If you’re chartering a yacht in the Abacos, Bahamas, where should you go? During our five-day Bahamas yacht charter, we visited about three locations every day. This gave us a sampling of Bahamian culture, white-sand beaches, wildlife, snorkeling and restaurants.
I’ll share all the stops that our captain took us to. But first, what are the Abacos? We were island hopping in a 120-mile chain of islands, surrounding the Sea of Abaco. The Abacos are north of Nassau and east of Grand Bahama. And in case you didn’t know, The Bahamas is an island nation about 100 miles off the southeastern coast of Florida.
While Disney’s private island, Castaway Cay, is nearby, the Abaco islands you’ll see yachting on your own have a different vibe. Island hopping in the Abacos, you’ll see no crowds — and not many facilities, vendors or other signs of commercialism. Some of the islands have a restaurant or two, and a few have villages, but many of those islands are small and sparsely — if at all — populated.
So if you’re looking to get away from it all, the Abacos are the perfect destination!
The perfect 5-day Abacos itinerary
After hearing about our priorities, likes and dislikes, our captain planned out a great itinerary for yachting the Abacos. Along the way, he made a few changes due to conditions.
Before we began our cruise, we provisioned our yacht at Maxwell’s in Marsh Harbour, a large, American-style grocery store. The goods at Maxwell’s are mostly imported from the US, so they will look familiar to Americans. The prices are higher to account for the shipping cost.
We spent the night before the trip at the Conch Inn Marina in Marsh Harbour. This is a really nice marina with great shower rooms and a gift shop with a Little Free Library. We also ate in the restaurant, Snappas. The service at Snappas was not very good — our waitress didn’t know the answers to any of our questions — and the New Year’s Eve special of surf and turf was tough. The conch fritters and cocktails were good, though!
Another time, we had dessert at Wally’s Restaurant, which is a fancier place just a short walk down the road, with much better service. The desserts — I remember one was bread pudding — were delicious.
Abacos itinerary day one: Marsh Harbour, Green Turtle Cay
We began our private cruise in the Conch Inn Marina in Marsh Harbour, on the island of Great Abaco.
Because we started our trip on New Year’s Day, our first priority was to get to Green Turtle Cay, where there would be a Junkanoo — a traditional Bahamian celebration and parade — in the historic town of New Plymouth. To get there, we needed to cross through Whale Cay Passage, an area that tends to have rough seas because of its exposure to the Atlantic Ocean.
So, although we started our first day lounging on the deck cushions with some New Year’s Day mimosas, after the first hour or so of motoring, things got rough, and we retreated to our bunks.
Meeting the swimming pigs
Around 1 p.m., we arrived at our first destination, No Name Cay. This little beach has two attractions: Big O’s restaurant and a small group of feral “swimming pigs.” There are a number of spots in the Bahamas where you can supposedly “swim with pigs,” and this beach is one of them.
We enjoyed photographing the pigs, which were very cute, especially the piglets. We loved seeing one sow lying on her side, nursing her brood. The pigs actually didn’t seem too keen to swim. Basically they only swim if people offer them treats from a dinghy or if you lure them into the water with a treat. We also saw tourists chasing and grabbing the piglets for photo opps, which did not impress us.
Big O’s has a gift shop which sells ice, in case you need any.
Green Turtle Cay
We were so lucky to be in the Abacos during one of the only two days a year when a Junkanoo parade happens! If you’re not lucky enough to be there on Dec. 26 or Jan. 1, it’s still worth checking out the village of New Plymouth.
The streets of the village are full of colonial-style wooden clapboard houses with pretty cut-outs. One of those pretty houses is home to the Albert Lowe Museum, which showcases the history of the area. If it hadn’t been a holiday, we definitely would have checked this place out.
New Providence is also one of the few places in the Abacos to stock up on groceries. We bought a few items at Sid’s grocery store, including two loaves of fresh-baked bread, one of which was coconute flavor. They were delicious!
At the end of our first day, we anchored in a quiet cove off Crab Cay. Our captain told us this would be a nice place to swim, but by the time we pulled in, the evening was cool, so we stayed on board. In the evening, we enjoyed happy hour, cooked dinner, played a card game and spent some time outside on the boat’s cushions, looking up at the stars.
Abacos itinerary day 2: Nunjack Cay, stingrays, Bluff House, Great Guana Cay sandbar
On our second day, we set off bright and early for a full day of activities.
Nunjack Cay/Manjack Cay
People come here to see — and touch — stingrays, and the rays know it. On this pristine white sand beach, a ray swam right up to us, looking for a treat. We didn’t actually bring anything to feed it. My kids grew up in Scouts, and they’ve been trained to never feed wildlife. However, we saw another family with their captain feeding them bits of squid. They came very close to all of us. Yes, they could sting you! But our captain simply warned us to stay away from the stinger end.
You can walk across Nunjack Cay to the ocean side of the Abacos and watch the waves crash. There was tons of flotsom and jetsam that had washed up on that side. The short trail is a nice little nature hike. We saw snails and a lot of interesting plants and flowers.
The beach at Nunjack Cay is very shallow, and we enjoyed splashing around and sunbathing there for a couple hours. I played around with my snorkel — although there is no reef here — and happened to see a green turtle underwater!
There are no bathrooms, vendors or anything on Manjack Cay. We took shade under a tree while we sat on the sand and let the waves lap our legs. Probably because of the lack of facilities, there are also hardly any visitors here. Visiting destinations like this is the privilege you get from traveling on a private yacht! If you have to go to the bathroom, the captain can take you back to the yacht at any time.
After leaving the beach, we stopped at a snorkel spot not far from Manjack, aka Nunjack Cay. Although coral are visibly dying in the Bahamas due to climate change, we saw some beautiful live coral as well as purple sea fans. I remember seeing sargeant major fish as well as little gold ones.
Tranquil Turtle Beach Bar, Bluff House
We returned to the island of Green Turtle Cay, but this time on the other side of the island, in a cove known as White Sound. Here we enjoyed some tropical drinks and a tasty lunch — conch fritters were my favorite dish everywhere we ate. While waiting for our lunch, we waded and took photos at a swing that had been set up over the water.
The second night, we anchored near a sandbar not far from Green Turtle Cay. Our captain told us that this sandbar had been formed by Hurricane Dorian. As the sun sank down, the beach was gorgeous. My daughter saw a dorsal fin sticking out of the water, silhouetted in the low light. We think it was a nurse shark.
Abacos itinerary day 3: Treasure Cay, snorkeling between Great Guana Cay & Scotland Cay
On the third day of our Bahamas yacht charter, the wind began to pick up, so we set out at 8:30 a.m. to again cross the Whale Cay Cut — the exposed area of the Abacos where the seas get rough.
Treasure Cay Beach Villa Owners Association
Our captain anchored off this beach and we took the dinghy to shore, landing right in front of an area with lounge chairs scattered about the sand. A flag and a sign announced that we had arrived at the BVOA: Beach Villa Owners Association.
We found this community to be quite welcoming. Just behind the beach area, there’s a pool with restrooms that anyone is welcome to use. They have an office where they sell water on the honor system from a reverse-osmosis filter. We were happy to be able to refill our jugs instead of buying more.
The water is deeper at Treasure Cay than at the other beaches we’d visited, so we enjoyed some real swimming here and floated around on some inflatibles we’d brought. We also enjoyed chatting with some other folks who were staying there and relaxing on the loungers.
While I was wading here, a stingray swam near me!
Great Guana Cay/Scotland Cay
There’s a coral reef at the gap between these two islands, with beautiful cacti-looking coral and a large fish population. We saw parrotfish, more sargeant majors, and — a favorite of mine — some bluehead wrasse. Also shiny long ones that were probably trumpetfish — although they could have been young barracuda.
Abacos itinerary day 4: Hopetown and Tahiti Beach
We actually spent our third night in Conch Inn Marina because our captain said the weather was too rough to be out. That made Hopetown a short trip in the morning.
Elbow Reef/Hopetown
The most iconic sight in the Abacos is the Elbow Reef Lighthouse, a big candy-striped lighthouse that’s even featured on a Bahamian $10 bill. We had seen it from the plane as we landed at Marsh Harbour Airport. So we were excited to pull up to the Elbow Reef dinghy dock and see the lighthouse in person.
Like most lighthouses, you walk up a ton of steps, and then when you get to the top you’re rewarded with a great view of the area. The water looked so blue from up there, and spotted our yacht anchored offshore. We climbed the stairs alongside both US tourists and a local family, which added to the fun. The locals brought a very adorable little boy.
There’s no charge to tour the tower — a rare active kerosene-burning lighthouse — but there’s a container where you can put a donation. There’s also a small gift shop.
After the lighthouse, we hopped in the dinghy to visit Hopetown. This absolutely charming village appears to be populated mostly by vacationers and folks making a living off vacationers. Like in New Providence, the houses are either white or colored wooden clapboard and very picturesque. The mood of the town is very laid back, with no private vehicles.
Sadly, there is evidence of hurricane damage here, like in most of the Bahamas. For example, the town’s original post office seems never to have reopened after Dorian struck in 2019. Now, the post office is located in the police station, also the site of the town playground.
We browsed some shops. The merchandise — like $200 bags made of sailcloth — were really nice but out of our price range. We bought postcards from a German artist who complained to us how hard it was to spend his retirement selling his work to tourists. We bought a pie from an elderly white man named Vernon, whose store is covered with amusing handwritten notes. Visiting Vernon’s is not unlike visiting your weird old uncle, if your weird old uncle made delicious key lime pies.
While walking around near the harbor, we saw a young man pulling the mollusks from a bucket of conch shells. Maybe he was selling them to the restaurant?
We ate lunch at Cap’n Jack’s Restaurant & Bar. Like the other places we’d eaten, the food was just OK, except for the conch fritters, which were great. I had mahi tacos and they were overcooked. My son really enjoyed the fried chicken burger, though. The view from the outside deck at Cap’n Jacks is fabulous — the harbor is all around you, and you can see the lighthouse too.
Tahiti Beach
Tahiti Beach was a highlight of our entire trip. Our captian told us that this beautiful beach had good snorkeling and swimming. But by the time we got there the sun was getting low, so we just walked around tidepooling. We saw a ton of sealife here: about a million live conch, a starfish and even an octopus! This is also one of the few places in the Abacos where we saw birds.
The only other people here were a group of young people having a campfire, waaay on the other side of the beach. It was a spectacular place to watch the sun go down. We spent the night anchored nearby.
Abacos itinerary day 5: Pelican Cays, Lynyard Cay
We snorkeled off the boat here. We saw a lot here: purple parrot fish, tons of conchs at the bottom, and many other fish.
Like at Nunjack Cay, you can walk across Lynyard Cay from the protected side to the ocean side, and back. We loved this beach because it had more shells than any other beach we’d visited so far. There were a lot of little trilobite-looking creatures embedded in the rock wall as well. We collected a conch shell and some other souvenirs to bring home. There were also a couple of beach loungers here, though no other facilities or people.
The spot that got away: Little Harbour
Our captain had also wanted to take us to Pete’s Pub & Gallery in Little Harbour. Knowing that Erik is an artist, he figured we would like to see the working bronze foundry and sculptures there. We would have indeed!
Unfortunately, when we tried to head in to Little Harbour, the waves were kicking up. Our captain knew that one of the kids had been getting seasick on the dinghy rides, and this one would have been really choppy. So we gave that stop up.
What else did we miss on our Abacos itinerary?
This was our first time in the Abacos, so I’m sure we missed a few things. We didn’t go out in the evening at all, so we certainly could have tried more restaurants. I’d love to hear about spots you love in the Abacos that we missed.