Catching up: March 20th to March 26th – 21st

Tuesday March 21st, 2017

Tuesday morning we moved on from No Name Cay heading to Allen Pensacola Cay. The morning began with a spectacular sun rise and shafts of sunlight through the clouds. The swimming pigs had put us back in holiday mood after the bouncing through the Whale. Little could we know that the slight bouncing in the Whale foreshadowed a more serious bouncing yet to come.

Along the way to Allen Cay we came across another sailboat that likely was a victim of Hurricane Matthew. This dismasted vessel was high and dry on a shoal. The winds were steady and reasonably light. It was time to put up all Fracas’ sails. Fracas’ main sail quickly overpowers her when the wind is over 16 kts, this makes her difficult to steer. The sail plan for higher winds is mizzen and genoa.

She has four sails, mizzen, main, staysail and genoa. If you try to trim like you are racing she is a very busy boat to trim. If you are cruising, she is much easier to handle and is very forgiving with trim vs speed. We managed to stay under full sail long enough to catch Last Mango. They insisted that they slowed down to let us pass for pictures…

We anchored at Allen’s Pensacola Cay in almost the same spot as last time.  The wind was from the south and that is wide open in this anchorage. Luck was with us and the winds stayed light all night. The bottom here is very hard amongst weeds and getting an anchor to bury is difficult. We did go ashore, we didn’t go to the whimsically decorated beach North West to the next cay to a more isolated beach. I took a few pics in a series, man and nature. The stuff that we throw overboard that washes up on the worlds beaches is embarrassing.

 

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