We left West End, Grand Bahamas, right after sunrise on a beautiful Sunday morning. Our plan was to head to Great Sale Cay, about an eight-hour passage away, where we would anchor for the night, and then sail to Green Turtle Cay the following day.
When leaving West End, one of the ways to get to Great Sale Cay is to go through the Indian Rock Cut. This channel is a bit shallow and it’s important to go through at half-tide or higher, based on our 4.5 foot draft. There can be a strong cross-current through the cut, so it’s not something to be taken lightly, especially since there are reefs, rocks, and bommies lining both side of the channel. Boats with bigger drafts might want to consider going through the Memory Rock channel, but drafts of 5.5 or less can easily get through at the right tide.
We’ve done this day-passage before and it’s a convenient way to get to Great Sale Cay from West End. You have to stay in the channel going through the cut, and then it opens up quite a bit and there’s plenty of room for sailing and tacking. We went on a day when the wind was 12 knots and the seas were one-foot, so it made for a very comfortable ride, even when we were head to wind for a bit. We were able to sail on a close haul almost the whole day, with engines off, doing an average of 6.5 knots.
We made it to Great Sale Cay around 4pm and anchored securely the first time. There’s nothing much to see on Great Sale, except possibly an abundance of sealife. Great Sale is uninhabited, and is a 370-acre private island near the Abacos available for sale for $9.9 million. Not a “great sale” for us!
Kory and I were on the island the last time we stopped on our way from West End to Green Turtle Cay. However, the beach we landed on had so many burrs that I was picking them out of Gracie for far too long. We also remember that the island had a lot of mosquitoes and no-see-ums that particularly come out at sunset (right when we were there).
No-see-ums are tiny flying insects that are incredibly hard to see. Also known as biting midges, sand flies or biting gnats, these insects are small enough to fit through the mesh screens on our hatches. They are also difficult to spot when they swarm around you or land on your skin. But after they bite, you’ll definitely know they got you because the itching will be intense. Because of our last experience with the burrs and the bugs, we decided to stay on the boat. Rick and Maryalice braved the beach for about ten minutes to let Harley go to the bathroom, but they came right back after Maryalice had a swarm of no-see-ums around here.
(photo courtesy of Google images)
(Photos courtesy of google images)
The family on Unfettered decided to dinghy farther away to a different beach at Tom Johnson Harbour. They said they found a better beach there and even saw a shark. I don’t think they stayed very long as the bugs mosquitoes were on a mission for blood. All in all, Great Sale Cay is a great place to stop on your way to The Abacos. The holding is good in the sand, and there is pretty good wind protection in several locations around the island.
We made a plan for all of our boats to pick up anchor at 6:30am the following morning to head to Green Turtle Cay. We enjoyed a beautiful sunset and a full moon (aka Beaver Moon).
