From Marsh Harbour · 7 nights · Marsh Harbour to Marsh Harbour
The northern sailing ground from Marsh Harbour: Hope Town's lighthouse, Pete's Pub, Nippers on the dune, Treasure Cay's beach and New Plymouth. Flat water behind the cays, a different week from the Exumas.
6 nm · 40 min · Board, then the lighthouse
Board at Marsh Harbour, twenty minutes from the airport, and cross to Hope Town, forty minutes away. Moor inside the harbour under the candy-striped lighthouse, the last kerosene-lit one in the world, and climb its hundred and one steps before dinner at Firefly on the sunset side of the cay.
Little Harbour, southern Abacos · 14 nm · 1.5 h · Pete's Pub and the reef
South down the Sea of Abaco, with a stop to snorkel the reef at Sandy Cay on the way. Little Harbour is a near-circular bay with Pete's Pub on the sand, a beach bar and bronze foundry the Johnston family have run since the fifties. Lunch there, a swim, and the quietest night of the week.
18 nm · 1.75 h · The boatbuilders' village
Back up the sea to Man-O-War, a dry, tidy village that has built wooden boats for two centuries. Walk the lanes to the Albury sail-bag workshop, cross to the Atlantic beach, and swim off the boat in the afternoon. The sailing yachts in the fleet earn their keep on this leg.
7 nm · 45 min · Nippers on the dune
Forty-five minutes north. Great Guana has one of the best beaches in the Bahamas on its Atlantic side and Nippers on the dune above it, the bar the Abacos are known for, with frozen rum punch and the Sunday pig roast if the week lands one. Grabbers on the sea side for sunset.
Treasure Cay, Great Abaco · 10 nm · 1 h · Three miles of beach
Across to the mainland side and three miles of beach that is usually empty. A beach day with the toys, the float-off if the water is flat, lunch at the marina, and the only golf course in the Abacos for anyone who wants it.
7 nm · 45 min · New Plymouth and the Goombay Smash
The northern end of the week. New Plymouth is the prettiest of the Loyalist villages, with a sculpture garden to its founders and Miss Emily's Blue Bee Bar, where the Goombay Smash was invented. White Sound for the night, and the themed night on board.
Hope Town, Elbow Cay · 21 nm · 2 h · Back down the sea for the last night
Two hours back down the Sea of Abaco with the breeze on the beam. A last swim off Tahiti Beach at the south end of Elbow Cay, where a sandbar appears at low tide, and the farewell dinner at the Abaco Inn on the ridge with the Atlantic on one side and the sea on the other.
Marsh Harbour, Great Abaco · 6 nm · 40 min · Disembark
Forty minutes back to Marsh Harbour after breakfast. The airport is twenty minutes from the marina.
The idea of the week
A different trip from the Exumas, and a different group usually: the Abacos are for people who want to sail. The cays sit along the outside of Great Abaco with the Sea of Abaco between, shallow and flat, so the sailing is easy and no leg is more than two hours. The villages were settled by American Loyalists after 1783 and still look like New England under palms: Hope Town with its lighthouse, Man-O-War with its boatbuilders, New Plymouth on Green Turtle.
Fly into Marsh Harbour, which has its own flights from Florida and Nassau. Total cruising for the week is about eight hours. We do not join the Abacos to the Exumas in one week; a day of open water separates them. Superyacht charters start on any day of the week, so the route stands on its own. Legs are approximate, at a steady ten knots, and the captain adjusts them for the weather and the tide on the day. The banks are shallow, so the yacht moves in daylight and takes her time.
What the week costs
The yacht's published weekly rate, plus an Advance Provisioning Allowance, customarily 30 percent, for fuel, food, drink and berths, plus local VAT where it applies. Every listing shows its rate.
How charter pricing worksAlso on this coast
Everything we know about Bahamas: when to go, where the fleet is and the other weeks we have planned.
Open BahamasWoven into the week
The parts of the week that need a phone call before you arrive: tables, guides, instructors and the toys on deck.
The beach picnic, on a sandbar or in your own bayThe crew land a table, chairs, umbrellas and a kitchen and cook lunch there, with the yacht in view. Ellie's favourite is the little bay at Pipe Cay, but the Exumas have more picnic beaches than we could list, and a sandbar that only exists at low tide is the Bahamas version.
A themed day or night on board, at least oneThe Bahamas is about the boat, so we plan at least one themed day or night. Tell us the idea before the charter and the crew have the costumes and decorations ready. Pirate night suits the Exumas: half these cays were pirate anchorages.
The float-off dayEllie's ritual. Every toy that floats goes in the water: the pool detached from the boat, the mats, the loungers. The esky goes in with them, and everyone drifts off together for the afternoon with drinks and snacks and nothing to do. Any yacht with floating mats can do it; the ones with a sea pool do it best.
Jet skis for the creeks and the sandbars, seabobs, paddleboards, wakeboards, the slide if the yacht has one. In the Exumas the water is the whole point, and the crew have the toys in by the time breakfast is cleared.
Staniel Cay has an airstrip in the middle of the chain, Great Exuma an international airport at the bottom, and North Eleuthera one ten minutes from Harbour Island. A mid-charter changeover is a short flight from Nassau, not the boat turning round.
For keen fishers. We arrange a professional fishing tender with its own fishermen to run alongside the yacht for a half or full day: wahoo, mahi-mahi and tuna off the drop-off into Exuma Sound, bonefish on the flats, marlin off Bimini and Chub Cay in season. Ellie's family do it on every Bahamas trip.
Boats coming from Florida can clear in at Port Lucaya on Grand Bahama and cross the Little Bahama Bank to the Abacos, with a kayak through the Lucayan mangroves on the way.
Yachts
Live from our charter list, in a different order every visit so you see the range. Every rate is the real weekly figure from the listing.
CORAL OCEAN
Lürssen · 73m · 1994, refit 2026
12 guests | 6 cabins | 28 crew
€650k – 790k
CEDAR ISLAND
Lazzara · 34m · 2003, refit 2016
10 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew
$60k
MEMENTO VIVERE
Westport · 40m · 2005, refit 2021
10 guests | 5 cabins | 7 crew
$120k – 150k
LADY ELAINE
Christensen · 50m · 2008, refit 2024
12 guests | 6 cabins | 9 crew
$200k – 225k
INSPIRATION
Benetti · 38m · 2017
10 guests | 5 cabins | 7 crew
$150k – 170k
CHANSON
Christensen · 37m · 1995, refit 2020
9 guests | 4 cabins | 6 crew
$75k – 85k
Lady Joy
Christensen · 48m · 2007, refit 2025
12 guests | 6 cabins | 11 crew
$199k – 225k
BG
Feadship · 47m · 1990, refit 2022
12 guests | 6 cabins | 10 crew
$149k – 170k
NOMADA
Mochi Craft · 24m · 2010, refit 2025
8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew
$50k – 55k
TCB
Trinity Yachts · 50m · 2008, refit 2022
11 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew
$175k – 200k
SeaQuest
Christensen · 38m · 1999, refit 2025
10 guests | 5 cabins | 6 crew
$85k – 98k
HAPPY HOUR
Horizon · 34m · 2018
11 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew
$95k – 105k
BUNDALONG
Sunreef Yachts · 24m · 2019
10 guests | 5 cabins
$82k
KING OF FUN
Northern Marine · 40m · 2005, refit 2022
10 guests | 5 cabins | 8 crew
$120k – 138k
CROSSED SABRE
Burger · 44m · 2006, refit 2021
12 guests | 7 cabins | 11 crew
$175k – 195k
MARY KATHLENE
Westport · 42m · 1989, refit 2023
8 guests | 4 cabins | 7 crew
$85k – 95k
PLAYTIME
Lagoon · 20m · 2018, refit 2021
6 guests | 3 cabins | 3 crew
$46k – 49k
LADY J
Palmer Johnson · 43m · 1997, refit 2021
12 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew
€109k – 119k
OCEAN ROSE
Ocean Alexander · 26m · 2018
8 guests | 4 cabins | 3 crew
$43k
NEVER ENOUGH
Feadship · 43m · 1992, refit 2019
10 guests | 5 cabins | 7 crew
$110k – 127k
SWEET CAROLINE II
Trinity Yachts · 50m · 2009, refit 2021
12 guests | 7 cabins | 11 crew
$199k – 230k
PIER PRESSURE
Azimut · 27m · 2020, refit 2024
10 guests | 5 cabins | 4 crew
$70k – 80k
MIDORI
Sunreef Yachts · 21m · 2016, refit 2026
8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew
$45k – 48k
LADY GRACE
Westport · 28m · 1996, refit 2025
6 guests | 3 cabins | 4 crew
$35k – 40k
Akasha
Lagoon · 19m · 2018
8 guests | 2 crew
$45k
RELENTLESS
Trinity Yachts · 44m · 2001, refit 2019
10 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew
$150k – 173k
Princess Mila
Fountaine Pajot · 20m · 2022
6 guests | 4 cabins | 3 crew
$45k – 49k
OCEAN VIEW
Gulf Craft · 32m · 2022
12 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew
€110k
LEXINGTON
Horizon · 26m · 2006, refit 2024
8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew
$40k – 46k
29 yachts in rotation. The order changes with every visit so no boat is always last.
The other weeks we have planned on this coast, and when to go.
