This is our second day at Harbour View Marina in Marsh Harbour, the place we often used as home base on past trips when weather prevented us from traveling on to Eleuthera and the Exumas. The last reported population was 6,283 people. In 2019 it was directly hit by category 5 Hurricane Dorian, severely damaging or destroying most of its structures. It’s still rebuilding. It’s the commercial center of the Abacos, hosting the larger of two international airports and has the only stop light to be found in the Bahamas out islands.
We arrived just before a major wind event with winds of 40 mph over an extended 10-hour period. We managed to get in a great meal at Wally’s across from the marina and check out one of our old haunts, Snappas Bar and Grill, that was rebuilt up the block after Dorian destroyed the older site. Then we were head’s down, with all the other boaters at the marina, preparing for the gale winds. And, as the standard routine before heavy winds, many of the anchored boats in the bay moved to slips. We were in good position with our bow pointing into the forecast winds so we handled the 3-foot seas that slammed in the marina as well as could be expected. It was a long bouncy ride through the night. The 10 lines and 6 fenders we put out kept us safely in the slip. Today the winds are still above 20 mph with a 1-foot chop, but it’s comfortable. Tomorrow we’re back to low winds and 75 degree days. I tried to get good pictures of the waves at the marina, but it was too dark most of the time the winds were up.
