Warderick Wells Cay
North Mooring Field
Certain movies like Captain
Ron, with Kurt Russel you can watch more than once. Other movies like Cut Throat Island, with Geena Davis are hard to sit through the
first time. We say movies like Captain Ron have “replay value.” Islands are the same way. Some you want to visit more than once, while others
not so much.
One place that certainly has replay value for us is the
Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park. Fifty
years-ago, a twenty-two mile stretch of the Exuma Cays was set aside as a
reserve. It is a no-take zone, meaning
no fishing, shelling, conching, or lobstering is allowed within the park
boundaries.
It seems most of the park’s creatures know the rules. The lizard above was happy to pose for the
camera. On previous trips we saw huge
lobsters waving their antenna as us as if to say, “Niener-niener-niener, you
can’t touch me!”
Source: Wikipedia
We even had a visit by one of the island’s hutia at a beach
cocktail party. You are not supposed to
feed the wildlife, but the little guy we saw appeared to be accustomed to
begging food from cruisers.
While we did not seem to intimidate the park’s smaller
creatures, some of the larger ones intimidated us. I was attaching the dinghy’s towing harness
to the lower pad eyes, when Pollie noticed we had a visitor. Please note how close the pad eyes are to the
water. The shark swam around inspecting
our towing harness, but then lost interest when I was no longer sticking my
hands in the water.
Hiking the well-marked trails on Warderick Wells is always
an adventure.
We did find out, however that their estimation for the
length of time a trail will take is a little on the optimistic side. Evidently they had timed a mountain goat
making his way around.
While I found a bench perfect for communing with nature
while enjoying a cold beer which Pollie carried for me in her backpack.
This outfit should
scare the sharks away!
It is a land and sea park. Besides hiking trails the park boasts great areas
to snorkel. A variety of sea life can be
observed, and near Cambridge Cay they have their own sunken drug plane.
The crew of Izzy R
told us about a feature not on the official park snorkel guides. A sunken wreck between moorings number 9 and 10
in the north mooring field. That was
handy because we were assigned mooring number 9.
The Exuma Cays Land
and Sea Park definitely has replay value!
Wow - I've been following Motivator for a couple of years now, I think, since your niece Rachel turned me on to the blog. I've never done any sailing/cruising, but your posts always make me envious, but this one more than any before. Thanks so much for letting us share your adventure and watch over your shoulder - once the kids are all out of the house, I may just be calling you up to ask for advice on how to start cruising!
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