It was one of those light air days when we had nothing better planned. So we headed up to Compass Cay to refill our fuel and water tanks. I had completely forgotten that the marina there doesn't sell fuel, but we needed water more than fuel so it wasn't a wasted trip. We even managed to sail slowly back, most of the way.
When Chris Parker returned to work on Monday he brought news of another strong cold front due on Wednesday. With 150 boats in the area for the 5F, I figured there would be a scramble for the few places nearby that are protected from west winds. We sailed back to Little Farmer's Cay, coming in from the west side of the island. We were surprised to find no boats at all off White Land Beach, only three near the yacht club, and one on the "sou'side."
In the Bahamas "nort'side" often refers to the east, windward, ocean side and "sou'side" to the western, leeward, banks side. I'm sure there's a good reason for this. I can think of several but don't know which might be correct.
Over that afternoon and the next day and a half, boats kept trickling in to the anchorages on the east side of Little Farmer's. By Wednesday afternoon there were 16 boats sheltered there. All the others had hunkered down at Staniel Cay, Pipe Creek or Georgetown. I'd take Little Farmer's over any of them for a long lasting front like the one that came through.
It gave us plenty of time to get to know some of the folks at Little Farmer's a bit better. Everyone there has families that go back generations on that small island. If you can't trace your ancestry to the woman, a freed slave, who originally owned the island, you can't live there. We spent many pleasant hours talking with (mostly listening to) Terry Bain who runs the bar/restaurant/hangout called Ocean Cabin which his grandmother started in the 60s when they'd get perhaps one boat a week during the season. Terry travelled much of the world before returning home to stay and loves to talk about world history, philosphy, flag making, religion, local history, cosmology and ethics, among others. He's quite a fascinating character. Roosevelt Nixon who runs the "yacht club," which competes with Ocean Cabin for visiting cruisers' business, filled us in on more of the local history and reasons for Little Farmer's decline from it's former status as capital of the area, a "fact" that is disputed by residents of Black Point and Staniel Cay. But Roosevelt claims to have papers to back up his claim of past superiority.
Today we're back in Black Point. Our mail which was sent seven weeks ago never arrived and could be anywhere. We're not waiting for it any longer but will be moving on. To where? We don't really know yet.