Great Inagua

We arrived in Man-O-War Bay before sunup and tacked back and forth until we had enough light to find the mooring buoy that we had used back in July. A large bulk cargo ship was at the salt dock taking on 43,000 tons of salt. Capt. Fawkes, the marine superintendent for Morton Salt Bahamas picked me up at the dinghy landing and gave me a ride to customs where Mr Albury the senior customs agent informed me of a 300 dollar transhipment bond that was required for the release of the 7 tons of Kids Against Hunger Food that was waiting in the customs warehouse. Not having that kind of money I was led to find Brother Carl Farquharson, the pastor of Inagua Gospel Chapel, who had expressed an interest in our mission to Brother Moss of Cat Island months earlier. When I told Brother Carl what my need was he immediately took me down to the bank where he withdrew the needed funds. Brother Carl explained that he also had an ongoing mission to Haiti at Port de Paix on the north coast and was happy to help any missionary working with Haitians. In the afternoon we moved the schooner to the small municipal basin that is close to town and the only place we could load the food. All the nautical information that you can read about Great Inagua warns of using the basin in all but settled weather because it becomes a ship wrecker with any surge. When we were in Great Inagua in July there were 4 sunken vessels cluttering the small basin. All was well when we entered the tiny cut leading into the basin in the afternoon but at 0400 a surge from the North started and we started popping dock lines and fenders. Deploying breast lines to a bollard that was 150 ft away took up a lot of the strain and we were relieved when the surge abated around 0730.