After a waaay too long hiatus from Samba, we headed back to the Bahamas to spend a week with some close friends exploring the Berry Islands. Since Samba was due back in the states for hurricane season, we drove to Stuart, rented a car & then went to the tiny Executive Airport in Fort Lauderdale to catch a small plane to where Samba was waiting.
As we flew over Great Harbour Marina, we could see that Samba was still happily sitting there awaiting our return!
Sometimes facilities in the Bahamas aren't the greatest. This is the airport terminal where we landed!
We arrived late afternoon Thursday & spent the day Friday opening up the boat & provisioning at the "grocery store" on the island in order be ready for our friends' arrival late afternoon Friday.
Their plane was early and it was raining so one of the guys at the marina rushed us over to the airport to get them & bring them back to the marina. Everyone here is so very helpful & nice!
It was great to have Kim & Kevin Nance join us for a week of adventure in the Berries!
We headed out first thing Saturday morning. Here you can see the tight little cut that leads from our safe harbour to the open ocean. Adventure, here we come!
Once out on the water, the first chore was cleaning up the lines.
We passed 2 private cruise ship islands on the way to our Soldier Cay anchorage. It is amazing just how hard the cruise ships try to entertain their guests!
Once past the ships, we put our lines out & Kevin almost immediately caught his first tuna. Woo hoo!
Then came a barracuda that we unhooked & let slip back into the water as they are not good eating due to the toxins they contain.
In quick succession, he caught a mackerel & then another tuna. At that point, we decided we had enough fresh fish for our trip.
Kim helped make sure Kevin didn't get pulled in! Good job guys!
Jim cleaned the fish enroute to our anchorage which was still 20 some miles away.
Once the anchor was down at soldier cay, Jim made sure it was well buried. The OK sign is always a good thing!
This is a live sea biscuit Jim found on the way back to the boat.
Before heading over to explore the island, we had a bite of lunch. Notice the islands in the background.
Soldier Cay was a beautiful little island to explore. Nice beaches & rock climbing. Carol even found a live conch in the shallow water!
We then headed out for a short "2 mile" trip to "nearby" Ambergris Cay. Though it turned out to be more like 5 miles, 1 way, it ended up being an amazing place. We anchored the dinghy & as we turned the corner of the beach, we encountered miles & miles of open sand. As far as the eye could see, there was just a huge sandy beach. Wow! And we were the only people for many miles.
Of course, we had fresh grilled fish for dinner. What a great end to a great first day!
