George Town

We heard that there is a weather front coming through on Tuesday, so we decided to make the run to George Town on Sunday. Part of the trip we follow the West coast of the Exuma Island chain (the more protected side), then at Little Farmers Cay, we need to cross through and follow the Eastern shore of the chain. When the weather is bad, that latter half of our trip could be difficult. As it turns out, we had a great trip with water almost as smooth as glass.

Three Sisters Rocks in the Exumas

George Town is the largest city in the Exumas and has a harbour protected by Stocking Island, a narrow strip of land from which I assume it got its name. This creates an anchorage that is about 6 to 7 miles long. It is also a great place to come by boaters cruising the Bahamas for the winter and serves as a turn-around point for many.

The town is geared for supporting the boating community and has a nice grocery store that has its own dinghy dock in a protected inlet called Lake Victoria and they allow boaters to leave their trash in the dumpster for free. They also have free water at the dock for boaters to fill their jerry jugs at.

There is a Straw Market where locals sell T Shirts and local crafts and baskets made by the ladies on the islands. It is not as large as the one is Nassau, but has about the same selection, minus the fake designer purses. You are pretty much only going to find the “basics” here, but a good selection of those. Bob was surprised to see that the store had capers, and that there were eight different kings of them!

At this time of year, there are between 400 to 500 boats in the harbor. Bob had been looking through the binoculars on the way South and said all the masts in the harbor reminded him of a forest about a year after a fire, where all the bark was stripped off the remaining trees.

We docked close to Stocking Island the first night. It was near a little beach with a food vendor run by a little hotel and restaurant in George Town called Peace and Plenty. We got off the boat and walked on the beach and played with a couple of “beach kitties” until they were treed by a couple of boat dogs. We had thought about having a pet on board, but am so glad we don’t have to find places where we can take the dogs to be watered two or three times a day. We’ll stick with “Fred” the toy parrot for now.

Beach Kitty Standoff

The second night, we moved in close to the George Town side near the only marina in George Town. It turns out our friends on Belleza, Grant and Brenda, although about a day behind us, decided to make the run on Sunday from Staniel Cay using the outside route all the way. We ran into them in town on Monday, and they were moving to the marina, so they could get water, fuel, and do laundry. We had dinner with them on Monday night.

Tuesday, a man that provides weather services on the radio every morning held a training session at the Community Center for all the boaters and Grant and Bob attended that.

This cruising community is quite organized holding events, sharing information, on the “Cruisers Net” every morning at 8:15 on VHF 72. It appears that because this island has regular airline service to Nassau, a lot of boaters have guests arrive and depart from here also. They even announce when someone is leaving so that they can share the taxi van when leaving. They also announce when someone is leaving and can take mail for people back to the states or to Canada (for the Canadians).

The first week of March, there is a cruising Regatta here, when my daughter Mindy and her husband Jim will be here visiting us. The place should really be jumping then. We’ll spend some time in town with them, and then head out to anchor off some of the many beaches on the less populated islands and snorkel and fish.

The water is now around 84 degrees, so swimming is almost no longer refreshing. Because there are so many boaters here that are almost permanent and they all dump tanks in the harbor, rather than making a day trip out three miles to dump, the guidebooks recommend that you not do much swimming in the harbor itself. The town is looking into having a pump-out service for the boats anchored here.

The following photo is an unusual cloud formation - Note the blue streaks.

Sunset in the Exumas