Cayo Largo Cuba

Approaching the Cayo Largo anchorage. Nomadicais trying to hide behind the red channel marker

Morgan, Cheryl and Gael coming over to talk depths

There’s a well-marked and well-dredged channel into the harbour at Cayo Largo and just off this channel, protected by a horseshoe of cays and islets, is the permitted anchorage.  Unfortunately, this is really rather shallow, a bit too shallow for comfort for our 2m draft and almost too shallow full stop for Nomadica’s 3m draft.  As we worked our way up the channel late on the afternoon of Monday 4 March and tried to work out the best way into the anchorage, Morgan and Cheryl came over in their dinghy to warn us about some particularly shallow areas, which they had inadvertently sounded out with Nomadica’s keel when they had arrived.  We took careful note and gingerly made our way out of the channel and into the anchorage, but not too far in, before calling it a day and dropping the anchor.

The Guarda Frontera station at Cayo Largo

When we were secure we dinghied in to the marina and checked in with the Guarda Frontera.  They liked Nicky’s form that she had made up listing the answers to all of the normal questions.  A copy of that plus a copy of our Ship’s Registration document made the arrivals process very quick and easy.

We were invited on board Nomadicathat evening to celebrate Gael’s first birthday.  It was a lovely evening and, yes, there were both Cayo Cuervo prawns and birthday cake ……but at the same time!  Unfortunately, it was our last evening with Morgan and Cheryl as their visas ran out the next day and they intended to leave Cuba for Belize.  We hope to catch up with them again in the USA as they make their way towards St Helena but that’s dependent on so many different factors that there’s no guarantee it will happen.

Laundry day [Ed: again!] before it gets too windy

The following morning, a little before high tide, we tried to move further into the lagoon to anchor in a deepish pool shown on our chart.  But we couldn’t work our way across the shallows, even despite the added benefit of the tide, so we returned to our first anchorage so that we didn’t go aground as the tide dropped.  Safely re-anchored within a stone’s throw of where we had spent the previous night, Nicky started on another laundry session whilst we ran the generator and watermaker to replenish the water tanks.

Different floorboards up; this time to get into the aft watertanks to clean them

Meanwhile, I used some of the water we were making to clean inside the aft watertanks as we had recently found that the water in these tanks was discoloured when the water level inside was low.  It’s not an easy job to clean the tanks, and there are areas that we cannot reach because of the location of the baffles, but by the time the job was complete the insides of the tanks were looking much better than they were before I had started.

We finished that job just in time to wave goodbye to Morgan and Cheryl, who had had to dinghy one of the Guarda Frontera officers out to Nomadica so that he could do a pre-departure inspection of the vessel. The Guarda Frontera had wanted them to bring Nomadica into the marina for the inspection but, with a 3m draft, there was no way that they could get her near the dock.  Since the mountain couldn’t get to Mohammed…….

Lobster thermidor

To celebrate some good jobs jobbed (including a number of blogs written but not posted, thanks to the Cuban internet access thing) we turned our Cayo Sal lobster into lobster thermidor.  We were missing some of the key ingredients, notably vermouth, so had to improvise, but the end result was perfectly acceptable [Ed: quite a lot more than ‘perfectly acceptable’ actually].

Wind in the anchorage but not as much as had been forecast

During the day the anchorage had gradually filled up as yachts had arrived to sit out the forecast windy period.  Overnight the wind swung around to the north-northeast and picked up to around 20kts and, as everyone swung around in the anchorage, we ran a spell of anchor watches to make sure we were alert if any of the other yachts dragged towards us.

The marina dock and bar

The water around the bar area was teaming with fish including huge tarpon

We spent the morning doing chores and in the afternoon headed ashore to do an internet weather check and clear out with the Guarda Frontera for the following morning.  Rather to our surprise (and relief, given that we planned on leaving at 0700hrs) the check-out procedure was efficient and painless and the Guarda Frontera officer returned our despatcho to us then and there.

 

We returned to BV by way of iguana beach and also the beach to the south of the anchorage, which we had noticed was a favourite of the guests of one of the hotels on the cay.

And it has to be said that it is a lovely beach, shelving shallowly on the Cayo Largo side, steeply shelving on the other, with lovely clear water and beautiful soft sand.

And with the front having gone through, and the wind having dropped a little, our final sunset at Cayo Largo was a lovely one.

Cayo Largo, Cuba