Sometimes You Find a Gem: Cay Verde

Top Shelf"s Track from Florida  - 536 nautical miles

As we left the sad remains of Ragged Island, we set our sites on an overnight passage to the south east and Great Inagua Island.  We hope this island will have a better economy which we believe it will as this is the source or Morton Salts raw materials.

I'm sitting here at anchor in the NW corner of the island.  We are anchored "Bahama Style" with

Cay Verde - Flat Calm

anchors both front and rear as we are trying to keep the anchor chain from tangling on the coral heads that surround us.  We are literally 30 yards from the shore.  So close that we were worried about bugs from the mangroves.  None so far.

On our trip here yesterday, Ryan had found a tiny island 50 miles off shore from Ragged Island when looking at Google Earth.  Ryan finds most of our fishing spots by studying the surrounding areas for reef formations.  Not just any reef, there are specific things he looks for in the reef.  He can tell me what fish will be there days before we go.He does this for tournaments all over the

Frigate Birds - Cay Verde

world.  You can see by past blog pictures, finding fish with this research works.

The tiny island he found has a name:  Cay Verde.  It is a tiny island that looked to have a beach.  No mention of this in any cruising guide and it barely shows up on navigational charts.  But it was there, and if the conditions were right, we were going to explore above and below the water.

Cay Verde - North Shore

We left Ragged Island with east winds at 10 kts gusting to 15 kts.  In addition, we had a 3-4 foot swell from weather to our east.  As we left the Ragged Island Cut, we gave ourselves 20% chance of anchoring at Cay Verde.

As the morning went on, the winds calmed and 30 minutes before we arrived the ocean went flat calm, I mean like a lake.  Still had 1 foot swells, but not a breath of air.

Ryan Leading the Hike

We slowly approached the beach with Top Shelf at slower than coasting.  We had no tender in the water to look for a path between the coral heads.  We had put the tender on the roof for the long overnight trip, and we would launch it only if we could anchor.  The water here was the clearest I had ever seen and Ryan said it may be the clearest water in the world.

We made it through the coral heads and found sand right off the beach.  There was no current and the anchor dropped like a stone.  We let out 5:1 scope, set the anchor, launched the tender and off we went.

Alfred Hitchcock - The Birds

I had told Ryan that if we were able to fish here, I would drive the tender and Sam and Ryan would fish.  This was Ryan's chance to fish blue water.  150 foot drop off were the pelagic fish like Wahoo roam.

Ryan set out the teasers and attracted two Wahoo, but they never got close enough for a shot.

At 3:30, we were out of the water, made a quick change to hiking gear, and Sam dropped us on the
beach to explore.  The island was about 100 feet high and this was obviously a nesting place for Frigate Birds.  We had been seeing these birds from as far out as 10 miles hunting the waters off of the island.  We were about to get a big surprise.

Frigates Nesting

As we climbed the hill, we found a very unique green plant along with knee high cactus.  At the top of the hill was the nesting place for the frigate birds.  Hundreds, possibly a thousand birds were in the area.  I asked Ryan if he had ever seen Alfred Hichcock's thriller "The Birds".  He had no idea what I was talking about.  I was in the movie right now!

We got close enough for some of the mama birds to leave the nest so we could see the eggs.  The camera is zoomed in as we didn't want to disturb anything.  After a few minutes, it was  4:35 and we had to get past the coral heads by sundown, or we would be stuck there for the night. 

My Favorite Pic

We got back to shore, Sam picked us up in the tender, we loaded it on the top deck, raised anchor and outside the coral heads on our way to Great Inagua by the time the sun touched the horizon.

Softest Beach Sand Ever

How long will these footsteps be there?