George Town to Little Farmers Cay

Hi everyone,

We had a very nice day sail from George Town to Little Farmers Cay.  Departed 0800 and arrived 1650.  A nice light wind reach, concluding with a two hour motor after the wind died.  This was our first passage for ages where we needed to take account of the tide.  We arrived at Farmers Cut at low tide springs and the current had just changed in our favour.  We briefly had 3 knots with us in the cut.

Through Farmers Cut

Here are the usual plots...

Overall Track

Arrival Track

Graphs

Here are the vital statistics...

• Distances/Speeds
• Route Distance = 40nm
• Log Distance = 44nm
• Track Distance = 42nm
• Duration = 9 hours
• Average boat speed = 4.9kt
• Average ground speed = 4.7kt
• Minimum boat speed = 3 kt
• Maximum boat speed = 6 kt
• Weather
• Minimum wind speed = 5kt
• Average wind speed = 8kt
• Maximum wind speed = 12kt (gusts to 14kt)
• Apparent wind angle range = 80 to 140
• Seas up to 1m
• Swell negligible
• Mostly clear sky with scattered small cumulus
• Engine
• Total = 2.5 hours

We really enjoyed our day at Monument Beach.  The anchorage there is much quieter than that off Chat'n'Chill.  We got a good night's sleep and this morning got underway at a reasonable time.  We were expecting light winds for much of the day, fading away to 'light & variable' later.  And that's exactly what we got.

George Town departure

In George Town we had met the Aussie sv Vesna crew.  They also sailed to Farmers today, leaving a little later and arriving with us in their Bavaria 44.  We led the way through the cut which had only minor overfalls but with quite a lot of current.  I can imagine it'd be quite exciting on the ebb with a swell coming in from the Atlantic.

Approaching the cut (stbd bow)

Approaching the cut (port bow)

sv Vesna followed us around the SE side of Little Farmers Cay and along to W side.  It was pretty shallow there.  Particularly being low tide springs.  Our sounder got down to 1.5m (below the transducer).  So our 2m keel was skimming the sand.  Welcome to the Bahamas!  Happily the anchorage is a little deeper at 2.2m above chart datum.

Trust all's well where you are!