses any of her hair now.  But gone is her wiry coat, common to Chesapeakes, instead she is left with soft fur.

The island to the north of Highborne has a number of Rock Iguanas living there.  They come out to the beach when you land, hoping to be fed.  Sunday after our primary lesson we went for a family outing to go see the Iguanas.

By Monday morning it was time to head on to see new sights.