Mike's Vacation

Emerald Bay Marina, Great Exuma Island
23 37.785 N 075 55.10 W

The Georgetown Cruiser's Regatta awards night at Chat & Chill Beach Bar. We enjoyed a nice meal and drinks with our friends Jeff & Izzy and Pollie & Mo (remember a few blogs back our New Year's Eve party onboard the Izzy R while  in Ft. Lauderdale).

Mark passed the time while the winds were howling to polish some sea beans and make beautiful necklaces. Sea beans are actually seed pods that are carried along ocean currents from as far away as Africa and end up on the ocean facing beaches of the islands. The beans above are an assortment of hamburger beans (they look like little burgers), purse beans and heart beans.



Mike, Kathy's son flew in from CT to visit for what was supposed to be a week. The following morning we had a good weather window, so before we even had breakfast, we raised anchor and left Georgetown. Here (a rather pale-skinned) Mike is taking in the turquoise waters as we cross the banks on our 38 mile trip to Long Island. He had his 1st glimpse of dolphins swimming along our bows that day.



Long Island is a long island. About 80 mile long and 4 miles at it's widest with one paved road -  named The Queen's Highway of course - that runs it's entire length. We rented a car for a day to better explore the island. Here Mom & Mike are enjoying the famous Max's Conch Bar that we stopped at for lunch.


 

After lunch we continued our drive south to visit Dean's Blue Hole which is the deepest in the world, plunging to a depth of 663'.

 

We wish we could say that Mike caught this Mahi, but then that would be a fish tale. While we were driving Long Island we stopped in Clarencetown to inspect the harbor anchorage & the Flying Fish Marina. While walking the docks a sportfishing boat, having just returned from an off-shore fishing trip, gave us this Mahi which made for a couple of excellent meals.



The day after we rented the car we took a school bus ride with a bunch of other cruisers back down to Clarencetown to experience the Long Island Agricultural and Mutton Festival. Here we met Alexander "Rasta-man" Adderly. 

 

By day 3 Mike was having so much fun enjoying the cruising lifestyle he decided to stay a 2nd week. Here they're using the WiFi link at the Long Island Breeze restaurant in Thompson Bay, Long Island to check air flights. That and a 35 minute international phone call (most of it on-hold) took care of it.   



During Mike's 1st week we had many passing rain showers that would last for 5-10 minutes producing many nice rainbows such as this one taken while anchored in Miller Bay, just north of Thompson Bay. After 4 days visiting Long Island, we sailed back to Georgetown on Great Exuma Island with the wind off our stern. It was a nice broad reach sail crossing the banks, but as we approached Great Exuma Island the open ocean swells and a wind driven chop produced 6' seas that gave Mike a taste of rougher sailing conditions. We sailed back up Elizbeth Harbor and once again reanchored off Monument Beach. Stocking Island is the popular anchorage just across Elizabeth Harbor from Georgetown.




We spent the next few days sheltered from strong easterly winds behind the lee of Stocking Island. We went for walks on the trails, beach combing, snorkeling, and just spending time at beach bars.



Kickin' back a few Kaliks at Big D's beach bar on Stocking Island. 



Although Mike was on vacation from cooking he managed to whip up a delicious omelet for breakfast.

 

Making friends with a "tame" ray off Chat & Chill's Volleyball Beach on Stocking Island. There are several Southern Stingrays here that hang around the beach near the conch salad stand waiting for a handouts.



After a the winds moderated we decided to give (by this time a much tanner) Mike a taste of a more isolated anchorage so we sailed north up the Exuma chain about 20 miles to Lee Stocking Island (different island than Stocking Is). We anchored in William's Bay (in the left background) and dinghied to Coconut Beach where we walked the trail up to Perry Peak. At 123' elevation Perry Peak is the highest point of land within the Exuma Island chain. 



Mike is on top of the world as he walked the cliffs on the Exuma Sound side of island.




The next day we motored a short distance back across shallow banks to the Barraterre Settlement on the north end of Great Exuma Island. We did some conching here and shared a conch feast with friends on Riff Raff and Sangaris. We came back to Emerald Bay Marina on Monday so Mike could catch a 6AM taxi to the airport for his flight today.