Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park

Wow!  I am simply blown away by the beauty of this place.

Not having a feel for how the park works, we headed straight for the park's headquarters.  Mooring balls are the preferred method of 'anchoring' in the park, thus limiting the disturbance of the sea bed.  Park headquarters are located at Warderick Wells.  The north mooring field is a stunning vista.  Unfortunately for us, we booked a less than stellar mooring ball.  It treated us okay, until the tide change.  The outgoing current, together with the wind had our boat sitting almost exactly sideways to the surge coming in from the ocean.  This just won't do, we had to move.  Just before sunset we grabbed our new mooring at Emerald Rock.

Our time at headquarters was not wasted, we had gathered exactly how we wanted to spend our day.  We had time to get school done before slack tide.  Then it was into the dinghy and race to the coral gardens located in front of headquarters.  Slack tide is not a long time, but long enough for a nice swim.    As the current began to switch Macara got a good look at her first Spotted Eagle Rays.

After a couple nights at Warderick Wells we followed the Exuma Bank down to Cambridge Cay.  Our original plan was to grab a spot close to Little Halls Pond Cay (a private island owned by Johnny Depp).  We snorkelled for a bit, but were never really satisfied with our anchorage and soon lifted anchor and picked up a mooring ball a little further south at Cambridge Cay.

Just east of the southern tip of Little Halls Pond Cay, there is a spot marked on the charts called 'Sea Aquarium'.  It's a snorkelling site with a pair of dinghy mooring floats.  I can safely say that I have done a fair bit of diving throughout the Caribbean.  This location ranks right up there as one of the best dive sites that I have ever been on.  And you can snorkel it.  We will be back!  The only down side, there was a barracuda there that did not appreciate my camera.  It stalked me all over the dive.  Posturing and being very aggressive towards me.  A very uncomfortable feeling.  Give me a shark any day.

Being our first time in the Exumas, we are kind of darting around here and there, trying to get a feel for the place.  Hoping to quickly figure out where we want to spend some time.  Georgetown better be amazing, because I am liking what I am seeing right now.

Tonight we are anchored west of Big Majors Spot.  There are pigs on the beach.  They swim out to your dinghy begging for food.  Swimming pigs, that's pretty novel.  We brought a couple carrots for them.  Just around the south side of the island is Thunderball Grotto of James Bond fame.  Of course, I will have to dive that!

But, that is tomorrow.