It was so calm in Governor's Harbor, our friend Brian went around taking pictures of his and our anchors. Neither anchor had much of a bite. We doubled our anchors in tandem. The Fortress was almost all on the surface and the Manson Surpreme had barely dug in and was caught on a rock. When we have good internet, we can put up the video and pictures.
We motored five miles north to Alabaster Bay. The bay has a pleasant looking curved beach with a small resort on the south end. The breeze was light out of the northwest when we arrived. Pilgrim got there first and got their anchor caught between two coral heads, so they were set. We drug around the Manson with no success and then switched out the Manson for the 66 pound Bruce. We drug that around in one area with no joy, then moved to another area and finally got a snag on coral. I kid you not, we were at it for an hour and quite frustrated by end.
To shake it off, we set off for a walk to the ocean side. The Explorer Charts indicated that the beach on the ocean side had pink sand. Well I'll be. It indeed has pink sand mixed in with regular sand and made for quite a sight against the blue and white surf on the mostly sunny day. As we explored the beach, we found the former US Navy Base. A local told us it used to be a missile base and that the US had also built the adjacent airport, now known as Governor's Harbor Airport. The first thing we came upon was a massive water collection site. The area was covered with concrete and there were pump stations in a couple of places. Then we came upon what I guessed was officer housing, then a motor pool facility, then what I guessed was the officer's club as it had nice stone work on one wall and another wall was tiled. I think we also came across a barracks. It was difficult to tell as the roofs had failed on all these buildings and they were in quite a state of disrepair. We got ourselves overheated looking for a small path back to the road. The local described it as a path near the trash pile. I should have asked 'which' trash pile as we saw well over thirty. We finally gave up and took the base road back to the main gate and down to the highway.
When we returned to the shore over two hours later, the winds had picked up out of the northwest and it looked like it might bring squalls from the same direction. Our dinghies were high and dry. It was a group effort to carrying each others' boats back to water. On our way back to Hold Fast we made the decision we did not care to stay in that precarious anchorage when it was a lee shore. We set out for Hatchet Bay about ten miles north.
As we entered Hatchet Bay we were stunned by the number of boats anchored in the north section. Three of us came in at the end of the day, making a total of twenty sailboats in the anchorage. That man is still charging $20/night for the moorings and now has initials on the mooring balls. We anchored near one, which got him ruffled. After church today, we moved over another 20 feet or so, which should resolve it. We were told Ms. Ingraham retired. A meeting on Monday should tell us where we stand in volunteering at the school. The one constant is that everything changes.
Love to all,
Dena
{GMST}25°20.82'N|076°29.27'W|3/22/2015|2:00 PM{GEND}
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