December 31, 2011.

Happy New Year everyone. We hope the new year brings health and happiness to everyone unless you're a racist, a Muslim extremist or a televangelist.

We pulled the hook in Georgetown at 0630 and motored slowly south through Elizabeth harbor. Our destination is the Jumentos and there are a few options when leaving Georgetown. If you have the tide in your favor, a shallow draft vessel, calm conditions and a bit of nerve you can take the shortcut through the Hog Cay Cut. Or you can take the traditional 35 mile trip to Long Island and wait for a favorable breeze to send you off to the Jumentos or......

You can just kinda cram it all into one long day. The catch is that you don't want to burn a whole lot of diesel heading to the Jumentos. We burned about 4 gallons of fuel before a light but favorable breeze filled in. So 2/3 of the way to Long Island we turned towards the Comer Channel and the gateway to the Jumentos. With only 6 knots of wind we were sailing between 2 and 3 knots as we gently moved along on dead flat seas. We opted to drop the hook shortly after completing the Comer Channel about a half mile off the channel. We were in 9 feet of water in the middle of the banks with the nearest land about 3 miles to the north. It was a calm night at anchor but we were both surprised by the number of local fishing boats passing by in the dark.

On Saturday we had a bit more wind so we easily covered the 35 miles to Flamingo Cay. The nice thing about being anchored in the middle of nowhere was that we were able to sail off the hook and didn't have to start the engine until we anchored for the evening.

In a weird twist of fate, Flamingo Cay is the place Christy & I spent last New Years Eve. Last year we spent Christmas in Pipe Creek on the fabulous First Edition, then we waited out a front before running down to Black Point and doing an overnighter down the west side of Great Exuma to Flamingo.

This year we had to go to Georgetown so we dragged our feet in the Exumas, spending at least 10 more days there than needed. Sapphire had friends flying in on December 28th and they were willing to bring small items that anyone might need. So since we had to be in Georgetown for Christmas anyway we had them bring us an unlocked air card for the computer. We ordered it and had it shipped to their home and they brought it with them. We spent an hour at the Batelco office getting it hooked up and now we can get online almost any place in the Bahamas where we have a phone signal.

The point I was trying to make was that last year we pretty much roared down here. This year we've been static more than we've been moving and still, we have the same tiny anchorage at Flamingo Cay all to ourselves on New Years Eve.