Bullock's Harbor, Berry Islands, Bahamas

White Pepper departed Port Lucaya just before dawn to take advantage of a favorable SW wind.  It would gently drive us SE to the Berry Islands.  They are 56 miles across the Northwest Providence Channel and just barely within reach within the 10 hours of January daylight.  Many cruisers who want to go further  choose to start crossing at night and or have faster motors, but we were able to sail most of the way.  These delightful SW and mild W winds come with a stinger.  They often precede a strong cold front which we knew was coming.  Thus we bypassed the usual stops of Great and Little Stirrup Cays as too exposed and went around to Bullock's Harbor.  As the sun touched the western horizon, the anchor rattled down in 7 feet of water just behind Rat Cay in the northeast corner of Bullock's Harbor.

The cold front whistled overhead for four days.  We were perfectly comfortable and safe in the protected waters but we never saw another sailboat or pleasure boat of any kind for the entire time.  It was too windy to even launch Habenero, our trusty dink, until day 5 when the wind moderated and clocked into the East.  We motored in the township of Bullock's Harbor on the island of Great Harbor Cay.  The town is a hardworking town of 750 souls.  They work on the cruise ships that stop regularly 8 miles away at Great Stirrup and Little Stirrup.  In fact cruise lines own all of both those islands.  The towns people also service a light sprinkling of resort homes on the island.  There is a well maintained 9 hole golf course although the club house is derelict.  Jack Nicklaus is said to visit here often, but comes for the bone fishing, not the golf.

We hiked and hitched a ride to the beach.  Wally let us ride in the bed of his truck dropping us off at the Beach Club and giving us a well received lecture about love and peace.  The beach is fabulous and, of course, deserted.  We walked about 3 miles.  The walk felt great after 4 days of cabin fever.  After lunch at the Beach Club Jan and I headed back to Bullock's Harbor.  We stopped at the marina for a look on the way.
Bullock's Harbor Marina got a poor review in one of the popular cruising guides, but we were favorably impressed.  The place was clean and neat.  The docks were well maintained and everything seemed quite in order despite being virtually empty.  We resolved to stay there on the next visit.  Back on the highway we were picked up by Barry, who by coincidence was the dock master at the marina.  He told us that indeed there was new management and that he had labored mightily to clean the place up.  He was proud of the fact that Jack Nicklaus keeps his large yacht there when he visits.  He offered to let us stay for $1/ft.  However, a day of decent weather was forecast  and we had to decline.

Back on White Pepper Jan and I told each other that we had been quite impressed with Bullock's Harbor and Great Harbor Cay and did not understand why it was off the cruiser's itenerary and so little visited.  We stored the dingy and prepared to leave early the next morning for Devil/ Hoffman's.

Note to readers:  pictures will be posted later.