The next leg, still in trade winds, but generally sheltered from the Atlantic swell by the T&Cs, was what has been called “champagne sailing”.  Strong steady winds, mostly flat seas; fast and easy towards the Bahamas,  We put our gennaker sail up for the first time in ages and flew it’s red glory all day long.  We were going so well that we were keeping up with the 52ft cat “No Rehearsal” which on paper should beat us on almost all points of sail.  We averaged 7kts all day and were doing over 9kts for good periods – wow, it doesn’t get much better than this!  It was the sort of sailing which makes you think you could just stay at sea and not bother with landfall at all!

Little Inagua was a delight – an uninhabited and tiny coral cay surrounded by really deep water, another sky lit up by the turquoise waters.  We had a lovely swim in slightly cooler waters (26°C!) and a run ashore in the dinghy to explore the gorgeous shoreline a bit.  As we rowed in we were escorted by a large nasty looking shark, so no more swims after that!  Apparently there are thousands of them patrolling the drop-off a few hundred feet away from the boat, and this one decided to see if any new tasty morsels and innocents had just arrived from overseas!