A What an exciting 7 weeks it has been since my last posting. The challenge now is to condense it all into a manageable rendition including the spark, and avoiding overshare ! When I last checked in, we had arrived in Georgetown Exuma and were anxiously awaiting the beginning of the 62nd annual Family Island Regatta. I must say it far exceeded our expectations.  The week before the actual regatta, Staniel Cay sent their two, much loved Class A sloops, “Lady Muriel”, and. ” Tida Wave” for a pre-regatta exhibition race. The committee asked for 30 volunteers to crew these beautiful vessels in this exciting publicity run.  Tom signed up to be a crew, even though he had never sailed this type of vessel. Tom might not have had as much weight to offer as some to add ballast, but he made up for that by being smart , fast and very enthusiastic. The beautiful hand made wooden boats are so overpowered by the massive cotton sails, that they carry two skinny wooden boards attached only by a thin rope to top of the deck. These boards, called the pry, are slid out over the side so the crew can hike out on them to keep the boat from turning over when the sail fills with the wind.   All the guys, and one hardy woman named Robin (not me), thoroughly enjoyed the experience and now have bragging rights for life. They formed a bond and will be BFF (if guys can actually claim that association ) as having been a part of a thrilling, rare opportunity, working hard, taking risks, and smiling all the way through.

Family Island Regatta is Georgetown’s biggest and busiest event. Islands from all over the Bahamas send their boats and captains to compete for the coveted prize of regatta winner, and cruisers and tourists fill the area to join in the excitement. The best place to watch the race is in your dinghy, chasing and cheering on the race boats as they sail around the course. Click on photos to view full size. 

A big part of my regatta experience centered around trying to obtain one of the most beautiful and sought after T shirts that I have ever seen. I was told that these T shirts can not be purchased but must be presented to you by the skipper of either Lady Muriel or Tida Wave. I asked and pleaded with anyone I saw who happened to be wearing one of the “crew shirts” After many smiles and much sweet talking I finally got mine!

We enjoyed venturing out all around Georgetown and dIscovering all that this settlement and it’s neighboring Stocking Island has to offer.I mentioned we were headed out to Eddie’s Rake and Scrape in my last blog. It is truly a locals event, but they are delighted to share this cultural experience with visitors & cruisers.

Stocking Island, which is located just across Elizabeth Harbor from Georgetown, offers many hiking trails and is home to the very popular Chat and Chill beach restaurant and bar. Every Sunday Chat and Chill serves up a Bar-B-Que buffet, and is just a great place to play sand volley ball or join in a game of Mexican Train Dominoes. The less energetic may choose to cool off in the shallows and feed the friendly sting rays with the left over scraps from the conch salad maker.

A large number of families depend on the income from making the plaited material called “top” gathered from the silver palm. This material is woven together into strips and the strips sewn together to make baskets, purses, place mats, hats, bowls, and a wide variety of household decorative items. There is a straw market in the center of town where the ladies sell their woven wares, along with handmade jewelry, and other items to sell to the tourists.

The week before regatta, the women had really stocked up on their wares in anticipation of selling to the crowds coming into town for regatta. One night about 9:00, Tom and I were sitting out on the back deck of our boat, which was anchored across on the other side of Elizabeth Harbor, about a mile from the downtown area of Georgetown. We looked up and were horrified to see huge flames and billowing smoke rising from town. We couldn’t tell what was on fire when we looked through the binoculars, but knew the island did not have a fire truck. We could see cars racing from all directions. The next morning, we were saddened to hear that it was the straw market that had burned completely to the ground, destroying all of the stock that had been so painstakingly prepared.

We are always amazed at our small world reminders and were thrilled to run into Michelle, the night of Eddies Rake and Scrape. Michele and John, on board Dalila, hailed from Folly Beach. Tom and I had enjoyed meeting this outgoing adventurous young couple at Mariners Cay. They owned an adventure company and spent part of their time in Chile.

They had planned to take their sailboat to Florida, fly to Chile for the season there, and then return to the boat and head south to the Bahamas. We wished them luck, and looked forward to crossing paths somewhere during our Bahamas cruise. Once we left Folly, we exchanged a couple of emails, but had not heard from them until we ran into Michelle in Georgetown, Exuma at Eddie’s. We exchanged hugs and hellos and were so excited to see Michelle who looked as beautiful as ever. We were horribly saddened to learn that John had been killed by a shark attack the month before. Michelle briefly and bravely told us what happened and shared her blog site with us.                       Simplyafloat.com

It had been Johns dream to take their boat all the way to Georgetown, so Michelle had managed to return to the boat after the accident, and with the help of her brother, had brought Dalila all the way south to Georgetown, Exuma and were now turning her around to return her to Charleston.

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Michelle is an incredible writer, so I encourage you to read their beautiful and  tragic story, and to continue to follow along with Michelle as she continues her life and her blog. A life that is full of adventure , is also full of risks. We wish Michelle all the best,and will remember John as a fine young man who lived his life to the fullest and died much too young, doing what he loved.

On a happier note, our adventure continued with a quick trip back to Charleston to attend my youngest son, Elliott’s Citadel graduation. it was also a rare and much looked forward to occasion to get to see all three of my sons together. Traveling home from the Exumas is no simple feat. We first had to prepare the boat to be without power, by defrosting the refrigerator and emptying the frig and freezer of all perishable goods. Then put Southern Trawl into a safe marina, and asked our friend to give us a dinghy ride to a deep water dock, where the water taxi could pick us up. The water taxi took us, and our luggage across Elizabeth Harbor to the Government dock, where we caught a taxi to the small airport. We had a connecting flight through Nassau, and another through Charlotte, and then finally home to Charleston.

Our return to the islands was not to be met with a quiet week of rest and relaxation. As May is the month that I had signed up to host my wonderful Charleston Bunko group, I suggested we have a Bahama Mama Bunko in addition to the one I had just hosted while we were home.  Much to our delight, 5 wonderful women, along with Anne, (another fun lady we had met while cruising. Her husband Marc had been a part of the “Tida Wave” crew with Tom during regatta)  decided to join us to experience the island life for a week. We had previously selected a beautiful house, a short dinghy ride from the center of Georgetown. Tom generously agreed to be our Dinghy Boy for the week. He was actually looking forward to a bit of quiet “Tom time” on the boat while the ladies and I enjoyed shopping and touring the area. As it turned out, Tom got a tiny bit of R & R , but was kept very busy hauling us around from place to place and helping to keep the busy activities schedule running smoothly. We also enlisted the help of Marc, Anne’s husband, and dubbed him Dinghy boy #2. In order to be able to call our Dinghy Boy when we need a ride, we decided to take the hand held VHF radio with us to the rental house. The VHF channel 68 is a public channel and is used and overheard by everyone in the Georgetown and Elizabeth Harbor area. When we hailed Tom on the radio , of course we had to come up with a name to identify who was calling. Tom appropriately dubbed us “The Mixed Nuts” after one of our favorite snack time provisions. The harbor must certainly have gotten a kick hearing, “Southern Trawl, Southern Trawl  this is Mixed Nuts, come in please.” several times each day and evening! The night of the ladies arrival, we enjoyed  a “Welcome to the Bahamas’ dinner prepared in our rental house by the very talented owner and chief cook of Cheaters restaurant. “Cheater” (pronounced Cheetah) prepared a delicious meal of fresh conch chowder, poached fish with veggies, sautéed carrots, peas and rice, finished off with a fabulously moist and potent rum cake. The next day we saw Cheetah at Chat and Chill beach where he posed with us for this fun shot!

The week was filled with lots of great fun and laughter. On Sunday we enjoyed the  Bar B Que at “Chat and Chill” beach on Stocking Island.

Monday was spent having lunch at “Peace and Plenty” restaurant, home of the creamy dreamy pina coladas and shopping in downtown Georgetown. (Thank you ladies for stimulating the local economy) Tuesday we rented a 15 passenger van and hired J J, a local cab driver to drive us around the island. JJ engaged the services of Ms Christine Rolle, who is an 85 year old retired cab driver and Root Medicine Doctor. Christine asked Tom to marry her, and told him that since she is a native heir to the Rolle property, they would be able to live out the rest of their lives together in a home overlooking the incredible turquoise sea.  Christine entertained us with many hysterical and historical stories about life in the out islands. She had prepared for us, some homemade johnny cakes and herbal tea. She showed us native plants used for various remedies, mosquito repellant, and even one that was a guaranteed aphrodisiac.

Tuesday evening we took in Eddie”s last Rake and Scrape of the season. We hired our favorite cab driver JJ to  take us into town, and Tom and Marc brought the dingies over and met us there. The place was loud to begin with, and Tom and Marc found a perfect way to handle the restaurant noise as well as the cacophony of 7 joyous and slightly inebriated women all talking at once. Since the cabs don”t run after 10:00, it was an interesting ride, needless to say, back to the house in the  two dinghies with 7 singing women and our wonderful dinghy boys.

Wednesday we said good bye to Donna and Patty so the rest of us enjoyed the week checking out local beaches, and enjoying a cookout with Anne and Mark on Flip Flop Beach  This is a beautiful little spot where cruisers, unknown to us, have set up common use area complete with tiki hut, beautiful wooden bar, and decorated with stacked rock walls and conch shells.

The week flew by and we were exhausted from all of the organized activity, but were absolutely thrilled these wonderful ladies chose to come enjoy a bit of island time with us. Thank you again Anne and Mark for being such a fun part of the week as well. I’ll stop here for now. I’ll be updating again very soon to tell you about our island aerial tour and our fantastic discoveries on Long Island.

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