Hiding From Regatta

March 1 - March 7, 2006

Wednesday, March 01, 2006 - Staniel Cay Harbour, Staniel Key, Exumas
By Tom

Another day in Staniel Cay. We hung out on the boat long enough to have breakfast, but then we beat it over to Isle's General Store to greet the fresh veggies that had just gotten of the mail boat about 20 minutes before.

After re-stocking the mother ship with fresh, green things, we went back into the Yacht Club to get online. We went back to the big boat long enough to get in our wet suits and then we headed out looking for dinner.

For this foray, we decided to try the back side of Big Majors and within minutes of our entry into the water, I had managed to shoot and loose a really nice sized Queen Trigger. 15 minutes into the outing, Amy returned to the dinghy triumphantly with her first fish kill of the year. It was a nice sized Big Eye Toro.

I joined her in the dinghy with a slightly larger Nassau Grouper, followed fifteen minutes later by a very large Queen Trigger that this time we got to keep. With sufficient meat in the dinghy for at least 2 meals, we returned home where I cleaned said fish and Amy straightened up below.

Dinner tonight was your choice of style, grilled Queen Trigger filets with baked potatoes and a side of garlic bread. Amy opted for the simple olive oil and salt and pepper recipe while I went with the mandarin blackened variety. They were both excellent. I think Queen Trigger is one of my favorite fish.

I watched Baseketball before bed, while Amy read. Another day in the books

Thursday, March 02, 2006 - Big Majors Key, Exumas, Exumas
By Tom

We hung out this morning, doing very little until around 11 am when we upped anchor and came along side the yacht club to take on fuel. There is a lot of current here and landing on the fuel pier is always a lot of fun.

Suffice it to say, we landed after a few minutes of effort and we were able to take on fuel successfully. We also went up to the Yacht Club bar and I checked email one last time while Amy got on the phone and made reservations for my parents at a hotel down in Georgetown for the first week in April.

Our chores complete, we cut loose of the dock and motored 2 miles around to anchor off of Big Majors for the evening. We plan on heading south tomorrow, but we both were ready for a change of scenery, so consequently here we sit.

For the record, there are 24 boats here and we are the only catamaran. I think thats the first time since we got to the Exumas that we haven't seen another cat in our anchorage. Hmm.

Oh, about the head problems. I got online and ordered a replacement head yesterday. It is being shipped to my dads house and from there I will make arrangements to have it express shipped down to me in Georgetown. We will beat the sewage problem into submission!

Dinner was Tuesday Tacos on Thursday. Milo was especially appreciative of the tacos and after dinner he was so fat and happy he layed on his back and showed us his belly for about 2 hours. See photo evidence at right.

Tomorrow we sail for Blackpoint Sound and the land of the free reverse osmosis water.

Friday, March 03, 2006 - Big Majors Key, Exumas, Exumas
By Tom

We awoke to no wind what so ever. We decided to fore go moving the boat if we were going to have to motor. We instead spent the afternoon alternately swimming around the boat, cleaning miscellaneous boat parts and reading.

It was an extremely relaxing day and I am pretty sure I didn't accomplish much.

In lieu of something interesting to say, let me take a moment to commend Staniel Cay Yacht Club on their forward thinking and generally all around good guy attitude. See, wireless internet, in my opinion is one of those things that should be free. In almost every city in the U.S. you can access the internet for free if you have your own equipment.

Starbuck's has been offering free wi-fi (wireless fidelity) access in their stores for years. In fact there are so many places in the states that offer access for free that it is almost odd when you find one that doesn't. I assume that the business's in question recognize that internet access for customers is just one of the costs of doing business.

Most of the Bahamas does not share this opinion. Late last year in Georgetown, it was common place to see people sitting in the park with their lap tops accessing one of at least 4 unsecured wi-fi networks that advertised themselves. Apparently, the Bahamians look upon this practice as theft.

I actually got in an argument with one Bahamian business owner when he accosted me on the side walk and said I was stealing from him and he was going to call the police. I told him by all means call, but that I wasn't actually using his network, I was using his competitors network because his wouldn't stay up long enough to keep connected. He was kind of a dick.

I guess my point is that if you don't want us to use it, it is as easy as a single click on your router to secure access. All it will take is one bar to offer free wi-fi access for every paying customer and they will corner the Cruisers market. I am still at a loss for why the Bahamian owners refuse to invest $300 and $35 a month to allow internet access at their establishment in return for the business of 90% of the cruisers here.

By The Way - Milo says the other 10% of cruisers are the French Canadians and they will not spend money anywhere. They suck and should be banned. Or eaten.

Ok, I'll get off my virtual soap box. For people coming this way, Staniel Cay, Sampson Cay, and Blue Yonder Cay all offer free wi-fi access in the Exumas. Way to go guys. You rock!

Oh yeah, for dinner I cooked something, but as I am writing this 2 days later, I cannot quite remember what it was. Lets just assume it was meat and starch and was exceptionally well prepared and perfectly cooked. A good time was surely had by all.

PS - It was home made pizza. Mila remembered. She loves pizza

Saturday, March 04, 2006 - Black Point Harbour, Great Guana Cay, Exumas
By Tom

We finally pulled up the anchor with the intentions of heading back south and motored a whopping 6 miles down to Blackpoint. We could have kept going, but there wasn't really any wind to sail and we also needed to get some water.

Blackpoint and Georgetown are the only two places we've found in the Bahamas that have free reverse osmosis water. We filled up our tanks in Nassau, but Amy doesn't like the taste of that water as it is city water with fluoride, so we got 5 gallons here just for drinking.

Water chores completed, we donned our diving gear and went in search of dinner. We weren't in the water 2 minutes before the first of at least 40 barracuda's showed up. Shitty death!

Said barracuda's ranged in size from 2 feet to 6 or 7. They quickly outnumbered us in both bodies and teeth, so we called it a day without ever having fired a shot. Score one for the fishes.

Fish-less and back on the boat, we went back in to town to get potatoes and paper towels from the store here. We spent about 30 minutes tracking down the lady who operates the store and eventually she took us to the store and allowed us to shop. She didn't have any paper towels, but we got some napkins and 4 Idaho potatoes.

Dinner was fried fish sandwiches and French fries. Early to bed in anticipation of an early departure

Sunday, March 05, 2006 - Rudder Cut Cay, , Exumas
By Tom

We had a great sail down the Exumas today. We covered about 30 miles on the inside and we are now anchored off of Rudder Cut Cay.

The anchorage is very pretty, but Rudder Cut Cay is like many of the islands in the Exumas and is privately owned. There are big no trespassing signs hung up on every fourth tree. Man thats lame.

We trolled both fish whackers the whole way down and we only caught one stinking barracuda which we returned to the wild. We have to be pretty hungry to resort to barracuda.

With no fish in the larder, we fell back to barbecued pork chops with rice and salad for dinner. During the afternoon I listened to race cars in Mexico. It sounded pretty lame and I turned it off half way through.

Amy and the ferrets lounged up in our cabin and read away the afternoon. Tomorrow we push on to Georgetown

Monday, March 06, 2006 - Monument Beach, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

We got underway early this morning and quickly ducked outside into open water just south of Rudder Cut Cay. We set the sails and I quickly deployed the fish whackers.

There wasn't much to do during the 6 or 7 hours down to Georgetown. Amy read books most of the way, but the boat was rolling a little too much for me to read, so I just sat at the helm and drove, giving Otto the Autopilot the day off.

Did you know that Otto is the most common name given to auto pilots? Thats pretty weird. Almost as weird as why someone would bother to find out. Hmm.

Anyhow, about 3 hours in, we hooked up a HUGE Mahi Mahi. The things was easily over 40 pounds and almost 5 feet in length. Mega cool, at least until he broke my line and took off with my good yellow, boa wearing squid firmly attached to the roof of his mouth. Shitty Death !

The fishing failure was likely my fault as I think I over tightened the drag on the reel. Damn me!

As we sailed away south, we could see the fish continuously leaping out of the water. I thought he was trying to dislodge the lure, but Amy said he was giving me the fin.

The rest of the trip in was pretty un-eventful and we were anchored off of Monument Beach by 3 p.m.. I made a quick trip into the store for beer and bread, but quickly found out that there is no beer on the island until the mail boat arrives tomorrow. Double damn me!

We made grilled cheesies for dinner and afterwards we attended a last minute gathering of the Alcohol Appreciation Society on the beach. Arriving back here kind of feels like coming home. Tomorrow we hit the volley ball courts.

Tuesday, March 07, 2006 - Kids Cove, George Town, Exumas
By Tom

We awoke to sunny skies and almost no wind. A quick check with the weather dude on the single side band revealed that a cold front would push through tonight and the wind would blow about 30 knots ahead of the front.

We had sausage egg and cheesies on home made biscuits for breakfast and then we moved the boat over to Kidd Cove to hide from the impending front. With the boat secured, we dinghied over to the volley ball courts and spent 3 hours smacking balls around.

To my dismay, I learned today that most of my two on two players have left for the season. Bummer.

I also forgot to mention that the Regatta is going on now. There are over 400 boats here now and it's mega crowded. Amy and I are not participating in any of the regatta events, mostly because the sign up happened while we were gone. Oh well.

Back on board the mother ship, we took care of a few odds and ends and then made grilled Brats for dinner. We played a game of cards afterwards and Amy lost pretty big. Mila sat on her shoulder while we played and sent me signals about Amy's cards. She is quite smart for a quadra-ped.

As a side note, Milo layed on his back and rubbed his own belly while we played