The weather window finally came on 17 March and we set off early in the morning for the Bahamas. We arrived at Morgan's Bluff on the northern tip of Andros Island about 4pm on the 18th.
Morgan's Bluff is a very small harbor that is mainly used by the Bahamian's on Andros as their main supplies port. The supply ships arrive about every other day bringing everything that is required to live on the island.
For us cruisers, the port is a convenient site to check in to customs and obtain your cruising permit.
Other than a place to check in to customs and sit out the next two days of easterly winds, there is not much to do in Morgan's Bluff. We did peer into Morgan's Cave but didn't see any buried treasure.
We decided to walk to the nearby Nicholls Town which turned out to be not really a typical USA town but rather a typical Bahamian settlement. It was a spread out residential area with a few houses converted into stores. There was no commercial district. We saw a sign advertising Conch Sound so we walked down there and discovered one house converted to a restaurant/bar, one house as a fishing supply store and a large conch cleaning station. There was a great view of the shoreline and offshore reef line.
It turned into a 15 mile walk and fortunately a nice lady gave us a ride back the last 3 miles or it would have been 18 miles.
Sue had a really tough time not picking up several of the conch shells many of which had 4-6inch lips and beautifully colored interiors, but we decided it was better to collect our own in the Exumas, where we are heading next.
After 2 days of brisk easterly winds, the wind eased off and veered to the south-south-east so it was time to set off for Providence Island and Nassau. We had originally planned to bypass Nassau, but Rivah seems a little under the weather, which could just be seasickness from our rough passage, but we want her to see a Vet before we move on to the Exumas where there is no Vet care available.
