Land Ahoy!

We spied the old lighthouse at Castle Island late afternoon after an uneventful crossin gof the Mira Por Vos Passage ("Watch out for yourselves!") The light was converted to electricity and has since deteriorated and no longer works, but the 40m high tower remains imposing.

Although the weather is decidedly cooler now, we spied the possibility of a quick stop for a snorkel in a tiny anchorage. The sun was just about high enough, but the route through the reef was indeed minuscule and the chop outside a hindrance, so James had to signal me to turn about before we got in far enough to drop the hook.

We also saw our first other yacht - "Moondog" was also heading north, but she had come from Bonaire. They called us to chat - we were their first sighting also - then we ended up running all night in formation until we eventually overhauled them off Long Island.

We are now at 24N 75W running the west side of Cat Island. We had planned to be bold and take one of the visual routes through the Exuma Cays and into The Tongue of the Ocean, however only two of these are available to Croix des Gardes and both require good sun and good weather. Today is slightly overcast so we have opted for the less interesting passage between Little San Salvador and Eleuthera. This is a relatively deep (enough) passage that we can make in the dark as will will arrive there about 8pm local time.

There is more Bahamian cargo traffic too, most of which seems to set itself on a collision course, refuse to talk to us on the DSC nor channel 16 and then only alter course a bare minimum after the 20 minute collision warning has sounded. This is bad for my nerves!

The sea is now utterly flat and we are making good speed under full sail. We pressed the genoa back on this morning and are running goose-winged and poled out. The forecast is for the wind to continue to drop and we hope to round up onto our northerly track up to the Northwest Providence Channel and back onto a reach before the wind drops much more. We're over halfway with just over 400nm to run to Canaveral so hopeful for landfall on Wednesday.