Last night as evening set in, Paula got some great pictures of the sunset. We know we take a lot of these, but somehow each one seems more beautiful than the last.

After coffee this morning, we got in the dinghy and went to the north part of the Island to explore some more trails that looked interesting on the map. It’s about a half mile dinghy ride that once again took us through that tricky little cut with a swift running current. Once on the trail, there were several informative signs describing the wildlife, land features, and history of the Island. The trail was also marked very well with orange blazes. It was high tide when we got there, and part of the trail at that moment was under water.

The most abundant wildlife were the little lizards that kept darting in and out of the thatch. Some of them seemed to want to pose for a picture.

There were several parts of the trail surrounded by small palm trees and other vegetation that made it look exactly like “Gilligan’s Island”.

The trail we were on went to the top of the highest hill on Warderick Wells to a place called “Boo Boo Hill”. There is a legend connected with this place. It says that a long time ago a schooner sank off the coast of Warderick Wells in a wild storm. All on board perished and no bodies were ever recovered. The locals say that if you climb the hill when the moon is full, you can hear the voices of the lost souls singing hymns. Some time after that disaster, a tradition started when cruisers visited the Island. In order to appease King Neptune in the hope that similar disaster would never befall them, each visiting cruiser would leave an “offering” on the top of Boo Boo Hill (featured picture). The park doesn’t mind, but would like each offering to be principally made of wood, preferably driftwood.

Yesterday, we discussed what to bring and decided on an on-the-spot assembly of some spare pieces from one of our Mortmade projects. We found a small piece of driftwood and some palm bark on the way up the hill and put a “C Ghost” pictogram together in a style similar to the other offerings. Hope Neptune likes it.

We had a great 360 degree view from the top of the hill. The sound side of the Island is just as gorgeous as the bank side. We could see our boat way off in the distance We then explored Boo Boo Beach, which was a short walk down hill. There looked to be the beginnings of another shrine to Neptune on Boo Boo Beach, consisting of a pile of colorful ropes that obviously came from boats.

Next, we made our way back to the boat and had a nice lunch. We had intended to go snorkeling in the afternoon, but that got pre-empted by several things. First, and this was Tom’s mistake, we did not have a proven method for each of us to get back into the dinghy once we jumped out in deep water to go snorkeling. Tom tried to rig something up with a little plastic boarding step we had but wasn’t having much luck. As we were testing this, a very nice couple pulled up in their dinghy to mention that they had the exact same model boat as C Ghost and were in the other mooring field. We had a pleasant conversation for a while, discussing cruising plans, our boats, and the fact that they also got their boat in Maryland. After that tiredness set in and we put off snorkeling for another day.

We would love to stay here longer but a strong West wind with some squalls is now predicted for Monday through Wednesday and this anchorage would be very exposed. So, tomorrow we are heading for Big Major, an Island about 24 miles south that has several good anchorages on its eastern side which should provide protection.