April 12 ,2004
Cape Santa Maria, Long Island Latitude 23_ 39.70N - Longitude 76_ 21.60W

A special welcome to members of the West Point Sailing Club visiting my site! If your schedule is anything like my nephew’s, I know they keep you pretty busy at school, so for now, I hope the site will spark your imagination until you have a chance to hop on a boat and ride the wild Bahamian winds for yourself! Feel free to ask any questions by email, and sooner or later, I will respond!

As I said before, it is best not to make too many solid plans when you are sailing. On our way to Rum Cay over two weeks ago, we anchored off the northern tip of Long Island at Cape Santa Maria to await favorable wind to enter the Atlantic. That weather window never came, in fact a prediction of sustained southwesterly winds of 25 knots, then changing to northeasterly and increasing (some reaching gale force) sent us retreating back to Georgetown for a while. The beauty of Georgetown for sailors is the abundance of anchorages with the ability to select shelter from winds in any direction. For the southwestern blow we chose a place called “Red Shanks” a series of Cays that provide protection from all winds without having to pick up anchor. We moved to Stocking Island when the wind shifted northeasterly to be closer to town and to visit the doctor who arrives from Nassau one day per week. Seems the spider bite I received over three week ago was of the necrosing type and was eating away my skin! The water we took on a couple weeks ago was tainted and also caused some problems. Thanks to the doctor, I’m all better now!

Since the weather has provided steady 25+ knot winds since last week and we are waiting for it to turn east later this week to begin moving North. Both Cat Island and Eleuthera. are lengthy and lie north-south so we hope to head there to get some good sailing in along their lee coast—if we can just get to them! After such windy weather the sea state is still high with 8-10 feet wind waves and contributing sea swells. If they lay down a few feet, and the wind direction turns more easterly, we will reef down and head northeast to Cat Island. Hopefully, I’ll be able to write you from there.

I’ve loaded a couple pictures of Long Island. This is one of my favorite islands to date. The interior is like a tide pool, drying at low tide to create immense sand bars, then filling in again at high tide to create inland lakes and rivers, navigable by dinghy. The north coast picture shows the steep cliffs at Cape Santa Maria with a monument marking what is supposed to be the site where the Santa Maria of the Columbus expedition met its end on the reef there. The other picture is an example of an inland lake. Of course pictures never do justice to the actual experience, but imagine…and enjoy!

Photo: Long Island Interior