Jan. 1 It was sunny but a bit windy. Today was the cruisers’ race and it went off pretty well. We could see it from where we were at anchor. As that was happening we left for our New Years lunch with Andale at Sampson Cay Marina Resort. John had helped Alan with a big boat project and he wanted to treat us. Our new Canadian friends tagged along and made the party even more jolly. The food was good but heavy and we spent the rest of the afternoon drinking ginger ale and making visits to the bathroom on Andale. I worked on their puzzle with Kat while digesting. We returned to the boat and made an early evening of it.

Jan 2. This morning, we went over to visit our Canadian friends on their big fishing trawler, Sunset. They gave us the fifty cent tour and we were impressed with the homey feeling and comfort everywhere. In the afternoon, John went quickly over to Andale in the marina and said our good byes. They had decided to go back to Ft. Lauderdale and get their boat worked on and maybe put it up for sale. That evening, we had our Portuguese friends on Eliora, Chuck and Sondra, over for a Portuguese style codfish dinner. They provided the dried cod and we provided the rest for the dish. Afterwards, we taught them dominos and kept them up well passed their bedtime!

Jan 3 It was a beautiful and calm day so we headed south to a new anchorage called White Point. We were anchored off a lovely large white beach but some other tourists had gotten their first with children and “sea toys” and they stayed too long. Finally, we couldn’t stand it anymore and swam into the beach and walked the opposite direction. They soon left and we had the whole place to ourselves. We then swam back hoping it wasn’t shark feeding time! That evening, I decided to continue the Brazilian Cipirina drinking and was feeling no pain and in bed by 8pm.

Jan.4 Another beautiful day and so we moved down the island to another new anchorage only this one had bad holding which means the anchor wouldn’t go into the sand because it was too hard. Because there wasn’t going to be any wind, we decided to let the anchor sit there and we put out alot of chain for weight. If we dragged, it would be out to sea which was fine. Two other boats with us did the same thing. One boat we had seen by Staniel and we had been very curious about because it was a very small “camper looking” power boat. The owners were German and very friendly and waved us over as we past in our dinghy. They gave us a tour which didn’t take long. We invited them for cocktails aboard Windermere. We had never been to Little Farmer’s Cay so we took the dinghy to the town dock only to find out the restaurant we wanted to go to was closed for the day! Plan B was the local yacht club where were able to secure two good cheeseburgers and two rum punches. Once we were back at the boat I changed into my bathing suit and we both went to the beach in the dinghy. This one was deserted and we found some interesting shells and John found a big beautiful dead crab. Once we get it cleaned up, I will send a photo. Cocktails went well and we watched a movie afterwards.

Jan. 5 More exploring down the island chain a few more miles looking for anchoring possibilities. Musha Cay resort has been closed to anchoring for several years but we had heard it was possible to anchor there again. We did so off the lovely resort beach. David Copperfield, the magician, owns the whole thing and it has been well done as far as we could see. After anchoring, we took the dinghy north to Cave Cay and checked out the almost totally enclosed deep water marina which seemed deserted. We couldn’t get anyone on the radio and we were thinking of anchoring there for the next storm that was coming. Our friends on Eliora stopped by and we all went on a sand dollar expedition to a big sand flats that was almost dry at low tide. Freckles, their cock-a-poo, had a great time running around in the shallow water and we found a good bunch of sand dollars. John even found another gigantic sea egg like he found last year! Hew gave it to Sondra for her new shell collection. They invited us to cocktails on their boat, which was anchored about a mile away, so we went back and changed and dinghied over there for a nice time. It was dark when we left them but we were able to find our way home by going slowly and looking at the various lights from the islands and boats

Jan 6 We both got up thinking it would be better to go home to the Staniel area and anchor between the Majors (islands) for the next blow. When we had anchored the day before, we noticed an old mooring cement block on the bottom. Our chain was next to it yesterday but slightly curved around it today because of the wind shift. As we maneuvered the boat to get away from it, it became apparent the anchor was tangled in the anchors and lines that used to hold it in place. John had to take our heavy snubber down to our anchor and hook it to it. I had to winch the snubber in and lower the chain to flip the anchor enough to release it. This worked and John swam back to the boat and finished the job as I steered us out through the cut to deeper water. The west wind allowed us to go up the island chain on the outside and we came in the cut by the Majors where we wanted to anchor. Everyone had the same idea so we had to pick a secondary spot with medium holding. We were very protected from the wind at that point so we hoped we would be all right through the night. During the night, the wind shifted as expected and picked up. John stayed up most of the night because he is the captain and “the princess” needs her sleep or she is cranky the next day. The anchor, Cecil, held once again. Yipee!