Its so nice to be back in the Exumas. Its like seeing an old friend, though we’ve only been acquainted for a short time. In truth, we were most excited to be back to explore the entire chain of Exuma. We missed a lot of it on our way south and plan to make up for it going north.

We enjoyed a really awesome night of sleep, which is rare. The wind was howling loud. We could even feel it in our super protected anchorage. It is tempting to stay and wait it out. But, we are impatient and planned our routes to make some northern progress despite the strong weather. We are protected by the lee of the land on the west side of the Exumas. With the 10-12 foot waves on the Exuma Sound (no thank you!), this is a much nicer option, don’t you think?

Jake pulled our anchor at 830AM after a quick breakfast of oatmeal and coffee. Can I just say I could never eat oatmeal again and be happy. It would be a very short passage, only 12 miles, to our anchorage at Oven Rock. We learned about this from our friends, The Beans, who told us about some great exploring to be done here. A cave, some beach combing and lots of hiking around.

We had to navigate some very shallow areas and skinny cuts, so we kept it simple and motored the entire way. We didn’t even bother to raise any sails. The 35+ mph winds were blowing us hard. I was bundled in all of my foul weather gear and still shivering as the wind blew through me.

It was a short trip at a little more than 2 hours. According to our charts, the anchorage is huge. And if you are daring, you can bring your boat pretty close to shore. With our new found confidence, we brought Bosco in as far as we dared. It was way too bouncy and choppy just a few hundred yards from shore, but we knew we’d be fine a bit closer. And it was so well worth it, because once we dropped anchor, we could feel the difference. The wind and chop cut in half – actually our chop died out completely. So we were in a nice flat spot and still had plenty of depth under us (around 8 feet).

Another amazing thing…there was no one else in sight. Actually it was odd because there was no one out at all. Period. No one was moving today – I guess we are the crazy ones? Our anchorage was empty which we love. It let us put out lots of scope (11-to-1) so that we can feel secure in the crazy wind.

The day was still young. After a simple lunch of leftover fish curry, we geared up for exploring the island. We read about the awesome cave that you can snorkel or dive and some great beach combing opportunities. I opted to bring my bare-bones snorkel gear, just in case along with several flashlights and headlamps.

We dinghied over to the beach, which looked like another planet. The rock feature known as Oven Rock, also known as Darth Vadar Rock since its shape sort of resembles the infamous helmet of the old Sith Lord, marked the spot to begin our journey. It felt great to have our feet on the sand, and thankfully our water shoes offer some protection from the sharp rock and limestone ground. We hiked through desert jungle, following trail cairns (piles of rocks) as best we could. We got lost a few times but eventually found the trail, which should have been obvious.

It was about 20 minutes until we reached the opposite end of the island and continued to follow our trail upward. At some point there were markers to indicate that we should turn, though it didn’t look like there was anything but thick jumble of trees ahead. Jake followed the lead and sure enough, the entrance to our cave lay ahead.

The cave was HUGE. Way bigger than I expected it to be. It was actually totally creepy, hello horror movie! It was a down climb to the entrance, at times on all fours. Just inside the maw of our cave, all sound ceased. Wind stopped blowing, waves stopped crashing. It was replaced with the sound of dripping water. Holy crap it was really dark in here. Not at all enticing to jump in the water, though some areas go as deep as 75 feet.

I’m glad we brought our lights. Jake and I explored around every nook and cranny available to us. It was fun to climb on the rocks, though we avoided the fragile areas as best we could. So much coolness to see – stalactites and stalagmites, and other cavy things. A couple of bats were hanging on ledge and the shallow pools of water had tiny little sea critters milling around (they looked like baby shrimp). It was fun and made even better since we were all alone. Still….it was creepy.

I was glad to climb back out into the trees and hear the noise of wind and waves. The view from this hill was spectacular too. We hiked down to the “iron shore” to watch the waves crash against the rocks. The little beach area was lined with sea grass and other bits of debris – tons of shells. Supposedly the area was known for sea beans, but we only spotted a couple during our hour and a half hike. Jake also found a perfect piece of driftwood for us to make our sign for Boo Boo Hill monument (which is to come…)

We had so much fun playing around yet I was happy to get back to Bosco boat. The best thing is that we still had hours to kill for the rest of the day. Somehow we managed to make progress north, explore an island and cave, eat yummy food and still have time to relax. It was a perfect day for just that, since it only got colder as the afternoon wore on. We were happy in our little abode watching movies and eating popcorn. A truly glorious day!