Log Book - San Salvador and Rum Cay

April 15th, 2004
Recap of Conception, San Salvador and Rum Cay Islands - The Gorgeous, the Hellish and the Abandoned

This is a re-cap page, with some of the photos and stories we've missed posting along the way.

Conception, as described before, was too beautiful to be fake. No Hollywood set could render such perfection as we found there in reality. Unfortunately for such wanderers as we two, we just had to leave Paradise for furthur exploration, and this is, in my opinion, where things went awry. San Salvador was memorable for us in a couple of ways, both good and bad. On the one hand, it sported as mascot the largest metal iguana we've ever seen (it's strange that they didn't pick Christopher Colombus as a mascot, but then I guess he was available for modelling) It was also the first marina stay I had in the 'Blue, the first shower in a little over a month (oh BLISS!!), the first time we got treated by a Bahamian and taken out for drinks in the local bar (the "Juicy") and the first period of time that I seriously regretted ever stepping foot on the Afterblue.

Yes, on the other hand, it was the site of our most horrible, rollicky, stomach-heaving anchorage yet. The story must be told.

We sailed away from our Marina after two days of pampering, with showers and toilets and quiet nights. We headed to the south tip of the island, French Wells, where there were some castle ruins, interesting looking reefs and a good starting point for our trip out to Rum Cay. What we weren't looking for was bad weather that kept us locked in place, miserably anchored about 10 feet from some nasty coral heads, rocking about day and night from double surges: ocean current pushing us towards shore, and the rebounding current from the long reef off-shore. The winds were 20-25 knots out on the open ocean, with no nearby islands to calm either the wind, or the 9 ft seas. So we stayed put, hoping it would change out there so we could cross over to Rum Cay.

It's hard to describe the awfulness, the continuing misery of never being still, of constantly moving up and down and side to side like a squirrel in the proverbial washing machine. The waves would slap so hard against the boat hull that it sounded like the crack of a baseball bat. And it wasn't one day, or even two, it was four days of unrelenting bobbing and bouncing. We were fed up, tired with little sleep, nothing but cans to eat and each other to entertain. We read incessantly, I painted, or tried to, we prayed for it to end, and it didn't. So in the end it was do or die, we just had to brave the bad weather and head off into big seas because anything would be better than staying through that any longer.

Once having left the island and into the open sea, it wasn't actually so bad: other than an occasional flip of my stomach when a monster wave came up behind us (thankfully we were running downwind) you just had to get used to everything on a 45 degree angle.

Why did I share this sad, uninspiring little anecdote? Why, just to let you folks know, who think sailing of in the 'Blue into the perfect, idyllic never-ending stretch of Caribbean out yonder, is not like a popsicle without a sour patch. Yes, we have our bad days too.

In Rum Cay, we found a practically deserted island, with one single restaurant/bar open, one grocery store, appropriately named the "Last Chance" and a closed BaTelCo office, our favourite haunt for internet access. What we did find though were some interesting cruising companions: one Polish vessel named Antica, a re-fitted fishing boat who was making it's third world expedition, following in the footsteps of famous Polish explorers, and a Quicksilver boat, carrying surfers and photographers around to surf spots to get footage.

The Antica was by far the more interesting boat, and of course, as our Captain was a member of that privileged people-group, the Poles, we were invited on board by his countrymen and given a tour of the vessel. She was huge, having originally 2 masts (one got snapped off somewhere in the Pacific on a previous voyage), with everything done in wood, painstakingly stripped and varnished, and the hugest, most stiff and impossible-looking sails I could ever imagine seeing. I looked at those sails in wonder, since it was usually my job to hoist our own, relatively puny, sails, and was thankful anew for our small, cramped, but manageble sloop. The wife of the first mate, there were only that married couple and the Captain on board, was sewingthose sails for 5 hours and her cramped and reddened fingers at the end of the day gave me sympathetic shudde. We didn't have any more time with the Antica because they took off that night, motoring by us with their huge ancient engine, giving us a flash of her flanks as she took off into the sunset.

In Rum Cay, we had a chance to visit the Lord's house, and partook of some of His electricity to recharge our laptops, hence all the shots in the old church. The church was still apparently in use, and was only lightly bolted, not locked, when we made our surruptitious way in. It's funny, the uses churches have for us.

Before leaving Rum, we went snokeling and Maciek speared a giant Nassau grouper, an ugly fish whose one purpose in life is to feed the hungry. The fact that we got him in the middle of enjoying his dinner, as evinced by the half-swallowed fish in his gullet, didn't deter us one bit from enjoying him to the fullest. We didn't eat the little fish.

On the 24th we left for Long Island, where we stayed for 4 days in the town of Salt Pond. We attended an Anglican mass, got a tour of some of the island afterwards from the local realtor (I think it really was his town, since he showed us areas where he and his brothers had cleared land for his father back in the day, and they grew corn and fruits of all kinds, though there's no evidence of it now - and almost every sign of business in the town bears his family name) and re-stocking at their surprisingly well kept stores before heading down to the Jumentos.

"Restocking" for me means food, but to certain Polish scavengers, it also means supplies. As we returned from another sucessful hunting trip (having tracked down apples and coconut cookies, a Bahamian favourite, at the store) we stopped to examine a large beached sailboat close to the dock. I knew we were in trouble when I saw the gleam in Maciek's eyes as he spied an intact running light, just about the size of the one 'Blue needed to replace the one smashed off by the powerboat back in Allen's Cay. Remember that story? Go back and read your history if you don't. I honestly thought he was going to leap up there and take it, but no, this boy has scruples. Just then, a lobster boat came in and the skipper jumped off and we got into a conversation. It turned out to be his sailboat, and he didn't mind us taking the light, so he and Maciek hopped up and started prying it off. Or tried. For the next 45 minutes, I whiled away the time by making 2 more trips up to the grocery store while they fought with that thing. Eventually, man triumphed over inanimate thing, and we returned to the 'Blue, happy scavengers. Of course, Mr Fix-It wasn't satisfied until he'd superglued, filed, fitted and surtured that thing, and (miraculously, to my untrained Ms. Break-It mind) it worked. He had a light that shone beautiful green and red at our bow, just like it should. For 3 days, that is, until I broke it off again somewhere between hoisting the anchor and raising a sail. Poor Mr. Fix-It, but such is his trial by fire that will build a solid foundation of patience.