On the Move Again

A big hello to all! Currently we are finishing up a delightful three day stay in Treasure Cay at their marina, on the Great Abaco Island. We left Sea Spray Marina on Tuesday, March 24 and are basically on the move again. We are making our way towards the West End of Grand Bahama Island one more time where we will cross back over the Atlantic around March 31. Ft Pierce, Florida will be our destination next. Our friends Jim and Lisa are on the move also and are paralleling our cruise plan.

Using Skype, an internet video phone system, we just found out while talking to our daughter Carrie that she and her husband Jody are taking her spring break week April 6-10 to drive down and visit us near Daytona, Florida!

We had a great time at Sea Spray. We were happy to see friends Peggy and Bob from their boat ‘Baby Grand’ again, who we originally met in the Florida panhandle.

One of our highlights was seeing the Discovery Space shuttle while on our boat as it traveled over the northern Bahamas on Sunday, March 15. I took photos but I asked a fellow boater, Paul, from the boat Katerina, to lend me his photo as seen above, to put in the blog. What an awesome photo. This was a thrill to see for all of us at the marina! Thank you Paul!


We made new friends with Lew and Florrie from New Jersey on their catamaran named ‘Harmony.’ Linda and Florrie went off painting together and had a great time.
We certainly had lots of winds at Sea Spray during our month and Linda usually had quite a time getting on and off the boat.


We had a very rainy day once and it was fun to stay inside where Linda made a family favorite; chocolate drop cookies. Linda set up a DVD movie exchange between us and our friends when the rain stopped temporarily so we had a ‘new' movie for the evening, cookies and coffee with Bailey’s added!

One fine day we walked on the beach by our marina where we were told to look for seaglass. We did find several pieces. Seaglass jewelry is popular in the shops here. It takes several years (20+) for pieces of glass to become weathered. And it is becoming more difficult to find it as glass containers are being replaced so much by plastic. The color of the glass can indicate the age of it. Common colors are green, white, and brown. Blue, aqua and pink are older and more rare. Historic and highly prized are the orange and red and gray colors.


Here is a collage of some of the things collected from our exploring days at Sea Spray. Seaglass from the beaches and from the water, the sea biscuits, and the bougainvillea flower from beautiful bushes growing around the pool.

Lisa and Jim joined us for the Bahamian feast night.

In conclusion, here are two more photos taken while staying at Sea Spray. First, A quaint view of a side street in Hope Town.

Second, the humor of a road sign. Linda was going “That Way” at the time!

Playing Tourist in Treasure Cay. March 24-27

Our marina here at Treasure Cay is pretty and has all the amenities. Water, electric, cable and high speed wireless internet! Treasure Cay is located on the Great Abaco Island.

Treasure Cay boasts of one of the top ten beautiful beaches in the world and the best in the Caribbean! We couldn’t get enough of looking at nature’s colors!

Today (March 26) we made it our top priority to spend the whole day on this beach. We found sand dollars, star fish and a conch! Look closely and see if you can find the eyes on the conch animal inside his shell! Click on the picture to enlarge! We gently threw him back in!

Here is a photo of Charlie looking for more shells at low tide. In the background you’ll see a mammoth rock. Named “Don’t Rock, it is well known in the area and is mentioned on all the charts of this area for being a treacherous area to go near on boat. We are going through the Don’t Rock passage in the morning on our way back to West End. Wish us luck!

We’ll touch base again in a week or two when we’re back in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

Sincerely,
Linda and Charlie

Laying Low Down in Abaco

So far, Charlie and I have deeply enjoyed the rugged beauty here on Elbow Cay.

Today is Friday,March 13, our Christa's 28th birthday and we found an internet connection at a restaurant in Hope Town to wish her a very Happy 28th Birthday and to do the blog. Charlie and I are currently in our third week out of four here at Sea Spray Marina on Elbow Cay in the Abacos.

First here are some basic facts of the Abacos
(Italicized text below taken from the” Guide to Abaco 2008,” by Steve Dodge)

The Abacos and its cays form one of the largest bodies of semi-protective waters in the Bahamas, and are less traveled than many of other islands. Miles of secluded beaches can be found and there are plentiful harbors and sheltered areas for anchoring one’s boat. These northeast islands of the Bahamas are laid back and more rustic than the more populated areas surrounding Nassau or Freeport on Grand Bahama Island. The population of the Abacos is about 15,000. The Abacos consist of Little Abaco Island, then southeast to the Great Abaco Island, and running along the eastern side of both islands are a string of outer Cays.

This photo above was taken near our marina at the beautiful Abaco Inn. Their restaurant and pool overlook this panoramic view of the rugged coastline of the Atlantic Ocean. During one of our walks, Charlie took my picture with their beautiful backdrop on their property.

We have walked along the beach close to our marina more than once, collecting things like sea glass and shells along the way and taking all the time we wanted to have a close look at some fantastic creatures like the one above. He looked like a baby in his size of about 5 inches.

I took this little crab home to the boat and put him in a container of saltwater with the hopes that I could photograph him more. But alas, the next morning he had crawled out, shell and all and apparently took a giant leap over the boat! The beauty and delicacies of nature! It was fun to have a pet for a night. Our girls used to have a hermit crab pet they brought home from Myrtle Beach named Hermie!

The water was clear and calm went we went to Marsh Harbor and back in our dinghy which enabled us all to see everything on the bottom from the sides of our dinghies quite clearly. We saw sea grasses, fish and starfish and something amazing which you will have to read farther down to see what it was! In the photo above, we borrowed Jim, and Lisa’s viewing bucket and could see things even more clearly like this beautiful starfish.

When we leave our marina around March 22, we hope to do more island hopping back north and west as we head back to West End again to cross back to Florida. Among the places we might get to include the pink and white beach with shallow, clear water at Treasure Cay, the great snorkeling opportunities at the 3rd largest barrier reef in the world at Great Guana Cay (where we recently took the Hope Town ferry on March 6 to attend the Barefoot Man Concert at the famous restaurant-bar, “Nippers”, on one of their beaches), and possibly we can go to Man-O-War Cay, for its natural quiet beauty, boat building, (and for its store that features handcrafted, quality handbags made from sailcloth!

Tourism is their biggest business with ship building, construction, and the seafood industry important as well.

Charlie and I have found that the people we have spoken to are most always are very friendly and helpful, and have displayed a lot of pride when answering our questions about their culture and heritage.

Their traffic rules follow the British laws so driving is done on the left side of the road.

Along the roads we have used, there are no sidewalks and very little room to walk along the edges of the roads. Even though we have seen about half cars and half golf carts with a few trucks go by us, we have to keep remembering to walk facing traffic on the right side of the roads and ride our bikes on the left sides of the roads with the traffic!

There is no sales tax on purchases but 15% tip is expected and is frequently added on the restaurant bill automatically. Linda recently spoke to a store owner who showed her all the Bahamian coins and bills currently used. The coins each have their own design on them; the penny has a starfish, the nickel a pineapple, the dime has bone fish and the quarter has a sailboat. All the coins are round except the nickel which is shaped like a fluted pie crust.

Roads in the villages and towns were originally designed for human traffic and wagons only and remain the same narrow width today. Automobiles are scarce; so the sounds one hears in the towns are most generally limited to boat building, small construction sites, and the church and school bells. ( And roosters crowing!)

Tourists and locals in town get around by walking, biking or riding in golf carts as well as taking ferry boats to and from the other islands.

Bait for fishing is from the waters.

The availability of much of the food in the grocery stores is dependant on when the next boat comes in. Fresh meat and food shipped from the U.S. is expensive and water is at a premium ($0.40/gallon at our dock so we limit our boat washing - it takes us 50 gallons to wash our boat!).

Much of the world’s best seafood is here and is plentiful year round.

The following italicized information is from the “Waterway Guide 2005, Bahamas section

One of the reasons for the popularity of the Bahamian islands is their temperate climate. The average temperature in Nassau is 77 degrees and the difference between the daily maximum and minimum is only about 12 degrees. Floridians often come to the islands in summer to escape the mainland’s heat and humidity. There are two distinct weather patterns in the Bahamas: winter and summer.

Winter begins in November or December and has cold fronts that last up to five days. With the fronts come high pressure winds from the continent, 20-30 knots that interrupt the easterly trades. Winds average 10-15 knots in the winter. Winter is also the dry season. (And can get very dusty, as we have experienced on windy days.)

These strong winds combined with the waves and current allow the sand to shift along the banks a great deal, creating unknown depths and unknown rock and coral exposure. While boating, it is important not to use “eyeball navigation” and stay strictly in the marked channels.

The summers begins in May, have lighter winds, high humidity and lots of thunderstorms and lightning.

Here at Sea Spray Marina, the cold front of several days last week with high’s in the 60’s and strong enough winds to make it difficult to get on and off our boat gave way to current weather that everyone is currently smiling about. Lately the weather has improved to the low 80’s and less wind. Recent nights of a full moon have given us fantastic views (along with extreme high and low tides ranging up to a three foot difference in our dock height getting off and on our boat.) Charlie and I have swum in the marina’s pool, and have been able to watch some of the MSU basketball games outside at the Tiki Bar.

The highlight of this week was on Monday, March 9 when Jim, Lisa, Charlie and I took our dinghies out into the Sea of Abaco to the town of Marsh Harbor, a 3.5 mile ride to the Boat Harbor Marina. In the marina, Jim and Lisa recognized the boat Christine from Toledo, Ohio. The owners, Jim and Joan let us all tie up to their boat while we visited Marsh Harbor for the day. We were grateful as the marina charges $25 for a day just to use their dinghy dock! After a walking day in the small town and a lunch on a waterfront restaurant called Mangoes, some sightseeing and shopping for groceries, we went to a boxcar looking building called “Buck a Book” where anyone can go and buy used books. The proceeds go for the efforts of protecting the wild horses of Abaco.

Here is the surprise we saw when coming home from Marsh Harbor in our dinghies!

Imagine our surprise when Jim and Lisa pointed to two sharks along side both of our dinghies!! They were each 6-8 feet long! (Later, Jim looked them up in a book and told us they were Nurse sharks. ) We took our photos carefully as they were very close. They moved swiftly past us and we had to go after them to take our pictures! This photo shows the body of the sharks taken right next to us! Wow!

The Bahamas have approximately 2,000 islands extending south west 800 miles. Hopefully when we leave Seas Spray, we can see much more. We are enthralled with the beauty here and the lore of the people and the culture. And it is a place in the world that looks like and feels like paradise. What a beautiful day. So let’s go out and play.

10th Annual Barefoot Man Concert, Nippers Bar and Restaurant,

Guana Cay, Abaco. Friday, March 6, 2009

Charlie and I boarded the Hope Town Ferry on March 6; the day of the year in the Abacos that boasts the much waited Barefoot Man Concert; a noonish concert and party complete with a pig roast and golf cart decoration competition at the very popular tropical beach bar-restaurant –gift shop place called Nippers.

The buzz of the concert had been building up everywhere since we arrived at Sea Spray Marina and we wanted to go. It would mean getting a courtesy ride from our marina to the ferry in Hope Town early in the morning of the concert and then taking the one hour ride to the island of Guana Cay. Then the concert, then the one hour ferry ride back to Hope Town, then we would have to walk the 3.5 miles home in the late afternoon.
Getting around from one island to another requires getting on a boat of some kind for everyone and so we set off for another one of our adventures!

Here is our view from our ferry arriving at Guana Cay for the concert.

Here is a photo of me standing next to a Cat Lady. Friends of the Human Society were out with their buckets on concert day dressed like cats and collecting funds to help control the island’s cat population by neutering the cats.

Here is the pathway leading up to the very colorful Nippers Beach Bar, Restaurant and Gift Shop.

The festivities began three hours before the concert with an appearance of the woman with the tiny waist. She is part of the lure of the islands! She is also listed in the Guinness Book of Records as having the smallest waist of 15 inches!

Everyone was enjoying the beautiful weather and the party atmosphere (3 Bahama Mamas for Linda!) building up to concert time with live music from Barefoot Man’s band.

See if you can find Charlie; (Where’s Waldo?) he has on an orange sherbet-colored shirt!(in middle – he had three Bahama Mama drinks also)

In spite of the fact that we had never heard his music before, we liked Barefoot Man’s songs immediately; they are a lot like Jimmy Buffet’s songs only more laid back.

Barefoot Man is actually the stage name of George Novak, from the Grand Cayman Islands who tours his homeland, the Bahamas, and Florida with his band to sing his own version of the Jimmy Buffet style. When he comes to Nippers with his wife and band, his concert draws people from all over the world. They come by yacht, plane, private plane, ferry and even golf carts! His lyrics are stories of the Abacos with places we know of and have heard of and the beat is a laid back, Caribbean, steel drum kind of sound. (you can go to http://www.barefootman.com/ if you wish)

No charge for the concert, just the costs of your food and drink. We got there three hours before the concert and were glad we did in order to get a spot at a table! I became a groupie and had to look up security to find Barefoot before the concert to get his picture with me and my new friend Ann.

Did we mention the golf cart competition?

All in all, this event was essentially an older kid spring break party! Charlie and I didn’t go on spring break trips for the most part when we were growing up like our girls did, so now it was our turn!

We say hello and hope everyone is getting some early spring-like weather up north these days.

We are grateful as always for our house sitter; another Christa, who watches over our home. We are also grateful that so many people can read the blog to know we are OK and having fun; especially Linda’s mother who goes to Tecumseh’s library each week to read about the trip and to Dick at the senior center who prints out the blog so that others can read it. And last, we are grateful for Linda’s new grand nephew, Noah, born to Melissa and Jia out in the Seattle area recently. Melissa is the daughter of Linda’s brother, Larry and wife Carolyn of Fowlerville, MI.

And we send big Happy Birthdays to daughters Christa and Carrie, Linda’s brother John, and to our friends Jeff and Marcia.

Sincerely, Linda and Charlie

Week three in the Bahamas-Life on a Boat in the Abacos

Freedom’s Turn is settling into her second week at slip #57 at Sea Spray Resort and Marina, on the Abaco island of Elbow Key.

It is her third week overall in the Bahamas. She is side by side to her boat friend Kismet.

The boats’ captains and first mates have certainly enjoyed greeting each other daily across boat railings and have shared cocktails, stories, and meetings in nearby Hope Town. One fine evening, the two couples had a delicious potluck dinner (lobster, grouper, salad, potatoes and peanut butter pie!) on the Kismet. The wind had died down that night and the stars were out in their full glory. This past Saturday night, Sea Spray Marina had a live band outside on the Tiki Bar deck where both couples and several others danced under the little white lights wrapped around the palm trees on the deck.

Since arriving here on February 21, Freedom’s Turn has seen magnificent sunrises and sunsets, pink and white sandy beaches in the distance, palm trees loaded with coconuts swaying, waters of aqua and turquoise, and the national flag of Bahamas welcoming her off the main dock. While she has cruised and at her slips she has also seen U.S., Canadian and British flags as well as the Bahamian courtesy flag she has seen on all visiting pleasure craft. Charlie attached one on Freedom’s Turn at the upper helm radar antenna when she cleared customs back in West End. All visiting pleasure boats are required to fly this flag while staying in the Bahamas.

Freedom’s Turn has had her lines tied and retied more times than she can remember in the ever changing 2-3 ft tides and wind direction. She feels and hears the howling winds blowing her away from her dock constantly.

During the early part of the morning, Freedom’s Turn and her crew hear the local roosters crowing nearby and at night, the roar coming from the ocean, just a sand dune away. Since crossing over the Atlantic, she has had big tastes of salt water spray and thus has several engine and zinc checks, washings and protective sprays applied to the Strata glass window at the upper helm which is sensitive to salt water, lots more polishing of her stainless steel railings, and salt deposits scrubbed out of grommets and snaps.

Since she has been docked at Sea Spray, Freedom's Turn has witnessed exotic looking foods on her decks including a cracked open coconut and fresh lobster waiting to be grilled. Linda and Charlie picked up a green coconut lying on the side of the road. The locals use the jelly meat mostly for baking and the coconut water is supposed to be very healthy to drink so the locals tell us. So Linda and Charlie drank the sweet coconut water and fried the coconut with butter and sugar and put it over their ice cream. (Healthy and not so healthy but good.)

The first day at Sea Spray Marina, Linda and Charlie paid for a day of the local internet service and that evening, they used ‘’Skype’ on their computer to talk to Linda’s mother on her mother’s phone, sound only. Then they used their computer to call daughter Carrie and Jody’s at their home on their computer equipped with a video cam! Other daughter Christa had come over to her sister’s to be a part of the big event! Everyone saw and heard each other! What computers can do! If both computers, have 'Skype', are on line at the same time,(free to sign up) their computer calls and videos are free! Both computers have to have the video cam to see each other. Calling Linda’s mother from Skype on the computer to her mother’s phone cost Linda and Charlie .02 per minute and they had to be on the internet at the time of the call and had to have a pre-paid account with 'Skype' to make the call work.

During the evenings, Charlie and Linda read or watch their DVD’s they’ve saved for these nights of no TV. They also have been laughing at the craziness of some DVD's of a season of the TV series “Arrested Development” given to them by their daughter Christa. They have not eaten a dinner out yet (just a few lunches in Hope Town) but on Wednesday nights in March next to the Tiki Bar and the decks of the Boathouse Restaurant, they plan on attending the marina’s Bahamian buffet soon (fish, ribs, chicken and all the fixin’s!) including the same live band which, by the way, features the harbormaster Junior, as the drummer and Junior’s right hand man Rodney as a guitarist.

The first afternoon here, Linda and Charlie walked to the beach and watched part of a youth surfing club age group competition going on. There were parents of the club selling grilled hot dogs and all the trimmings from their beach concession stand. Linda and Charlie felt at home while they ate their lunch there right on the beach and stayed for some of the competition. It made them think of all the swim meets they have watched and participated in while their girls swam competitively from 1988-2001.

This past Saturday, Freedom’s Turn watched while Captain Charlie took the dinghy down for he and Linda to go into Hope Town to attend the annual fair put on by the Hope Town Firefighters and Rescue Department. Charlie wore his Michigan State Shirt because he and Linda were going to meet the man from Okemos named Pete, (who wore his Lansing Lugnuts shirt for us) an Okemos Chieftain graduate in 1972, who lives with his wife in Hope Town during their winters. It turns out that Charlie had Pete’s dad as an inorganic chemistry professor at MSU (small world!).

Since arriving here at Sea Spray, Linda and Charlie have listened to Pete and others broadcasting on the Abaco Cruisers Net program. The program can be found on channel 68 on the VHS marine radio at 8:15 every morning. Boaters and non-boaters alike in the Abaco area can hear the local weather and happenings of the day as well as being invited to talk on the program to let others know who is currently cruising in the area and their personal updates on the sea conditions. Pete and his wife now live in Oregon for the rest of the year.

Freedom’s Turn heard about the beautiful island sights of Hope Town and its bay from Linda and Charlie when they came back from their first visit there. Hope Town is the second largest town in the Abacos with about 350 permanent residents; in addition would be the boaters and vacationers. The largest town is Marsh Harbor, just across the Abaco Sea (3.5 miles).

When visiting the Hope Town, one sees a clean and pretty town with a freshly painted look. Its people are friendly and helpful. It has three grocery stores; small and quaint with items like homemade baked goods and produce just picked out of someone’s garden. One store, Vernon’s, makes bread everyday except Sunday. He and his wife post little signs on the food shelves giving one advice as you shop as you can see below.

It has one bank which shows the true laid back ambiance of the town by it's sign posted outside.

It’s Post Office, Police Department and Commissioners Office are all in one bright blue building where the Post Office closes for lunch from 12-1:10 p.m.

Announcements posted on the telephone poles show several local organizations to be involved in as well as lots of events planned around the sailing club. The Coffee House proved to be a place for those that really appreciate a great cup of coffee (like us) and seems to be a popular meeting place for retirees who stay in the area for the winter, or permanent, (all are youthful and vibrant looking like us!). The large harbor in the town offers a marina or mooring balls and anchorages and the docks are used by fishing boats and small runabouts; small dinghies can tie up at two special areas. We have ridden our bikes into town (3.5 miles one way) and have gone on the inside through the Sea Of Abaco in our dinghy as well. It is fun!

Hope Town’s red and white striped lighthouse is the landmark of the city.

Click on photos in blog to see them enlarged then to back arrow to continue

Both Charlie and Linda enjoyed touring it and the view from the top.

Charlie liked walking around looking at boats and buildings while enjoying a cup of homemade coconut ice cream. He and Linda found a basketball court (!) He wonders how his 50+ team in Lansing, MI, Art’s Bar, is doing this winter without him!

Linda was charmed by the views of a quaint Methodist church and several cottage homes with the brightly painted gingerbread designs. The architecture here, particularly the gingerbread designs, date back from New England influence dating back to Colonial America. It was during the American Revolution when loyalists to the British crown fled America to live in the safe haven of the British ruling Bahamas. Hope Town was settled in 1785 by these Loyalists and was first named "Grand Harbor".

Charlie and Linda found a beautiful view of the ocean (below)and a pretty beach where they rested for awhile.

The fair was small but filled with lots of enthusiasm with a quaint and laid back feeling, just like the town. The fair was hosted by and benefited the Hope Town Fire and Rescue Department. They had a silent auction, a raffle, baked goods, games, and good food, including yummy giant chili foot longs and sweet potato rolls with coconut in them, both of which we ate. And we topped our meal off with a refreshing local drink called a swiggle (pronounced swishel), consisting of coconut juice and gin. Also featured was a chicken soup called “Souse” which is heavily stocked with chicken and vegetables of which we did not try, but it looked nourishing.

Another example of the laid back feeling in Hope Town, Linda and Charlie rode their bikes into town last Friday and joined Lisa and Jim, who got a ride from our harbormaster around 12:30 p.m., to buy fresh fish off the city’s main dock. After being told the boat comes in between 1-3 p.m., they waited. By 2 p.m. they went to have a drink and watch for the boat. By 4 p.m. the waitress at the bar told them it always comes in by 4 p.m. and the locals added that it comes in between 4-5 p.m. The boaters settled into local time with a sigh and eventually purchased their fish around 4:30, the quality and prices for delicious lobster tail and strawberry grouper, being well worth the wait.

And this past week, Freedom’s Turn watched while Charlie took the dinghy to go play with Jim, where they explored the local waters, coves and inlets while imagining when their first fishing expedition will take place. And to Linda’s and Lisa’s dismay they ended up at a local island bar called Cracker P’s on Lubbers Quarters. Don’t you just love these names!

Jim went into town to buy some shrimp bait for them for the future days of fishing.

Other happenings from Freedom’s Turn view was witnessing Charlie’s bike being blown off the dock next to her into several feet of salt water, land upside down then watched while Jim and Charlie got Charlie’s dinghy anchor/ grappling hook to pull the bike out. Luckily, they found it and Charlie cleaned it very carefully.

Today the morning sun and breezes are making Linda feel like ending this blog and going for a one mile walk to the closest grocery to buy some butter, salt and a few potatoes. Charlie and Jim did go out fishing just now. Charlie will let you know what happened out there. He adds: caught two fish, a 15” snapper and a 14” angelfish. Snapper fish fight about like largemouth bass; the anglefish actually fought very hard like a trout. Both were edible, but not kept. They also saw a large turtle and a couple of rays (probably manta).

Three things we are grateful for: being in good health, Freedom’s Turn is doing her job very well, and we have good friends right next door with Lisa and Jim.

(And of course we are grateful for no snow here!

(And Charlie adds the MSU Big Ten Basketball Championship)

(We sure do miss family and friends, though)

Sincerely, Linda and Charlie