MAGIC IN PARADISE
Our friends said we couldn’t do it. Everyone we spoke to about trying to take an engineless rowing and sailing tender through the meandering, gin-clear waters of Shroud Cay’s north creek from the Exuma Banks out to sea and the famous natural “washing machine” said it could only be done in a powerful RIB.
The top of the vast Exuma Land and Sea Park in Shroud Cay and its maze of creeks that wind through acres of mangrove roots play host to a large population of juvenile marine life including spotted eagle rays and hawksbill and green sea turtles, all unthreatened, calmly gliding up and down the narrow waterways. Still, they said, “Sorry, Chris. Currents are too strong for your set-up. Take it off your list.”
I had carefully mapped out our big family adventure for two years. The plan was: buy a bluewater boat with some class like our past traditional boats, sail it to the Bahamas in the fall, and take our vacations on the boat before using my newly-honed passage-making skills to sail her straight from Nassau home to New England. A nice feather in all our caps.
No one had said we do this grand voyage with our traditionally-rigged pilot schooner. But we never
