Blog Entries for Summer of 2011

Another summer out sailing on our beautiful boat "Life". However, this year I've decided to use Facebook to publish updates for our friends rather than this old blog. Facebook has some advantages that this blog doesn't, the most important of which is that Facebook interfaces with our SPOT satellite transmitter, so we can post position updates on Facebook even if we're nowhere near a port with internet access.

If you're interested in receiving sailing updates, send me a Facebook friend request. My profile is http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000612342684. Once you're on my Facebook friend list then you'll be able to see all the photos, videos, and other updates that we'll be sending out this summer.

Best wishes,

Doug

Other Adventures in life...

If you'd like to follow my adventures on land come see me at:

JudieQuayle.blogspot.com

= )

The AfterLife

Well folks, summer is now over for Judie and me. The time has come to leave our precious Life behind (at least for this year) and move on to whatever AfterLife there might be waiting for us. We've now put the boat into dry storage in a boat yard in the Bahamas. It'll sit there until next summer.

Here's a photo of the boat in the place that'll be her home until next June.

The thin stands that you see supporting the boat are just temporary. The people at the boat yard are going to custom make a "cradle" to support the boat more securely in case a hurricane blows through there.

The next picture (below) shows how they lifted her up out of the water and put her on those stands. That big frame with crane-like lifting arms is called a "Travel Lift". The people put some heavy duty straps under the boat, attached them to the arms of the travel lift, lifted the boat out of the water and then drove it over to where the stands were waiting.

Judie and I are now in Florida. We're taking a few days of vacation from our vacation and then we'll head home to Utah after that. Here's a picture of the balcony of our hotel room. We've found that those lounge chairs are a great place to relax, catch up on some blogging, and just enjoy the ocean breeze.

Maybe Judie and I will do a "cleanup blog entry" or two after this present entry, in order to fill you in on some details that we left out of previous blogs, or maybe this will be our last entry for this year. I don't know.

It's been a nice summer. I hope all of you had good summers too.

Best wishes,

Doug

More Ramblings from Green Turtle Cay

Joy Ride

The golf cart gave us the freedom to explore most of the island. Durring our travels we discovered many dead ends. However, if you are persistent enough and go down enough roads you just might end up at a pretty little beach and have it all to yourself.

Wasn't Us

Docking a 42 foot sailboat has its challenges, especially when the" crew" is inexperienced. While it is true that we've left our "mark" on the Bahamas, I promise that it was not us who mangled this dock.

I suspect it was the ferry fleeing in the background.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Dogs

While we were wandering back to the dinghy I notice two dogs hanging out. It was a warm day and one of the dogs decided that a cool swim would be in order. Right into the sea he went. Soon all you could see was his nose and his tail. When he came out he saw me watching him and in three shakes of a puppy's tail he and his buddy were by our side.

They decided to escort us all the way back to the dinghy. It was a good thing too as there were fearsome creatures about the island and no one knows what might have happened to us without our canine escort.

Catching up

Oii

The Internet service we purchased for our time in the Bahamas seemed promising. Outer Island Internet, sounded REAL good. However, the this has to talk to the that and if the other has its back turned things just don't work out as planned. Needless to say we didn't always have Internet access.

We are in Florida now and the Internet gods do seem to be smiling upon us so I'll do a bit of catching up.

That's the best you got?

As we were leaving Marsh Harbour we saw a small squall and decided to motor out of its path. Seeing the puny boat trying to escape, it began the chase and soon caught up to us. It was awesome watching the line of the storm approach. It pelted our boat briefly and passed on its way. Doug looked to the heavens and asked, "That's the best you got?"

It wasn't. The storm came back with a vengeance. A waterfall fell from the bimini to the seat cushions, gushing from the down spout beneath the seat cushions to form a turbulent mass swirling about Doug's feet before descending through the drain on the cockpit floor.

It rained and rained and rained. Doug looked like a drowned rat at the helm and she who did not mock the gods found shelter under the dodger.

Eventually the rains ceased and we continued our outing.

Fishing on the ocean

We went out the Man-o-War cut leaving the Sea of Abaco behind to fish in the ocean. We pulled a line behind the boat but there was little chance of catching a fish. The winds were wonderful and it would have taken a very fast, suicidal fish to chase down the hook as we had the boat over 8 knots on occasion .

Green Turtle Cay

We picked up a mooring ball in the Black Sound Harbour near evening and were relaxing on deck when I heard a very distinctive sound. Very near the boat I saw a fin disappear beneath the water. Doug and I got to see a pod of dolphins coming into the harbour for the evening.

Pineapples

We took the dinghy over to the settlement of New Plymouth and rented a golf cart. We were on a quest to find the restaurant Pineapples. Following the signs we left the paved road and dodged pot holes when we could and bounced about the seat when we couldn't. Every time we were certain that we were on the wrong road, a pineapple shaped sign would appear encouraging us to continue.

We finally arrived. Plunked ourselves down at the bar and were promptly ignored. Eventually we were acknowledged. She brought us our cokes and took our order. Thoughtful lady that she was she BLASTED the music and Doug and I were driven from the dry comfort of the bar stool the the wet seat of a picnic table. We did eventually get our food, and I do mean eventually. If this is the way she treats clients, I never, ever want to get on her bad side!

Sunrise in Marsh Harbour

I'm thinking this doesn't need words at all. Just a cup of coffee and a contented sigh.

At Last... Some Underwater Photos

For the past several weeks I've been trying to find a way to describe to all of you how astoundingly beautiful the underwater scenery is here, but without success. I finally now have some photographs to share with you. However even they can't come close to capturing the incredible beauty that's underneath the waves here. But anyway, here they are...

This first one was taken in one of the many many caves that criss-cross the big reef in the Fowl Cay area. There are hundreds of thousands of tiny silver fish that make the cave their home. It's an amazing experience to swim through the middle of this school of fish, especially when it's in a cave or a big crevasse.

The next picture is a photo of me swimming through one of those schools of silver fishes. Obviously I didn't take the photo. In fact, I didn't take any of the photos you'll see in today's blog. I was with a dive tour company and the dive master had an underwater camera. (Judie will snorkel with me, but she's not quite willing yet to try scuba. Maybe I'll get her to do it next year... Or maybe not.)

And here's yet another one of me. This time (in the photo below, not the one above) I'm not in the cave. I'm just swimming through a coral area. The coral wasn't nearly as dense in this photo as it was in other places. Many of the places are composed of huge regions of densely packed corals of all different types. I really wish I could show you a picture of those, but the dive master didn't take any pictures there. So you'll just have to settle for this one. (I really need to get myself a good underwater camera. I've tried those cheapies that you use once and then throw away, but the pictures never come out good at all. )

By the way... in case anybody's curious... Yesterday Judie and I decided to return to the main metropolis here in Marsh Harbor. We had planned to go somewhere else, but the outboard motor on our dinghy died yet again so we changed our plans. We came back here (to the "big city") in order to have the outboard engine repaired. While we were here I decided to hook up with the dive tour company to do some more scuba diving while Judie just relaxed on our boat.

The outboard engine for the dinghy is now repaired, so tomorrow Judie and I will head off again. We're thinking to go out relatively far from the islands this time to do some deep-sea fishing (pulling a lure behind the boat while we sail along). However, we might not. We'll see what happens and we'll update you later.

Bye for now,

Doug

Wish you were here...

Dear Chester,

Wish you were here. You would love the sand and the ocean. The waves crash against the shore bringing fish with it. You would love chasing them as they wiggle furiously to get back to the deeper water. There are small crabs that hide in their shells and if you are quiet and hold still long enough they peep out and start crawling along the sand. You and I could have such a fun romp if only you were here.

But alas, you are not.

Meet Rover.

Ahahaha no worries Chester. You are the only dog for me, besides Rover didn't seem to like estrogen all that much. He was totally into testosterone, not that there's anything wrong with that. ;) Rover appeared on the beach and acted like he wanted to be with people, but did not want to get too close. Just sort of hang out with 'em. Make people think that he belongs so that no one runs him off the beach or out of the restaurant where he eventually showed up and mooched food off the young boys.

Curly Tailed Lizards

I think these guys are so cute. I am not alone.

Someone in Hope Town built them a lodge.

More Hope Town Pics (even though we're no longer there)

We left Hope Town yesterday, but I wanted to post just a few more pictures from there. Before we left, we stopped at the bank to get some cash. Their schedule for when they're open was rather amusing. Here's a picture of the sign on their door.

While we were there we spent quite a bit of time at one of the beaches there that we really enjoyed. In addition to being very beautiful, there were also many very good snorkeling spots just a short distance out from the water's edge, and there was also an excellent restaurant right there to enjoy before or after swimming. Here's a picture of the beach so you can see what I mean about it being a very pretty place. Whoever owns that home on the rocky point there sure is lucky.

And finally, here's another picture of the harbor at Hope Town, with the light house in the background. (I didn't label our boat in the picture this time, but if you look at the docks at the base of the lighthouse you can just barely see it.)
Right now Judie and I are anchored at a different spot on the same island where Hope Town is. There's another incredibly beautiful beach here. It's called "Tahiti Beach. I'm guessing that it got that name because it's so very lush and green, with lots of palm trees and other green vegetation... more than is typical for beaches here. We dinghied in yesterday to do some snorkeling and exploring. I took some pictures but the light wasn't quite right to do justice to the place so I won't include those photos right now. Today I'll take some more when the lighting conditions are more suited to show off the beauty of the place.

Bye for now,

Doug

Hope Town (my version ;)

Dinghy Love

We cracked jokes about Barry the barracuda being in love with the dinghy but we did not realize that the love was returned. The dinghy unable to be with her own true love decided to commit suicide.

When we first pulled into Hope Town it slipped under the out flow spout for the air conditioner and tried to drown itself. Poor thing was almost full of water before we pulled it back from the brink of despair. We pointed out that there were some handsome looking fish to be had here too. Even though they don't have the bad boy reputation that Barry had the dinghy seems content and has not tried a second attempt.

Good News and Bad News

I've had an earache for the past several days. I could take the pain no longer and requested medical assistance in this matter since it was not going away.

Doug called the Hope Town Clinic

Bad News: Clinic is closed today because of the holiday

Worse News: Clinic will be closed all week as the nurse will be in Marsh Harbour

Best News: Nurse lives in Hope Town and was home for the holiday and agreed to meet us at the office. What a wonderful person!! I have a middle ear infection and she hooked me up with some drugs. Only three more days of pain. I am counting the hours.

Traffic Jam Bahama Style

Nope, we're not reminiscing about the three cars, we are talking about coming into Hope Town. To enter the harbour is a little tricky and when we came in not only had everyone in the Sea of Abaco decided to do the same thing, there were many people leaving too. Our slip was still encumbered with another boat and so Doug was out doing 'brodies' in this little harbour with all the moored boats, all the incoming traffic and all the out going traffic. You go Captain Doug.

Lobster Fest

August 1 is the first day of lobster season and we attended a Lobster Fest here at Hope Town. They had 'live' music. ahaha They had recorded music and two dudes at mikes singing along playing the maracas or banging on a saw. The music was jumping, but I couldn't help but smile as the guy was jamming to the music and making all these comments as if he were the dude on the recorded version.

Doug and I shared a Reef and Beef. A lobster and a steak. I know who else LOVES lobster. The freaking flies. She put the plates down and the flies descended. We got to eat a lovely dinner AND get our arm exercises all at the same time. Talk about a full service meal.

= )

J.

Hope Town

We're now on the island of Elbow Cay, tied up to a marina in a pretty little community called Hope Town. One of the attractions that draws tourists to Hope Town is the candy-striped lighthouse shown below. It's one of the very few lighthouses left in the world that still works the original way... using a kerosene lamp as the light source and using a rotating ring of lenses in order to make the light flash the correct pattern. (Each lighthouse is assigned a unique flash pattern. This lighthouse's pattern is to flash five times followed by a long pause, every fifteen seconds.) The rotating ring of lenses is driven by a hand-cranked system, kind of like a big clock. There's no electricity at all used at this lighthouse. It's very cool, if you're into that kind of stuff.

Here's a picture of the lighthouse that I took this morning while sitting on the back of our boat. I wanted to show you how picturesque our view is. It's just like a post card.

I'll also include a picture that I took yesterday when Judie and I climbed up to the top of the lighthouse. The picture below was taken looking back towards the boat so that you can see the harbor and the community. You'll notice that the marina is very small. It can only handle six boats. We had to radio ahead to reserve our slip.

While we were up at the top of the lighthouse I took a picture from inside the rotating ring of lenses. The lenses are a special design called Fresnel lenses, which won't mean much to non-physicists, but a physicist will look at them and say, "Cool", because they're different from a normal lens design.

There's a wick shown near the top of the photo which is where the kerosene burns like a big candle. It's so bright that with the help of the lenses it can be seen from seventeen miles out at sea.

Judie writes blog entries about the animals we encounter. I write about the technology. Between the two of us you get the complete story. If it were only one of us here, you'd only get half the story.

Great Guana Cay

What a drag

When we parked the boat at Great Guana the winds were so very calm. Doug dove on the anchor and it hadn't grabbed, but if a wind came up (South/South East generally) it was in a position to dig right in. However, the winds decided to come from the west and they came with a gusto. Doug poked his head up to check on things and the boat was making its way into shore. The anchor was dragging and so we had a few interesting moments while we tried to get the boat into safe water.

Traffic Jam

We were there to witness the traffic jam at Great Guana Cay. It was something to behold. Prior to this we'd only seen golf carts but to our amazement we saw not one but THREE vehicles of the auto variety and they were all jammed up. A delivery truck was causing the whole debacle. He was stopped at the bright pink cafe, that closes between 12-1 for lunch, and no one could get around him.

In Bahama horns are used to say hi. I'm not sure that we'll ever know what they do if they get annoyed at another driver.

Sunsets

The sunsets at Guana were gorgeous and we had a front row seat every night.

Relaxing

We just spent a couple of days basically relaxing by the pool, reading and enjoying the scenery.

Loud Family

On one of our 'relaxation' days were were out on the ocean side at Nippers enjoying the white sand beach and turquoise water when a boat loaded with people pulled up. These yahoos kept getting closer and closer and closer to the shore while the only one with IQ points, a kid about ten, kept saying, "reverse, reverse, reverse."

Doug and I kept trying to get out of his way and he kept creeping ever near us. I was afraid that the dude would actually FIND reverse and back the boat right over us. We obviously lived to tell the tale ;)

The unloading of the boat was a humorous affair. They are just throwing kids off the bow to swim to shore. Eventually an adult got in the water. Then the "GET MY GOGGLES" and other missed items were hollered for. They were so loud and obnoxious. The fumes from their engine taking every breath of fresh air to be had AND they were parking all their stuff by our belongings. It was time to get away from the Loud family, so Doug and I headed up to Nippers for a drink.

Eventually the boat disgorged all of its passengers and guess where they headed? Yep, to the table right in front of ours. We moved again and found some vacated lounge chairs by the pool near the shade. Ah peace.

Not for long. The Loud family descended on the pool. At least now they were some what entertaining. The kids all lined up on the ledge and began to jump into the pool. Uncle would say, "belly flop" and damned if these kids did not comply. It was a sight to behold. After uncle was done bruising their bellies the kids were content to jump into the pool and run up the steps to jump again. It was fun to watch.

Never before seen footage

Lunch at Nippers... $55.00

Rum Punch ... $ 7.50 each

Result... Priceless

Man-O-War Cay

Low Place

Not a comment on my mental state... not at all ;)

The place where we stayed when we were on Man-O-War was called the Low Place. Mama Wendy said that during the Spring Tides the ocean can totally wash over the 'road'. That would be wonderful to see.

The seas calmed and the stars came out

On our snorkeling expeditions, as we'd dingy to the reef, you'd see green patches here and there in the sand beneath the boat. It wasn't until the seas were totally calm that I realized that these patches were really starfish. AWESOME!! Even around our boat were a scattering of them. Doug found one portly starfish by our boat, it was huge.

Walk into Man-O-War

We took the dingy to the beach at the Low Place and walked into Man-O-War. It was a wonderful walk, and we got to see some wonderful things we would not have been able to enjoy if we had taken the dingy. The path varied between worn down lava, sand and concrete. The vehicle of choice? Golf cart.

Afternoon in Man-O-War

While we were waiting for the motor to be repaired we had the wonderful opportunity to enjoy ice cream cones, cinnamon rolls and an afternoon at the pool. I worked off all the treats by doing laps in the pool. They were 'Bahama' laps of course. You float on your back until you bump into the wall, push gently off with a foot or hand and repeat.

I threw part of the cinnamon roll to a bird that was acting as if it would like a nibble. One of the curly tailed lizards raced down the tree across the grass and grabbed it quick as a lick. It was awesome.

Man-O-War Cay and Great Guana Cay

This (the picture above) is our latest anchorage as of today, Wednesday July 28. It’s on the island of Great Guana Cay. I took this photo about an hour ago from the beach-front restaurant where Judie and I had dinner tonight. We left our previous anchorage this morning and moved over to this new island this afternoon.

One really cool thing we discovered upon arrival is that this place has wireless internet that’s strong enough to reach all the way out to where we’re anchored. As I type this I’m sitting on the boat, relatively far from land, and yet I can get access to the internet via wireless connection. I've marked in the photo which boat is ours so that you can see how far from shore the boat is anchored. (We couldn’t get any closer because the water is too shallow closer in.) And yet we can get a wireless internet connection from here. Amazing.

Yesterday we had an adventure worth describing to you. We found out that it's best not to put too much trust in the dingy, or at least not its outboard motor. What happened was that we used the dingy to travel several miles away from where we had our big boat (Life) anchored. We went to a spot where the snorkeling was absolutely phenomenal but it’s a place where you can’t take a big boat like the Life. There are too many reefs and corals just barely under the surface of the water and not enough room to safely maneuver a big boat. So we went there by using our dingy even though it was a far distance from where Life was anchored.

After we'd enjoyed several hours of truly incredible snorkeling (the best I’ve ever seen anywhere in the world), we started up the little outboard engine on the dingy, headed back, and all of the sudden the engine dies. Completely dead. Nothing will restart it. It wasn’t out of gas, because we’d brought extra and had refilled it before starting the return trip. So there we were, miles away from our boat and to get back we had to cross a large gap between two islands where there's a strong current that could carry us out to sea if we couldn't move fast enough. And without our outboard engine we couldn't move fast enough. We had oars so we could theoretically row back to the boat, but we wouldn’t be able to cross that one dangerous spot fast enough to avoid being carried out to sea by the current.

Luckily we had thought to bring a handheld radio with us just in case of this type of emergency and so we were able to call for assistance. A very kind lady named “Mama Wendy” had her marine radio on even though she lives on land. (Apparently lots of people here use the marine band radios to communicate even if they aren’t boaters.) Mama Wendy called one of her relatives who has a boat. They came and got us and pulled our dingy back to a dock near her house. Her husband is a mechanic and he took our outboard engine apart, found the problem and fixed it.

It was a little dicey there for a while, but in the end everything turned out well and we made friends with some very nice people here.

All of that happened while we were anchored at the island where we’ve been for the past three days but we were incommunicado because of no internet access. That island is called Man-O-War Cay. While we were there we did lots of snorkeling, including two trips (on two separate days) to the place I described above. That place is such an incredible snorkeling location that it’s been designated as a Bahamas National Underwater Preserve. (It’s called the “Fowl Cay Preserve”.) The government monitors it closely to make sure that nobody takes any fish, corral, or disturbs things in any way. In fact, a ranger drove up to us in his boat one time and checked us over to make sure that we hadn’t broken the rules while we were there. The first time we went there we got back without incident. It was the second time there that we had our little adventure that I told you about above.

While we were at Man-O-War Cay we also had some very nice meals. Here’s a picture of me grilling some hamburgers and brats on the grill attached to the back of our boat. They sure tasted wonderful after a long hard day of snorkeling and exploring.

We also explored and swam at some very pretty beaches. Here’s a picture of one of them.

So now we’re at yet another island. We didn’t really do any exploring today… just went ashore and had dinner at the restaurant where I took the first picture shown above. Tomorrow we’ll do more exploring of this new island.

Well that’s enough chatter for one blog post.

Talk to ya later,

Doug

Time to Move On

It's been a fun week here in Marsh Harbor. We've eaten some great food, listened to some great music, Judie's back has done some great rehabilitation and I did some great scuba diving. But now we're ready to move on. The plan is for us to cast off tomorrow (Sunday) morning. It might be a while before you hear from us again here on the blog. Or it might not... I've purchased a temporary subscription to an internet provider here who claims to have wireless service at many of the popular anchorages in the "outer islands". We'll see if their claim is good or not.

We're not going to go far. We'll probably just sail a few miles over to a cay near here called Man-O-War Cay. There's a place off the north side of that cay that's famous for underwater scenery. In fact, it's so nice that it's been declared a national preserve. So our plan is to anchor there for a while... we don't know how long. Part of the joy of the sailing lifestyle is not making firm plans. We'll just see how we feel each morning. One day we'll look at each other and say, let's go somewhere else.

Oh... regarding the concert that we attended yesterday. There were a couple of details that Judie didn't mention that I thought were worth telling you all about. The musician we listened to is an island dweller who is supposedly famous outside of the islands as well as locally. He's called "The Barefoot Man". He did some very humorous songs, one of which he wrote just in the past week. It was a song about the "Barefoot Bandit". I assume you've all heard about HIM in the news. He stole several planes in the US and crash landed the last one right here in Marsh Harbor. Then he stole a boat here and took it to another island not too far from here. That's where the Bahamian police finally caught up with him, shooting out his boat's engines and very nearly shooting him too.

Anyway... the Barefoot Man did a song about all that. Part of the lyrics went something like this...

"He stole a boat, he stole a plane, but worst of all he stole my name."

"Why can't we catch him? Well somebody might, if BEC would ever turn on the lights."

That last reference would go over the heads of anybody who's not local, but if you are from here you'll really appreciate it. BEC is the local power company and they are really really bad at their job. There is a power outage every single day... I kid you not... and some days the power goes out two or even three times. At first I thought they were just doing rolling blackouts on purpose because they didn't have enough capacity when everybody ran their air conditioners during the heat of the day. That would have been understandable. However, that theory got shot down when the power outages happened at night as well as during the day. So we'll have to just chalk it up to a crappy power company. The people who came here from other places are outraged at BEC's incompetence. The local people just shrug.

The concert was very fun. Good music. Lots of bikini-clad girls dancing. Lots of old men and old women trying to dance... not succeeding, but that was OK because nobody cared. Lots of shirtless young guys standing on the sidelines ogling the girls who were dancing. Why the young guys didn't dance was a mystery. They just stood there and watched the girls.

There were lots of people drunk out of their minds. The guy that Judie mentioned falling off the pier afterward the concert let out... The reason he fell off was because he was so drunk. His friends had left him to wait for the ferry all alone while they went shopping. Some friends. He couldn't even stand up on his own. It's no wonder that he fell off the pier. The water was very shallow where he fell. There were rocks right under the surface. He had cuts all over him, including one bad one on his head that was bleeding pretty good. Luckily for him there were some non-drunk people nearby who fished him out of the water. Otherwise he could have easily died.

And people ask me why I've never been drunk. Over the years I've seen waaaay too many drunks do things like this guy did. I could tell LOTS of stories about the drunks I dealt with while on business trips in Asia where the local sales rep and I took customers our for dinner and drinks in order to "establish relationships" with them. (Taking customers out to eat and drink is a very important part of the sales cycle over there.) Man have I ever seen a lot of drunks, and seeing what people do when they're drunk leaves me with no desire whatsoever to get drunk.

So anyway... back to our sailing plans. Tomorrow Judie and I will cast off the dock lines and leave what's been our home for the past week. It's been a nice place here, but it's time to move on.

Talk to you all later.

Doug

I'm back...

Pun intended. My back is feeling so much better I can sit at the computer for more than three nano seconds.

CRUSHED NUTS!!

Doug and I ate at Jamie's Place. The restaurant had a 'family' feel to it.

Tropical Salad sounded good but one of the ingredients was crushed nuts and I was concerned as to the kind of nut. So as we were ordering Doug inquired, "What kind of nuts are one the salad?"

Her reply, "CRUSHED NUTS!!"

Like Duh!!

We had salad without the nuts.

And a good time was had by all...

Yesterday my back was feeling 'better' and we decided to put it to the ultimate test. Give it a good work out and if I could walk on Saturday, then maybe we could untether ourselves from this dock and go do a bit more sailing.

We took the ferry over to Big Guana Cay and saw a concert by the Barefoot Man at Nippers. It was very fun. The music had the 'island-ish / Jimmy Buffet kind of feel and he loved to make fun of the BEC (Bahama Electric Company) because you KNOW that there will be a power outrage at least once a day if not multiple times and it can last for hours and hours and hours.

Watching all the girls dance was great.... did I mention that Nippers is a bar that also has two pools. All these drunk bikini clad gals are out dancing together or dancing with the old guys. The young guys seemed content to just watch from afar. (Admire from afar? ;)

This one ANCIENT couple was out dancing. Now grandma still had some moves in her, but grandpa, well, he was doing good to just stand on his feet. He'd lumber out onto the dance floor and grandma would use him as a prop as she'd dance around. He had a huge smile on his face, I'm assuming he was having fun. Another old dude, that looked like Don Rickles had a gaggle of gal that kept him on the dance floor for most of the afternoon.

After the 'concert' we headed back to the ferry. We were waiting for it to take off when down at the end of the pier one of the 'concert' goers walked off the dock and fell into the water. Kersplash. Luckily someone was near and help to fish him out of the water. He had only a few bloody scrapes and bruises. The guy that helped him on to the ferry gave him the advice of 3 gallons of water and 10 apples. Sounds like helper guy has taken a dive or two off the pier himself perhaps?

OOPS... boy is my face red

Well, it seems that rice and peas IS rice and peas. Not navy or kidney beans. PEAS

We were trying to figure out what to have for dinner and we pulled out a can that the previous owner had left on the boat of Pigeon Peas and by golly if they weren't the "bean"... ahaha who'd a guessed.

Here is a recipe for anyone who is adventurous enough to give 'em a go.

PIGEON PEAS 'N RICE

Printed from COOKS.COM

---

1/4 c. bacon, diced
1 sm. onion
1 green pepper, diced
1 stalk celery
1 (8 oz.) can Pigeon peas
4 tbsp. tomato paste
1 c. rice
2 c. water
Thyme

Cook bacon until crisp. Add onion, pepper, and celery and cook until the mixture is pulpy. Add tomato paste and cook until most of the liquid in the pan has evaporated.

Add the drained Pigeon peas, thyme, salt, and pepper and cook for 2 minutes. Pour in the rice and add water to cover. Cover the pot and allow mixture to simmer until all liquid had evaporated.

Rest, Recuperation, Repair and Resupply

Hi everyone,

For the past several days we've stayed tied up to a marina in Marsh Harbor so that we could rest, recuperate, repair and resupply. We've hit several of the local restaurants, done some exploring around the town, and in general just relaxed.

A couple of days ago I joined up with a scuba trip that was run by a local dive shop while Judie stayed "home" and gave her back a rest. The dive trip was incredible. We went out to a large reef that has a network of caves running through it. Part of the cave was filled with hundreds of thousands of tiny silver fish. They were illuminated by an opening in the cave up above and it looked like there was a spot light on all the fish. It was an incredible sight.

Judie and I are planning to stay here at the marina for the rest of this week. The weather report shows a tropical storm forming north of Haiti that will head this way and give us some rough weather later in the week. Therefore we'll stay tied up at the dock until that passes. Don't worry if you see something in the news about a tropical storm hitting the Bahamas. We'll be fine here in this safe and pleasant marina at Marsh Harbor.

Bye for now,

Doug

Great Harbor Cay

At Great Harbor Cay we rented a jeep. Ahahaha I guess if navey beans can be call peas, then a Geo can be called a jeep.

The guy that rented us the 'jeep' told us to keep it on the hard road and with good reason. The last person that took one of them off road got stuck. The guy was not telling tales out of school, there at the beach was a car stuck in the sand. They had to bring in a HUGE machine that could almost stretch out and reach the car. They tied ropes to it and eventually were able to drag it out of the sand.

The sand really did seem like sugar, it was white and so very fine. Doug swam out enjoying the cool ocean water while I explored the area.

There were tide pools that were fun to watch. Near one of the pools I met this wrinkly black crab. I'd never seen anything like it before so I tried to take his photo. He was just a little camera shy.

In the tide pool was one large-ish fish. He seemed to have it down to a fine art. The ocean would wash over the rocks and he'd hide in a crevasse. When the water would recede he would dart out and enjoy a wonderful lunch of the tiny fish that had washed in.

"Come on in for a bite boys."

Catching up

Devils Cay

We had a nice little sail from Goat Cay to Devils Cay. Squeezed our way into an anchorage (well, it looked like it to me) but Captain D. with chart in one hand and the 'talkie' in the other got us in and anchored.

He had to dive on the anchor to make sure it was set properly and before long we were both enjoying the water. Doug swam over to check out a neighboring cay and by the time he got back a storm was hinting at the fact it might join us. It began talking. It grumbled and rumbled but there was no lightning to be seen. Next thing we know out of the clear blue sky, literally, directly above our heads we had a flash of light and a crack of thunder.

When I realized that we were both alive and neither one 'sizzled', then I decided it was freaking awesome!!

Soon the rains descended and Doug was out swabbing the decks. I was not able to get a picture of that, but I did get a picture of the rainbow.

Snorkeling

The snorkeling at Devils Cay was wonderful. My favorite part was when Doug said, "Let's go to the edge of the reef where the big fish are." Sounded good to me. Suddenly he's tugging on me acting agitated. I can't figure out what it is I'm supposed to be looking at. Doug goes up topside and says, "Swim back the way we came."

I comply. His need to get out of the area was so urgent I assumed that we'd stumbled over a crop of coral that we were in risk of killing...warn't no coral!! It was a six foot shark. Yea Doug, let's go out where the BIG fish are. ;)))

Barry

Doug also told you about Barry, the barracuda that fell in love with our dingy. Doug said he was looking for shade, but even in the cool of the evening he lingered...it was love, I'm certain of it.

I went to the Doctor

ahahaha anyone who knows me won't believe this one. However, it is true.

From time to time my back likes to give me fits and starts. It had been a while and my back decided it was time once again to prove who was the boss. Generally, a day in the fetal position and then an icy/hot pad or two is sufficient to make things better. Not this time.

I blame it on the boat. The constant rocking and never being able to find one spot and stay there, I was constantly shifting for balance and it was not pretty. When we made it to Marsh Harbour poor Doug had to bring the boat in by himself. It was not pretty, but he got the job done.

The doctor said it was 'muscle spasms'. I could have told you that Doc!! ahaha he did give me some drugs and it seems to be helping. I slept for about 20 hours yesterday and am feeling well enough to sit here and type. That's a biggie.