Highborne Cay, March 1 - 4, 2022

      After feeling a bit disappointed by the marina at Atlantis, we were going to swear off marinas altogether.  However, we were also a bit stressed out about all the warnings about learning to read the water and watching out for the extreme shallows so we had some anxiety about finding our way through coral heads and sand bars to a good anchorage, so we went the wimpy way and reserved one night at the marina in Highborne Cay.  They made a lot of noise about how the various onshore attractions of the island were strictly limited to marina guests.

They definitely talked a good game about preventing cruisers from coming ashore.

     There was an extremely cool little horseshoe shaped beach with kayaks and paddleboards and shaded beach chairs.  Additionally, there was a tiki bar staffed by an affable bartender who kept us supplied with rum punch and ice cold water.  There were also a number of dinghys that came ashore from boats anchored offshore to buy a drink or three.  At no possible time did the bartender express any concerns with the "private" nature of the island.  So enforcement of the ban against coming ashore was spotty at best.

We spent an extremely pleasant afternoon chilling at these beach chairs.

     I was quite glad that they allowed other boaters to come ashore because it gave us an opportunity to meet some cool people.  We also had a really good time paddling around the little protected inlet in a tandem kayak.  I've learned from my past mistakes and made Lisa sit in front so that I could ensure she didn't just treat our tandem kayak as a guided tour.  It turns out that our synchronized rowing didn't go all that well anyhow and I ended up asking her to stop rowing at some point.

Lisa coasting back to the bar.

     The island was actually quite well organized for boaters.  There were a number of paths you could take and bicycles and golf carts to make covering the distance easier.  We had a grand time exploring around the island.  My favorite spot was probably this swing overlooking the vast Atlantic.  It was poised to pick up the steady easterly trade winds and we hung out there for a while.

Our private swing.

     I think Lisa's favorite thing was the resident parrot, LuAnn.  LuAnn had the run of the place although she preferred to tuck back into her cage at night.  One her favorite things to do was to wait until you got very close to her and if she thought you hadn't noticed her, she would issue an ear-splitting squawk to watch you jump.  I'm not sure birds can laugh, but I'm pretty sure she was at least laughing on the inside.  We were always looking for her and rarely got the screaming treatment.  In fact at one point, she looked at me for a few minutes and gave me a very polite "Hello!"

Trying to get LuAnn to repeat her greeting on my way to dinner. 
LuAnn talks when LuAnn wants to, not on command.

     We did also have a nice dinner at the restaurant when we extended our stay to a second day because we were enjoying everything so much.  It was no fine dining, but it was good Bahamian food without a lot of pretense.  The conch fritters were delicious minced little fried balls that we honestly better than the fancy grilled conch at Fish a few days before.

 The view from our dinner table really couldn't be beat.

    It was our plan to leave on the third day and head south to Norman's Cay.  This plan went spectacularly badly.  The pilings on the pier at the marina were old trees that were splintering in many places and as I unwrapped the lines and passed them back to the boat, they picked up a number of massive splinters.  Lisa managed to find out the hard way when she jabbed herself hard with one.  I was at the helm, engines idling while Lisa tried to remove the splinter.  Having no luck, she called to me and I rushed down to her aid.  Unfortunately, I rushed a bit too fast and completely missed the first step down from the helm and crashed like a bag of rocks to the deck.  It was loud enough that the dockhand came rushing to see if I brained myself and Lisa came flying out of the cabin.  I knew I had scraped my knee and hit my hand pretty hard on the table, but I didn't hit my head and was pretty sure I was fine.  Unfortunately, Lisa pointed out that people who were fine generally weren't bleeding all over the place.  I somehow smashed my hand into the table with enough force that I just split the skin on my pinkie finger wide open in a jagged gash.  When I rinsed it off in clean water and realized it was a bit more impressive than I hoped, I got a rush of light-headedness and we cancelled our plans to depart immediately.  Lisa sent the dock hand to look for a nurse or doctor and I got out the first aid kit and started to do some basic wound treatment.  It was one of those cuts that probably would have been stitched in a perfect world because it was so jagged, but it wasn't very deep.  I wasn't that keen on letting Lisa try out her suturing skills if I didn't absolutely have to, so I just soaked through a few bandages until I got the bleeding to stop.  It turned out there weren't any medical types on the island, so it was all on us and our wilderness medical training.

You'd rather look at this pretty seashell than my mangled finger, I promise.

     Lisa set off to reserve a third night and I laid down to feel sorry for myself as I tried not to bleed on anything else.  She came back with the answer that they weren't sure they could let us stay.  They had someone with a month reserved, but they weren't sure he would show up so that said to stay while they waited to figure it out.  Lisa later decided if they were going to kick us off they would have done so by now and went to the store to buy some food.  As she checked out, they told her that she couldn't charge it to the boat because they were going to tell us to leave any minute.  She came back to report that to me and I popped out of my funk and got the boat running and the lines ready to go and free of splinters.  Lisa had to go back to the store with cash while I did this.  We maneuvered off the dock without incident other than a new dock hand telling us we should have been waiting offshore to see if they would have room rather than staying on the dock.  We pointed out that no one actually told us that and he seemed to think this was due to untrained office staff, which honestly I don't think was our fault either.

 The weather was fine, but the next day was going to bring really high sustained winds.

    We decided it was now way too late in the day to maneuver to Norman's Cay, so we just anchored off-shore and decided we'd make the short trip the next day.  Honestly, the breeze at anchor was better than being in the marina anyhow.  The only trouble we had during the night was that I found many new and innovative ways to hit my little finger on things and make noises like a wounded cartoon character whenever I did.  We absolutely needed to move the next day, because very strong winds were coming and we wanted to be in a nice protected anchorage before they got there.