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THIS IS NOT IN ORDER DUE TO MAIL FAILURE

05 Jan 2006 1640 hours
Royal Island, Eleuthera

You can find us on Google earth at this lat. and long.:

N 25 degrees 39.902 minutes
W 076 degrees 50.838 minutes

Don't believe a word we write when we tell you where we are headed "tomorrow." It seems that we never do get there.

We are not at Allan's Cay. In fact, we are not in the Exumas. We are anchored in a tiny harbor on an island off northern Eleuthera. We went north, not south. Why? Weather, that's why.

Every morning at 0630, this guy named Chris Parker gets on his SSB radio and gives a forecast for the Bahamas (4045.0 MHz USB). He's really quite good, and has made a little business for himself, forecasting the weather for cruisers and then answering weather questions for people who pay for the privilege of calling him with specific questions. The rest of us cheapskates get to listen in for free.

This morning Chris gave a weather report that caused us to change our minds about where we would go. The forecast called for 20-25 knot winds with gusts to 30 from the west (and northwest, and north) tomorrow as a front moves through from the U.S. It turns out that there's not great protection from those winds--which will oppose some strong currents--in the northernmost Exuma islands, and we would be in for a few days of rolling around at anchor. But we're in a really protected anchorage now, and it turns out that we aren't the only people who thought of it. Since we got here a half hour ago, four new boats have arrived, and there were six boats here when we anchored. Fortunately, there is room, and unlike Nassau Harbor, there is some nice sand. Dean dove down and set our anchor well, so we will sleep tonight.

And tomorrow, if it's not too rough on the north shore of the island, we will snorkel on the reefs (which means, I suppose, that we will do something else entirely).

One thing is certain: it's 4:30 now and time for our second round of cocktails.

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