3/24/16

Mahi party on Persephone at Thompson Bay, Long Island

Happy bunch of bats in the cave.  Aren't they cute!!

Making our way towards the back of the cave.

Great place to explore!  Great home if you're a bat (or cockroach or crab...)

The entrance to the cave at Thompson Bay, Long Island.

Dean's Blue Hole.   Diving platform for competition anchored here.

Jerry Luh snorkels at  Dean's Blue Hole.

Dean's Blue Hole, Long Island.

Columbus Monument - northern tip of Long Island.

Columbus Monument - nice view!

Especially for Chris Jones - Bloody leg tuna mess.

Bluejacket at New Bight, Cat Island.

Bob the Builder steers.

Farmers Market, Salt Pond, Long Island

Firelight with their spinnaker!

Firelight with half a spinnaker!

Kirsti from Firelight captured the green flash at sunset.

Group photo at the Hermitage, Cat Island.

A view of Father Jerome's hermitage from our anchorage.  Batelco tower in the foreground.

Jerry's view from the roof of the hermitage.

At the base of the trail to the hermitage.

The arch at the beginning of the trail to the hermitage.

Jerry tenderizes the conch for conch chowder.

The white tip shark behind Persephone following the lure.

Woo Hoo!  Now we're moving!

The tuna that turned into dinner (x3).

Trail to the hermitage.

Another shot of the white tip shark.

I suppose when I mention Long Island you think of expressways and New York City.  The Long Island down here in the Bahamas is the opposite.  80 miles long and 4 miles wide at the most with one two lane road – The Queens Highway running the length.  When we left Georgetown heading east to Long Island we expected to be tight to the wind as the prevailing wind is easterly.  Instead, we sailed wing on wing at 7 knots using the spinnaker pole to travel the 40 miles to Thompson Bay on Long Island.  Persephone led the way with Bluejacket and a few others behind.  We were greeted to Thompson Bay with a VHF radio invitation to a dish-to-pass beach gathering by the cruisers already anchored there.  Ann of “Krazy Lady” from Oswego was there and she and Jerry discussed repairing her broken boom.  The next day we boarded Krazy Lady, took the sail off, and dinghied her boom back to Persephone where Jerry took apart the fitting at the front of the boom where the rivets were ripping out of the aluminum.  He cut ¼ inch of aluminum off the boom, redrilled and riveted the fitting back on.  Ready to install and sail!  You know the story of the elves and the shoemaker, the elves come in and make the shoes.  Well, elf doesn’t rhyme with Jerry so I’ve been saying Jerry Jerry the boat fixing fairy since he sails into an anchorage and in no time at all has fixed someone’s broken boat parts.  He’s not sure he appreciates the fairy part of  that expression.

There are many caves carved in the coral of this island and one nearby our anchorage.  Jerry Luh came with us to go exploring.  The cave goes back in about 100 yards and is so dark you can’t see your hand in front of your face if you turn off the flashlights.  The sound of bats fills the cave and a few fly around.  Some joker left a small plastic skeleton curled up in a corner!

Donna and Jerry decided to rent a car and invited us to do an island tour with them.  Down the Queens Highway we go to Dean’s Hole on the east side of the island.  This is a 663 ft. “hole” at the water’s edge in the coral where they hold free diving competitions.  (Google Evolve Free Diving for more information from our friends, instructors, and champions Ren and Ashley.)  Jerry Luh brought his fins and snorkel and swam around the blue hole trying to peer into the depths.  The water was a little cloudy as the winds were whipping the seas into the bay.

Next stop Clarence Town where we’ve been to before by boat.  There are two churches in Clarence Town built on the hill with spectacular views.   One Anglican and one Catholic both designed by Father Jerome (who eventually became a monk).  At Clarence Town we saw more damage caused by hurricane Joaquin that pummeled Long Island last October.  It sat right over  Long Island for a couple days blowing roofs off houses and bringing the sea up on the west side of the island causing destruction.  As we ventured further south in the car, towards the town of Hard Bargain, there were many vacant homes.  Some vacancies due to Joaquin, others empty as families have moved to Nassau and other locations to try to make a living and raise their families.  The salt ponds at Hard Bargain were crusting with salt around the edges (no rain in the last month or more) but no industry there anymore.

Our lunch stop was at a “take away”.  We ordered the food, they cooked it up, and we took it away in a foam box.  We held onto our boxes at the picnic table as the wind tried to take away our foam boxes of food!  The chicken, fish, peas & rice, and coleslaw were excellent!

The northernmost point we visited was Columbus Monument on the northern tip.  The “road” to the monument would have been better suited for an ATV; not a small rental car.  A chain on posts used for a railing helped us climb the steep rocks to the monument.  What a wonderful view!  There are a number of dedicated Columbus sites in the Bahamas as he “first” explored and “discovered” the land.

Our tourist adventure ended that evening with a stop at Club Washington where a number of cruisers and some locals were gathered for drinks and a fish dinner.  It was close to 8 pm when we pulled into the driveway of the rental car business (also their home) and walked down to the dinghy dock to go home.

Before leaving Long Island Saturday we took advantage of the Farmer’s Market.  Fresh home grown tomatoes, green peppers, watermelon and more were on display.  We also bought a bag of local sea salt someone had gathered.  Then off to the northern tip of Long Island to anchor for the night where we had a perfect view of an amazing green flash at sunset.

The next day we sailed from Long Island to Conception Island, an uninhabited island where we snorkeled the reefs, walked the beaches, and explored the mangrove creeks.  Beautiful elk horn coral reefs but not many fish. Tons of turtles in the mangrove creeks as we dinghied, kayaked in and then floated out the creeks with the tide.  Conception Island is also where we took our scrapers in the water and scraped the barnacles off both Persephone and Bluejacket.  More dinners to share with Bluejacket and Firelight along with another green flash sunset.

Our good weather window of no westerly winds was coming to an end son and we wanted to see the hermitage Father Jerome built on Cat Island.  Off we go trying out the spinnaker for the first time.  It would have been great but there just wasn’t enough wind.  We were going so slow some kind of reef fish followed right at the transom at the water’s surface.  Jerry reeled in his hand line and saw a 10 ft white tip shark following the lure.  It lazily swam around the transom following the lure every time Jerry dipped it back in the water.  Kinda like playing with a cat and a piece of yarn.  Incredible to watch and so close we could have reached out and touched the shark!  No wind made the water perfectly flat and crystal clear.

From that point we put away the spinnaker and became a fishing boat instead of a sailboat (although we had full sail up).  Just before Cat Island we got a hit on the handline and Jerry pulled in a yellow tail tuna.  At the same time the rod and reel started spinning – a fish there too!   It took 45 minutes of reeling and struggling to finally see a shark on the line.  At that point it pulled hard enough to bend the hook and get away.  Yeah!  We don’t want to have to land a shark to get back the lure.  Excellent tuna steaks pan seared in oil for dinner.

For our one day at Cat Island we hiked with Bluejacket and Firelight to the hermitage on the top of Como Hill, the highest hill in the Bahamas at 206 ft.  Father Jerome, an architect and then priest, was sent to the Bahamas in 1908 after a hurricane damaged England’s churches.  He built and restored many churches in the Bahamas – hurricane proof stonework with thick walls and barrel-vaulted roofs.  When approaching New Bight on Cat Island Father Jerome’s hermitage or retirement home appears to be a castle atop Como Hill.  When we got to the hermitage at the top we found essentially a 3 room structure with doors and windows at the correct proportions to make the place look like a castle from afar.  We had to duck through the doors to explore the hermitage.  What a peaceful place to think and admire the vistas.  From our chartbook, “As you walk through the archway at the property’s entrance at the base of the hill, you will be struck not only with his gift of architecture and stonework but also with his genuine and humble devotion to God, which carries all the way up the hill through his Stations of the Cross past the replica of Jesus’ tomb with its rolled-away stone and to his stoic living quarters and small chapel for private devotions.”    He renamed the hill Mt. Alvernia and built another church on the island to lead.  He sounds like a most interesting man!

We walked a couple of miles to the market and were pleased to find bananas then back to “town” where I sang at the post office with the woman belting out One Day At A Time while she sorted through the stamps.  Love the Bahamians!

A cold front was approaching in a day or two so we set the spinnaker and had a super fast sail to anchor between Big and Little Majors – protection from the wind in all directions.  Firelight had their spinnaker out as well….for a couple of hours and just as we sailed up to take pictures of them the spinnaker blew out from the top and fell to the water.  No problem – they rolled out their jib and continued along taking some great pictures of Persephone under sail heeled over doing 8 knots.   Thanks!

So, after a few days at the Majors we headed back to Little Bay around the corner from Black Point to visit again with Doug and Jean of Sandcastle.  Another super spaghetti dinner with 9 at the tables at the castle.  We also rode in the back of Doug and Jean’s pickup to attend happy hour at Scorpio’s in Black Point.  Rum pumch, dinner and then the music.  Dad – I know you’d be glad to know I didn’t miss a beat and danced every dance.  Donna called me the energizer bunny.  We’ll be here in Black Point for a few days before heading off to Rock Sound on Eleuthera.

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Karen, Jerry and Builder Bob (a 6" refugee found on the beach on Long Island)