Puerto Rico to the Bahamas- Sailing from San Juan to Mayaguana

The wind has returned, so it is time to make our way North again. But not before bidding San Juan a fond farewell.

We have not seen vibrant street art like this since the Canary Islands

The Puerto Ricans love their beer and produce a huge range

With heavy hearts, and heavy heads, we headed out into the blue yonder.

Fort guarding the narrow entrance to San Juan's harbours — Fort guarding the narrow entrance to San Juan’s harbours

We planned a 4 day trip straight to the Bahamian Island of Mayaguana.

There are two reasons we are not stopping at the Dominican Republic or the Turks and Caicos.

(1) Financial. To check in to the Dominican Republic the cost starts at $150 and goes up. Every ‘official’ requires a ‘small payment’ to get off your boat. The Turks and Caicos requires you to purchase a minimum of a weeks travel permit at $100.

(2) We were anxious to get to the Bahamas, as we are nearing the end of the sailing season, so we did not have the time to ‘really’ stay at these places along the way.

So we decided, rather then stop along the way, we would just carry on straight to the Bahamas.

First you need to get out of the tight entrance to San Juan's harbours — First you need to get out of the tight entrance to San Juan’s harbours

Once we decided on the route, we do a little preparation before a long trip.

It always takes us a few days to get our sea legs so I like to make up a few meals for the humans in advance and tuck them in the fridge.

All of these make the passage a little more pleasant, even if it still is a bit rolly.

We had company on this trip. The sailing vessel Waimangu sailed in tandem with us the whole way.

We were both impressed with our fishing luck this trip, as we have had little luck in the Southern Caribbean. And we were also visited by a school of dolphins. We had a birthday aboard.

I like to play with 'balls' so I thought the human would like one too — I like to play with ‘balls’ so I thought the human would like one too

We had planned on entering Abraham Bay, Mayaguana Island to check in to the Bahamas, but things do not always go to plan.

Unfortunately our arrival time turned out to be night, and Abraham Bay is too littered with coral heads to risk entering without good light. Instead we anchored up just NW in Start Bay.

In the late morning, when we had good light, we headed into the anchorage at the mouth of Abraham Bay.

In retrospect we should have stopped at West Caicos instead. Then timed our crossing to Mayaguana to arrive in good light.

There was too much coral and rocks in Start Bay, even at 10-12m in the suggested anchoring spot, to risk anchoring there at night. Our anchor was not set properly and Waimangu got rapped around some rocks.

Another boat, we met later, used one of the multitude of diving buoys on the west coast of West Caicos to tie onto for a few hours rest (not checking into the island) and set off early for Mayaguana. That sounded like the better option.

We were just happy to have made it safe and sound, as we had a mired of equipment failures to fix along the way. First the autopilot broke, then the chart plotter and finally the depth gauge. The first two we fixed along the way, the third meant we were not comfortable heading too deep into Abraham Bay.

It did not matter. The anchorage was lovely, we had plenty of time to complete repairs, and so what if was going to be a 5 mile dingy ride to check in!?!?!