Marsh Harbour to Little Harbour Bahamas

Total Miles Traveled 1762

This is the water taxi stop at Marsh Harbor, every morning the locals wait here for their turn to ride the taxi to the outlying islands.

We only traveled 9 miles to Hope Town, by far the most picturesque settlement we have visited.  We are attached to a mooring ball within the harbor and found the moorings are very close together.  We picked up Charlie and Robin from “The Lower Place” in the dinghy, and visited friends we met in the panhandle of Florida “Bee Haven” at the marina.  They took us to the path leading to the lighthouse.

The Elbow Reef Lighthouse was erected in 1864, and modified in 1936 to include a Fresnel lens and rotating mechanism that is still in place today.  The lighting source is a 325,000 candlepower “Hood” petroleum (Kerosene) vapor burner.  The entire lens with its brass work, bull’s-eye lenses and additional prisms weighs about three or four tons and floats in a circular tub containing about 1200 pounds of mercury.  It works like a giant grandfather clock and the keeper on duty has to wind up the weights every two hours.  The system runs without the use of any electricity.  The tower is 89 feet high and there are 101 steps to the lantern room.

"Moni Jean" in the harbour

After our lighthouse tour, we took the dinghy to the other side of the harbor to Hope Town. 

The Atlantic Ocean side of Elbow Cay.

On Sunday morning we left Hope Town and stopped at Tahiti Beach for a few hours.

We continued on to Little Harbour,  we did not expect rough water but at one point between the barrier islands  and the Atlantic Ocean we had 4 foot waves…..this was outside our comfort range.  The channel leading into Little Harbour has to be transited at mid to high tide because a section of the channel is only 3.5 feet at low tide.  We draw close to 4 feet and arrived at the channel at high tide.  The waves were crashing into to rock shoreline as we entered the channel; it was a relief to get to a mooring ball.

Pete’s Pub and Gallery was established in the early 1950’s.  Pete’s dad was an internationally known artist renowned for his lost wax casting in bronze.  Their son Pete now runs Pete’s Pub and Gallery, and makes life size marine bronzes and jewelry.  This has been one of our best stops while exploring the Abacos.

 Pete

 The sign on the wall says if you are wearing shoes, you are overdressed.

Trying to hook the brass ring on the hook.

Better than a no trespassing sign

While exploring Little Harbour we noticed a sign and path leading to the lighthouse.

Little did we know the lighthouse had been abandon, but it was still a fun adventure.