We continue to slowly make our way down along the Ragged Islands, also known as the Jumemtos, of the Southeastern Bahamas. This stretch of small cays is uninhabited except for transient fisherman who harvest conch, lobster, and grouper from the local waters. Some of the islands have ruins from long ago attempts to pasture animals and harvest salt. These are not easy places to make a living.
Right now we are at Flamingo Cay, and will be here another day or two before moving further south.
Fishing is spectacular. Grouper and snapper are plentiful. Snorkeling is fantastic. Boats are infrequent, but seem to move in groups rapidly through the islands. Which seems odd to us. Why come all the way out here if you are just anchoring overnight before rushing off to the next island?
Sailing is challenging here. The islands are on the edge of the Great Bahama Bank. An area almost the size of New Jersey that is mostly less than 20 feet deep. When the tide rises and falls a huge amount of water roars up onto the bank, and then 6 1/2 hours later, it all pours back out into the ocean. Currents in the cuts between the islands can be ferocious. Care and timing is important.
We will eventually get down to Ragged Island itself, the only currently inhabited permanent settlement in this extended chain. It has a population of about 80 people.
We are enjoying our time unplugged from the torrent of information that is the modern world.
fetchinketch 
Bill, Enjoy your “unplugged” time, we all need a bit of that. James SV Sueno
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Hello Bill
Very nice to be able to follow you !
Was the fishing successful ? How are you dealing with the tides ? Being in the Med I’m not familiar with this problem , do you use an almanach or an App to work it out ?
Fair winds
Nicolas
Sv DarNico
Amel 53 #471
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Nicholas,
The fishing is quite successful. We keep a full freezer of self caught fish. Today we added another 4kg of king mackerel. Last week was grouper and snapper.
Tides are an important here in the Bahamas because the water is shallow, and we have boats that need a lot of water. In places, the currents that result from the tides are a key issue. The various charting programs we use all have tidal data, and those are our primary source of information.
Bill Kinney
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Thank you for your answer Bill !
Any program’s names as your favorite ?
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Nicholas,
We use Navionics chart data on our main chart plotter, and iSailor on our tablet. The reason we use iSailor it that it is the only way to access TranSas charts, which are independent of Navionics, and are a convenient “second opinion” in places where information is hard to come by.
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