Little Ragged Island, Bahamas

Starting a windy period- the sunrise was a little ominous.

 

At the peak, there were 11 boats in this small little anchorage...but almost all of them have left now.  It's just 3 - Messhuga, What If and Sojourn again.

Jeanna and Jeff on Meriwether leaving just after sunrise on the high tide.

 

Robin & Corbett on Cookie Monster

 

Bob and Diane on 2 of a Kind

 

 

Now and Zen - heading back up to Hog Cay.

 

 

We did a bit of boat work.

One of our 5 year old folding chairs broke at the cook out the other night.  Since there is no place to purchase a replacement within 100 miles, we had to fix it!   Duane spent a good while drilling out broken rivets and fabricating a replacement part out of webbing for a plastic piece that had broken.  He put stainless screws back in place of the broken rivets and it's as good as new!

 

And it was time for more bread baking.   I also made a batch of bagels but forgot to snap a photo.  That's about it for a mundane day.

 

Little Ragged Island, Bahamas

 Several people have sent me photos they took from our trail-cleaning day.  I thought I'd share some of them since they include photos of me!  (I'm almost always the one behind the camera so there are seldom photos of me...)

Little Ragged Island, Bahamas

 Another busy day!!

Armed with machetes and hand saws, we along with several other cruisers set out on the dinghies to clear/trim the path across the island to the south.

We got right to work - the path is a little over a half mile.

 

 

Michelle and Clark from Roam.

 

Ed from What If and Clark.  I know, lots of photos of laboring backs!

 

Michele from Reach and Jeff from Meriwether.

 

Michelle hard at work.

 

Dee from Messhuga.

 

Cathy from What If.

Jeff and Jeanna from Meriwether.

 

And Duane with his machete.

 

A view of a cleared path.

 

Clark, Dee and Ed.  

 

And finally we had worked our way to the ocean side of the island about 2 hours later!  Jeff and Jeanna collecting some debris from the surf to use as trail markers on the way back.

 

The trail is marked on the ocean side with a Minnie Mouse toy tied on twin palm trees.

 

View from the trail.

 

The trail head from the ocean side.

 

We walked back to the dinghies on the trimmed trail, so nice not to have to fight all the bushes!  The tide had gone out so our dinghy was aground in the flat shallow cove.  No worries, Ed and Dee helped us pull it to deeper water.

 

Dee rode back to the anchorage with us.

 

I made some cheesecake for the evening cookout (I melted chocolate chips and poured over the squares for added fun).

 

We went to shore early to set up a new fire pit...Dee noticed this snake crawling on our chair!! I think this may be the first snake we've seen in the Bahamas.  We looked it up and believe it is probably a Bimini boa.

 

Duane gently put him on a stick and took him out into the bushes....he reappeared about a half hour later, much to Jeanna's shock when he climbed on her chair.  One more lift out into the bushes at sunset and the snake stayed away (although we kept a lookout so there were no more snaky surprises!)

 

The anchorage crew has grown a bit.  All folks that have been in the Raggeds for a couple of weeks so have no Covid exposure.

 

 

A pretty sunset with Roam leaving at high tide.  We'll see them again probably in Hog Cay or elsewhere if we ever decide to move.

 

 

The cookout was great, as usual.   Wonderful food and fun chatting.

 

Little Ragged Island, Bahamas

 We had another quiet chore day.  Making fresh water, washing clothes, etc.  

I had found this wooden piece in the surf - and didn't quite know it's purpose.  So I asked the question on the Bahamas Cruising Facebook page, thinking someone would know the answer.  My simple question ended up being quite the "joke thread" for some reason as 129 folks either answered the question with useful information or made amusing/off-color comments.  Strange what happens out there on the internet!!

The two common answers were:

It's a pestle (from a mortar and pestle set)

Or it could be a belaying pin from an old sailboat.

 

Either answer is pretty cool.

The usual sundown gathering - just a little larger again with Reach and Two of a Kind  added to the mix.  

Little Ragged Island, Bahamas

 Busy day....first we set out to snorkel and crossed paths with Clark & Michelle from Roam (former owners of Sojourn).  

 

 

The usual out snorkeling - a pretty French angelfish.

 

 

And a Nassau grouper.  He calm because he knows he's safe today.... there are 4 days left until open fishing season.....

 

 

I was thrilled to spot this little flamingo tongue snail.  Cool little things.

 

 

Some pretty coral.

 

 

Duane investigating an underwater ledge.

 

 

A good amount of new growth elkhorn coral.  A good sign that the reef is healthy.

 

 

A big school of blue tangs.

 

 

Ed and Cathy left to go back to their boat, but told us that Dee and Nicholas were on the other side of this little spit.

 

 

Not wanting to leave anyone miles from home alone, we went over to say hi.  Lucky that we did, because they were having engine issues.  While Nicholas worked on the engine, we rigged a tow line and started slowly making our way back to the anchorage.

 

 

But luckily, cruisers are usually quite prepared to handle things on their own!  Nicholas continued troubleshooting while being towed.  They had a spare spark plug on board and soon they were back in running order.

 

 

We untied the tow line and they were back underway with their own power. 

 

 

Before long it was time for sundowners.  Roam had come into the anchorage from Hog Cay at high tide so our circle has increased by 2.

 

Ralph took his drone up and got some great shots of the anchorage.

Here is our little circle of friends from above.  (Thanks Ralph!)

 

And this great shot of our protected little anchorage.

 

And here's the "Who's Who" photo.

 

Pretty sunset but no green flash...

 

 

Michelle and Jeanna  ended the evening at sunset traditionally by blowing their conch horns.