We left Children's Bay this morning before sunrise, just as there was enough light in the sky to see. Our plan was to take a shortcut over some shallow sandbars that enabled us to go over the top of Great Exuma Island and down the sout' side of Great Exuma and Little Exuma. This route would save a lot of time and distance on our way to the Jumentos Cays and the Ragged Islands. If we were successful it would also open up possibilities for the future. We had originally planned to leave Children's Bay yesterday but we had agreed if it was too windy and/or squally when the alarm went off in the morning we would postpone a day. It was blowing 20 knots in the morning so we decided to postpone. The first shallow area we were to cross is also very narrow and we didn't want to risk getting blown into the even shallower area of the sandbar and getting stuck. It is not as if we can call Boat US for a tow here in the Bahamas. The squalls did eventually arrive yesterday. When they finally let up in the late afternoon we put the dinghy in the water and took George's iPad with his Aqua Map chart along with our handheld depth sounder over to the sandbar. It was a choppy, wet dinghy ride so we were grateful to have thought to put the iPad in a gallon ziplock bag. We found the narrow route over the sandbar and measured the depths. It was close to high tide and we didn't find any depths less than 7 feet. That made us both feel better about trying the plan.
This morning just at high tide we made it through all of the shallow areas and, again didn't see anything less than 7 feet. We had enough wind to sail most of the day and considered that a bonus. We are now anchored at Flamingo Cay in the Jumentos and plan to continue south to the Ragged Islands tomorrow. Breeze On is currently farther south than she has ever been.
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