As forecast, the winds blew about 22-26 knots all day from the east under bright sunshine. Before leaving Shroud Cay in the morning, we successfully navigated the southern river through the mangroves from the western side of Shroud Cay to the eastern side and discovered that this river stopped short of the eastern shore in a large lake with about 8 inches of water- not enough for our dinghy engine to work. Thus we anchored the dinghy in the lake and walked through the shallow water to a Sandy beach where we could cross over to the Atlantic which was in a revved up state with white caps everywhere. Back on Juno we planned to sail SE on the banks where the Cays offered some protection from the large seas. With all the wind, we only used a bit of jib and found ourselves moving adequately until we needed to alter course to more of an ESE course. Now the seas and apparent winds increased and we found ourselves pounding into the waves. Added to this, we discovered a leak in the port side near the side stays that was dripping into the cabin. Faced with the choice of continuing to sail close hauled up wind 5.5 miles, or 3 miles down wind from the direction we had come, we chose the latter and pulled into the southern anchorage on Hawksbill Cay and picked up a park mooring. We should have known that there was a reason as to why we ( and one other boat) were the only boats choosing to spend the night in this southern anchorage on Hawksbill Cay. That story follows in tomorrow’s post.
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