Eleuthera Island, Hatchet Bay – A Cool Cave!

The humans heard there was a large bat cave a few miles from the anchorage at Hatchet Bay. They did not hear whether it had a good beach for me.

But we headed North again.

Nicer sailing weather, but slow in the light winds

We left behind Governor’s Harbour and threaded our way through lots more crab pots. The trip was broken up by a pleasant visit by dolphins.

These were large common bottlenose dolphins

They stayed with us a long while, playing in the bow wave.

They even had a very small baby dolphin with them

By late afternoon we arrived at the man-made rock-cut entrance into Hatchet Bay.

From sea the small cut in the rock face is hard to pick out

The humans were a bit nervous as they negotiated the tight entrance.

They were used to having the shore line a little further away

You can anchor either side of the harbour. The government has placed a few ‘free’ mooring balls about. The town is on the south shore, but we found plenty of room to anchor among the mooring balls in the north end.

We were joined by the sailing vessel Prospero.

We found the holding good here, but my prospects for a beach greatly limited.

That is a sorry example of a tiny sandy spot in a harbour. That is not a beach.

This little sandy slip area is a great place to leave your dingy or kayaks if you want to explore the local ‘bat’ cave. You will find a short path to the main highway.

With the anchor set, off we went with our neighbours Jake and Sarah to investigate.

We hitch hiked (people will offer you rides even without the thumb out) the 3 miles north to the cave entrance.

A cluster of silos warn you of the clearly sign posted turn off.

A few minutes walk up a gravel road/trail and you find the caves natural entrance.

We had read a short description of the caves in our guide-book, and we were aware that there would be no natural light and we might get wet. The humans brought bathing suits, head lights and waterproof diving torches.

What they found……far exceeded the drab description other cruisers had given in passing. We took lots of photos, so you can judge for yourself.

Let us now take you down….

……….INTO THE BOWELS OF THE EARTH………

c-entrance-first set of stairs — The natural entrance has stairs and a railing. I suspect the first cave chamber is as far as most cruisers go.

C-first sight — Your confronted right away by some pretty amazing stalactites and stalagmites. Too bad about the graffiti.

C-first entering only light is flash light — As you move deeper into the cave you become totally reliant on your flashlight to see anything, and we are not going to stop here.

c-first entering amazed at the number of stalagmites and tights — The number of stalagmites is incredible. You are stepping through and around them to make progress into the cave system.

C-stairs decending down — Then the cave narrows into a tube descending into the earth.

C-first ladder down — At the end of this section we found a ladder to descend further into the cave system. Graffiti on the wall said ‘Welcome to Hell’.

c-start of tunnels-maze ahead — Below we found a maze of tunnels.

C-string and crawl throughs — Exploring the maze of chambers is fun. The main cave tunnels tend to be on the right. It gets a bit narrow in spots, but you are confident you are on the right track because someone has tided a string through this section of the maze to help you follow the shaft through.

c-large cavern — Then the cave opens up into a large ‘cathedral’ like section

c-large cavern and big stalamight — Here we found some very large stalagmites and stalactites. Anywhere else this cave would have ‘designated’ walkways and fences around all the growing natural structures

c-continuing down after big cavern — After the large cavern the cave tunnel narrows again and you enter a ‘very’ famous section.

c-graffiti etched with carbon from torches — This is a section of graffiti from the 1800’s. Etched onto the walls using the carbon from burning torches.

c-1800's graffiti — In this dry section of the cave this graffiti is captured in time

c-continuing down — The cave system continues deeper into the earth

c-roof with red clay or minerals forming spiderweb patterns — As you get further in red (minerals or clay?) seep in through cracks in the ceiling creating a marbling effect in the cavern.

c-continuing down after big cavern 2 — Further in the water seepage allows the growth of stalagmites and stalactites again.

c-cont, starting to get tighter with lots of stalg — You need to thread yourself through them to continue

c-ladder down to wet section of caves — Then you come to the ‘wet’ section of the cave. If you want to continue exploring, you are going to have to get wet.

c-decending into wet section — There was no way we were going to let a ‘little’ water stop us. Off they went on a wet adventure.

The cave system continued with two more chambers to explore. We did not expect this section to be so extensive or so cool. It was ‘like in the movies’, with low ceilings between sections, water filled caverns with dripping stalactites from the ceilings. Dry selves at the back of the caverns that extended further into the caves only to drop back in to flooded sections. Unfortunately we did not think to also bring the waterproof camera. Sorry.

After exploring the ‘wet’ section of the cave, we climbed back out and headed on. We found the cave sloped up and dead ended at a shaft to the surface.