Saturday, August 24, 2013

Ranguana Cay, Belize - Day 3 - Sailing, Lobster, and a Great Ending

You can tell it's rainy season here, as we woke to rain and thunderstorms.  It seems that every morning the thunderstorms move through and the day clears up before lunch.  The seas were flat, so we waited for the 9:00 am weather report from the Mooring base.  Good weather, seas 3 to 5 feet, wind 5 to 15 knots, scattered thunderstorms.  I this this is a recording, as the same forecast has been reported almost everyday that we have been here! 

We pulled up the anchor, and motored out of the harbor.  It is a 20 NM sail to Ranguana Cay, so we wanted to get a early start.  We had planned on motoring, as the seas were flat, but once we got out into the channel, the wind kicked up!  I was nervous about all of the thunderstorms, so I decided to put a reef in the main.  No one showed me how to do this on our orientation of the boat, so it took me about 20 minutes to figure out how to tie the reeling points on the main, and which line to tightened the foot of the main.  Once this was done, we were off sailing.  It was an excellent sail, as we were running about 5 to 6 knots in 10 to 15 knots of wind!



As a warning of the weather conditions, we watched a water spout dropping from a dark cloud about 10 NM away.  It was moving slowly away from us, but stayed down for about 30 minutes.  I was thankful that it didn't come our way.    Water spouts are tornadoes, but over water.  This was the first one that we have seen in these waters.


 We had to do a couple of tacks to finally get to where we were going, as the wind was coming from the east, and Ranguana Cay was south east.  We also threw out our fishing line, but no luck today. 



As we approached Ranguana Cay, it look like a perfect little island with aqua blue water around!  It was amazing!!!  There were a couple of mooring balls, to happily, we grabbed one and tied off the boat.  I snorkeled down and checked out the mooring, and was happy it looked secure.

The water was calling me, even though it was a little late to start snorkeling.  I grabbed my new lobster hook, and motored the dinghy over to the reefs, with lobster hunting on my mind!  The water was incredible clear and there were all the beautiful fish around!  I was focused on lobsters, so I started looking in all of the holes trying to find one.  Finally, I saw one, and tried to catch it, but he was too quick.  Lobster 1 dale 0.  I finally figured out where they were, and it didn't take too long before I caught my first one!!  It wasn't any record in size, so I kept hunting.  I finally caught 4 in total, enough for dinner, so back to the boat I went.  I then realized how exhausted I was, and had to drink a beer and eat a lit snack. 
We boiled the lobsters and had potatoes and avocado!  It was a feast!  What a perfect day it was!  I crashed at 8:00 PM from exhaustion, but happy for the excellent day.
 
My First Lobster Catch
Lobster Dinner

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