One way, slowly · 10 nights · Nassau to George Town, Great Exuma

The whole Exuma chain in ten nights: Nassau to George Town

One way, Nassau to George Town: two nights in the park, two at Staniel, then Black Point and Little Farmer's where the day boats never go, and a flight home from Great Exuma.

Planned by the Ahoy Club charter team and reshaped for every yacht and every group we send here.

Best months: November - May
How long: 11 Days / 10 Nights
Start and finish: Nassau to George Town, Great Exuma
The pace: 11 days, 9 stops
Suits: Family & friends

Highbourne Cay

Highbourne Cay, northern Exumas · 38 nm · 4 h · Board and cross the Yellow Bank

Board at Albany, lunch under way across the bank, and the first night at Highbourne with the nurse sharks off the dock and the iguanas of Allen's Cay a tender ride away. Before the move in the morning, walk from the marina across to Horseshoe Bay: a white beach with hammocks and pontoons, a little bar on the sand that opens at midday if you call ahead, and buggies for anyone who would rather ride. Grapes for the iguanas.

Straight out from the airport
Nurse sharks and iguanas
First sunset over the banks

Norman's Cay

Norman's Cay, northern Exumas · 7 nm · 45 min · The walk, the piña coladas, the plane

The long walk across the island to the west beach, chairs and piña coladas on the sand, burgers at MacDuff's, buggies back. The cartel's DC-3 to snorkel in the afternoon.

The walk to the west beach
MacDuff's for burgers
Snorkel the drug plane

Warderick Wells

Warderick Wells, Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park · 17 nm · 1.75 h · Into the Land and Sea Park

The park headquarters and the sandbar anchorage. Boo Boo Hill, the driftwood pile, jet skis round the cays and a snorkel on the reef.

Boo Boo Hill
Jet skis through the park
The protected reef

Hawksbill Cay

Hawksbill Cay, Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park · 6 nm · 40 min · A second park day: the Loyalist ruins and an empty beach

Forty minutes north to one of the prettiest cays in the park. Wardens have cleared a trail through the scrub to the ruins of a Loyalist plantation, and the trail ends on a beach where the only footprints are yours. Kayaks and paddleboards in the lee, and the float-off day if the water is flat.

The trail to the Loyalist ruins
A beach with nobody on it
The float-off, if today is the day

Compass Cay and Pipe Creek

Compass Cay and Pipe Creek, central Exumas · 16 nm · 1.5 h · Sharks at the dock, the Pipe Cay picnic

Swim with the nurse sharks under the Compass Cay dock, find Rachel's Bubble Bath, and have the beach picnic in your own bay at Pipe Cay. Sunset in the turquoise maze of Pipe Creek.

Nurse sharks at Compass Cay
The picnic at Pipe Cay
Sunset in Pipe Creek

Staniel Cay and Big Major

Staniel Cay, central Exumas · 7 nm · 45 min · Pigs, grotto, sharks at the yacht club

Feeding and swimming with the pigs first, Thunderball Grotto at low tide, and Staniel Cay Yacht Club for drinks and pool before the nurse sharks arrive under the dock at sunset.

Carrots for the pigs
Thunderball Grotto
The yacht club and the sharks at sunset

Staniel Cay, the other side

Staniel Cay, central Exumas · Stay, or 2 nm round the island · A second night, a themed night

Stay a second night and see the other side of the island. The themed night on board is tonight, with a torch-lit dinner on a nearby beach if the group would rather be on the sand.

Round the island
The themed night
Or dinner on the beach by torchlight

Black Point

Black Point, Great Guana Cay, central Exumas · 5 nm · 30 min · The most Bahamian village in the chain

Half an hour south past Musha Cay, David Copperfield's private string of islands, which you cannot land on without an invitation but can admire from the water, to the largest settlement in the cays and the least touristy: a village where straw is still plaited on the porches, Lorraine's Café serves the lunch, and the blowhole on the Atlantic side fires with the swell. The day boats do not come here.

Musha Cay from the water on the way
A real Exumas village, lunch at Lorraine's Café
The blowhole on the Atlantic side

Little Farmer's Cay

Little Farmer's Cay, southern Exumas · 10 nm · 1 h · Where almost nobody goes

An hour south to a cay of fifty people. Turtles in the harbour, Oven Rock cave to climb into, Ty's Sunset Bar for a rum punch as the sun goes down over the banks. The quietest night of the trip.

Turtles in the harbour
Oven Rock cave
Sunset at Ty's

George Town and Stocking Island

George Town, Great Exuma · 43 nm · 4.5 h · Chat 'N' Chill and the stingrays

The one longer run, down the sound to Elizabeth Harbour, the biggest anchorage in the chain. Lunch at Chat 'N' Chill on Stocking Island, conch salad made in front of you with the stingrays nosing round your ankles, the walk up to the Monument for the view back over the whole chain, and the farewell dinner on board.

Chat 'N' Chill on the beach
Stingrays in the shallows
The Monument walk

George Town

George Town, Great Exuma · Tender to the dock · Disembark

Exuma International Airport is fifteen minutes from the dock, with direct flights to Miami, Atlanta and Toronto in season and Nassau every day.

Fifteen minutes to the airport
Direct flights to the US in season

The idea of the week

For people who want the Exumas and nothing else, slowly. The same water as the week, with every stop given room to breathe: two nights in the Land and Sea Park, two at Staniel, and then on south past where the week turns round, into the half of the chain that the day boats never reach. Black Point, the most Bahamian village in the cays; Little Farmer's, where almost nobody goes; and George Town at the bottom, with Chat 'N' Chill on the beach and an international airport, so you fly home instead of doubling back.

Total cruising is about fourteen hours over ten days, the laziest route we run. 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.

Longer trip
Couples
Seasoned charterers
One way

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 works

Also on this coast

Everything we know about Exuma Cays: when to go, where the fleet is and the other weeks we have planned.

Open Exuma Cays

Woven into the week

What the crew arrange along the way

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 bay

The 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 one

The 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 day

Ellie'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.

The toys, every day

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.

Guests arriving late or leaving early

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.

Staniel Cay, forty minutes from Nassau and direct flights from Fort Lauderdale
George Town, Great Exuma, with direct US flights
North Eleuthera for Harbour Island
Marsh Harbour for the Abacos

A day's sport fishing

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.

Half or full day, from the anchorage
The Exuma Sound drop-off is minutes away
Bonefishing on the flats for the patient
The galley cooks the catch that night

A night in Nassau, before or after

If the flights give you a night in the capital, we know how to spend it. Lunch at the Fish Fry on Arawak Cay, at Oh Andros, for the conch salad: go hungry, the plates are enormous, and bar-hop down the strip afterwards. The long slide at Atlantis for anyone who wants it, and Nobu there if the group wants Japanese. Then dinner at Graycliff, with its private room in a cellar of a quarter of a million bottles and the piano bar after. Wine lovers, this is your night. Over Christmas and New Year the night to be in Nassau is Junkanoo, the costumed street parade on Boxing Day and New Year's Day from two in the morning.

Oh Andros at the Fish Fry, in the daytime
The slide at Atlantis
Graycliff: the cellar room and the piano bar

Fly to the boat

A seaplane or a propeller flight from Nassau to Staniel Cay takes forty minutes and lands you a tender ride from the yacht. For a short trip it buys you a day; for a longer one it means the boat is already in the cays when you arrive.

Nassau to Staniel Cay in forty minutes
Nassau to North Eleuthera in thirty
Helicopter from Nassau for the biggest groups

Yachts

Yachts available in Exuma Cays right now

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.

Every yacht available here

CORAL OCEAN

Lürssen · 73m · 1994, refit 2026

12 guests | 6 cabins | 28 crew

€650k – 790k

Andiamo

Symbol Yachts · 28m · 2010, refit 2023

6 guests | 3 cabins | 3 crew

$35k

MIDORI

Sunreef Yachts · 21m · 2016, refit 2026

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$44k – 48k

SPECTRE

Princess · 29m · 2009, refit 2025

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$50k – 65k

CAMILLE

Broward Marine · 38m · 2007, refit 2019

10 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew

$85k – 98k

SWEET CAROLINE II

Trinity Yachts · 50m · 2009, refit 2021

12 guests | 7 cabins | 11 crew

$19k – 230k

Akasha

Lagoon · 19m · 2018

8 guests | 2 crew

$45k

TOP FIVE II

Royal Hakvoort · 61m · 2021

12 guests | 7 cabins | 19 crew

$600k – 650k

LADY ELAINE

Christensen · 50m · 2008, refit 2024

12 guests | 6 cabins | 9 crew

$200k – 225k

LADY J

Palmer Johnson · 43m · 1997, refit 2021

12 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew

$109k – 119k

Princess Mila

Fountaine Pajot · 20m · 2022

6 guests | 4 cabins | 3 crew

$43k – 49k

Giuli

Sunseeker · 23m · 2000

6 guests | 3 cabins | 3 crew

$34k – 44k

INDY

Hatteras · 26m · 2005, refit 2023

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$45k – 50k

MARY KATHLENE

Westport · 42m · 1989, refit 2023

8 guests | 4 cabins | 7 crew

$85k – 95k

NOW OR NEVER

Westport · 34m · 2010, refit 2020

8 guests | 4 cabins | 5 crew

$65k – 75k

CROSSED SABRE

Burger · 44m · 2006, refit 2021

12 guests | 7 cabins | 11 crew

$175k – 195k

PIER PRESSURE

Azimut · 27m · 2020, refit 2024

10 guests | 5 cabins | 4 crew

$70k – 80k

RISK & REWARD

Crescent Yachts · 37m · 2004, refit 2022

9 guests | 4 cabins | 6 crew

$75k – 85k

MURPHY'S LAW

Delta Marine · 38m · 1998, refit 2015

10 guests | 4 cabins | 5 crew

$7k – 81k

SLEEPOVER

Westport · 34m · 2008, refit 2021

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$65k – 75k

A PLACE IN THE SUN

Broward Marine · 30m · 1992, refit 2024

10 guests | 5 cabins | 4 crew

Price on request

CHANSON

Christensen · 37m · 1995, refit 2020

9 guests | 4 cabins | 6 crew

$75k – 85k

LEXINGTON

Horizon · 26m · 2006, refit 2024

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$40k – 46k

Intermarine Savannah · 45m · 2002, refit 2024

10 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew

$145k – 167k

TRUE NORTH

Broward Marine · 36m · 2000, refit 2019

8 guests | 4 cabins | 5 crew

$60k – 69k

SAINT

Sirena Yachts · 27m · 2021

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$85k – 98k

RELENTLESS

Trinity Yachts · 44m · 2001, refit 2019

10 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew

$150k – 173k

CARPE DIEM

Azimut · 31m · 2023

10 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew

$99k – 115k

NEVER ENOUGH

Feadship · 43m · 1992, refit 2019

10 guests | 5 cabins | 7 crew

$110k – 127k

Alegria

Azimut · 32m · 2024

8 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew

€100k – 110k

HAPPY HOUR

Horizon · 34m · 2018

11 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew

$95k – 105k

SOVEREIGN

Burger · 30m · 1966, refit 2020

8 guests | 4 cabins | 3 crew

$48k – 50k

BEYOND BEYOND

Riva · 29m · 2019

6 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$95k – 105k

PLAYTIME

Lagoon · 20m · 2018, refit 2021

6 guests | 3 cabins | 3 crew

$43k – 49k

BUNDALONG

Sunreef Yachts · 24m · 2019

10 guests | 5 cabins

$82k

LADY GRACE

Westport · 28m · 1996, refit 2025

6 guests | 3 cabins | 4 crew

$35k – 40k

OCEAN VIEW

Gulf Craft · 32m · 2022

12 guests | 5 cabins | 5 crew

€110k

PRIVILEGE

Custom Line · 34m · 2010, refit 2023

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

Price on request

KING OF FUN

Northern Marine · 40m · 2005, refit 2022

10 guests | 5 cabins | 8 crew

$120k – 138k

PILOT LOUNGE

Horizon · 28m · 2015, refit 2024

8 guests | 4 cabins | 3 crew

$48k – 52k

NOMADA

Mochi Craft · 24m · 2010, refit 2025

8 guests | 4 cabins | 4 crew

$50k – 55k

SeaQuest

Christensen · 38m · 1999, refit 2025

10 guests | 5 cabins | 6 crew

$85k – 98k

COPAY

Lazzara · 24m · 2003, refit 2020

6 guests | 3 cabins | 3 crew

$36k – 41k

Feadship · 47m · 1990, refit 2022

12 guests | 6 cabins | 10 crew

$140k – 170k

MEMENTO VIVERE

Westport · 40m · 2005, refit 2021

10 guests | 5 cabins | 7 crew

$120k – 150k

Afforded Leisure

Lazzara · 24m · 2001, refit 2025

6 guests | 3 cabins | 3 crew

$31k – 34k

TCB

Trinity Yachts · 50m · 2008, refit 2022

11 guests | 5 cabins | 9 crew

$175k – 200k

47 yachts in rotation. The order changes with every visit so no boat is always last.

Back to Exuma Cays

The other weeks we have planned on this coast, and when to go.

Exuma Cays All itineraries