If it's Thursday it must be Half Moon Bay

Well at least that’s what some folks on big cruise boats were thinking when they awoke that day. But we simply planned it as an intermediary stop on the way to Eleuthera and a chance to see what tourists see of Bahamas. So up kind of early but we made a nice breakfast and set out mid-morning for the short run to Little San Salvador Cay whose prominent feature is Half Moon Bay; called that because it literally looks like a half moon bite out of the island.

Carnival and Holland America cruises go to Half Moon Bay.

The way point we needed to reach was about 18 miles at 280 degrees from our position behind Alligator Point. Wind was blowing probably from around 150 degrees so it was close behind us. I debated about using the spinnaker but thought it was too short a run and it was a lot of work so we decided to just sail it. We were able to sail at about 260 deg with a lot of sail flop from the swells but managed to keep up close to 7 kts in 12-18 kts of breeze. We jibed just south of Half Moon Bay and got right to the entrance by the cruise ship. In the final analysis it would have been a perfect run with the spinnaker as we would have made it faster and right to the Bay.

Little San Salvador is owned by Holland America Cruise Line and is used by their cruise ships and those of Carnival to provide their customers the perfect island experience. They have built a little amusement park without rides but lots of activities for the guests. Passing boats are allowed to anchor in the Bay away from their activity areas and after the guests go back to the ship cruisers can go ashore.

Captain Morgan's Bar right behind the beach.

We used the afternoon to snorkel the reefs that were off-limits to the cruise ship folks and after they left we moved our boat into more protected waters closer to their beach and then we went ashore to see the attractions. The ship left late so we didn’t get to see as much as we had hoped but it was fun to see what they saw in their day at the beach.

We had a nice dinner aboard and went to bed with the chickens in preparation for our next sail up to Eleuthera and Rock Sound Harbor. It would be nice to stay at Half Moon Bay but there was little shelter and we are running low on fresh food so time to move on.

But with thousands of our closest friends we experienced Thursday at Half Moon Bay.   Over one of the walks off the beach was a sign "I wish I could stay here forever." Yes we are.