New Year's in Nassau

We just can’t seem to leave Nassau. NOT the most beautiful place in the world, by any stretch. There’s poverty, slums, high prices, blatantly distasteful tourism, and of course, blatantly distasteful tourists. We don’t find Nassau to be anywhere close to our ideal fantasy of an island paradise. And yet, every time we plan to leave, some unforeseen impediment arises and we have to change our plans. It’s as though someone has attached a five-mile length of line to our boat, and tethered us to the city.

 

Giant cruise ships lined up in Nassau Harbor

Nassau was about a forty-mile sail from Chub Cay, and we needed to get there by January 2^nd to pick up my son from the airport. Dewey was spending Christmas with his Aunt Star and her family in Miami, and the plan was for him to join us on the boat for a few days before his return to Baltimore. We arrived in the area in plenty of time, and spent a few days anchored at Rose Island, a mostly uninhabited little place about five miles from Nassau. I had been reading up on the city, looking for things to do with Dewey, and the guide books kept referring to the Junkanoo Festival as a particular Bahamian tradition, not to be missed. It happens twice a year, on Boxing Day (the day after Christmas), and on New Year’s Day. Dewey would arrive too late, but it seemed a shame for us to miss it. “Let’s go!” I urged Rick. We reserved a slip at a marina and arrived on New Year’s Eve.

Junkanoo is basically a parade, with elaborate costumes, floats, dancers and cowbells. The whole town was set up with temporary bleachers that lined the main street, to provide seating for the locals and tourists. What the guide books didn’t make clear is that Junkanoo happens in the wee hours of the morning; yes, it’s technically on New Year’s Day, but it begins right after midnight (New Year’s Eve), and goes until dawn. Most days on the boat, I can’t stay awake past ten-o-clock. This could be a real problem. We decided to take a long nap starting at eight, giving us a good stretch of sleep before getting up around one and then walking in to town for Junkanoo. Of course that’s not what happened…

We slept through the whole thing.

Discarded costumes after Junkanoo

Everyone we encountered the next day, marina personnel, grocery store clerks, waiters and waitresses – everyone asked us, “Did you see Junkanoo? How did you like it?” We were honest at first, but it was so embarrassing to admit that we had snoozed through the biggest celebration of the year that after awhile we just started responding with, “Oh yes, it was wonderful!”

Dewey’s visit was short, too short really, but we made the absolute most of it. Unfortunately, the weather took a distinct turn for the worse as soon as he arrived; cloudy, windy, rainy and cool. Not the best beach or sailing weather to say the least. We decided instead to make his trip a cultural experience that would include museums and local cuisine. Walking everywhere, ducking under overhangs to dodge the intermittent rain, we went to the very informative Pompey Slavery Museum, and then to the impressive sixty-five steps of the Queen’s Staircase which lead up to Fort Fincastle, an eighteenth century fort built in the shape of a ship. By the time we visited Fort Charlotte, another, bigger fort built around the same time, the wind was whipping around enough to almost knock us down, and the rain was starting up again too. Luckily, we managed to hail a cab for the trip back to the marina.

The Queen's Staircase

Foodwise, we got a good sampling of island treats. Nassau is filled with crowded chain stores and restaurants (can you say “Burger King”?) that cater to the cruise ship clientele, but just off the main drag are a few unique and local eateries that we found much more inviting. Sadly empty, the food at a place called Bahama Cookin’ was marvelous – the conch salad and chicken barbeque were superb, and believe it or not, the best mac and cheese I’ve ever tasted. We had dinner at the local cruisers’ hangout, the Poop Deck, where Dewey had his first taste of Caribbean spiny lobster, along with conch fritters. The next night we got take-out from a fantastic Jamaican place and had dinner on the boat. All in all, a very good visit.

Spiny lobsters are really more like crayfish - no claws!

 

A few days after Dewey returned home, I took my own flight back to Baltimore for a set of scheduled doctors’ appointments. My neck and shoulder issues remain a problem, but what we thought would be a, “Keep doing your exercises and I’ll see you again in May,” kind of visit, turned instead into a steroid injection and a, “You need at least a month of hands-on physical therapy,” sort of thing. Kind of put a wrench in our plan to sail off to the Exumas as soon as I got back. I did come back briefly to see Rick, and also to pick up items from the boat that I would need for a more extended stay in the States.

After I took off for Baltimore once again, Rick moved the boat out to Rose Island where he basically stayed by himself and worked on his book/sabbatical project. I’m sure that he missed me, but without my distracting presence he managed to get a great deal of work done, so not all bad. I spent the month hanging out at home and seeing my physical therapist a couple times a week. It was painful to be away from Rick for so long, and not so pleasant being in cold winter weather unexpectedly. And the physical therapy was painful too, by the way. But I got to spend time with my friends, check in on Dewey, and see lots and lots of movies – all things that I had been missing. One real upside of this tripus-interruptus is that I was able to buy some small fans in Baltimore that, once back on the boat, would hopefully help to combat those nasty no-see-ums.

Turtles at Rose Island!

So where are we now? I have returned to the boat, shoulder much improved, and we are back at – where else - Rose Island. We were here two weeks ago, waiting for a good weather window to FINALLY get down to the Exumas when our almost-brand-new dinghy motor conked out, thwarting our plan once again. It took until a couple of days ago to get it fixed (in Nassau of course), and now so much time has passed that we will need to shorten our Exumas visit to just a few of the northern islands.

In the meantime, life on the boat is pretty idyllic. We had spent most of the time at Rose Island on the southern side where there is a well protected cove with passable  scenery. But we’ve since discovered the northern shore, which is kind of a mini-paradise with a beautiful half-mile crescent beach, pure white sand, trees for shade, gorgeous azure water and nearby coral reefs for snorkeling. This is the Bahamas I had been picturing in my dreams. There’s no wind right now, but there will be soon. After being in the area for almost nine weeks, our plan is to go back to Nassau on Friday to provision the boat and prepare for a Sunday sail to the northern Exumas. But if something else happens to thwart that plan, well, there’s always Rose Island. I could stay here all winter – and of course if the gods decide to pull again on our tether, we might just be doing exactly that.

Christmas

It's been a while since my last post. Sorry about that. Between internet woes and a couple of unscheduled trips back to Baltimore, I've gotten way behind. But not to worry, all is quite well. We have not sunk. Rick has not murdered me like that guy at Cay Sal Island. Not yet anyway (you can read about that here).

More B'sSA episodes are on their way, and hopefully I'll get caught up soon. What follows is a piece I wrote a couple of days after Christmas, but never posted:

Our boat Xmas tree - decorated with popcorn and cranberries

I am not feeling very Christmassy this year. Not that I’m turning into a Mister Grinch or anything. But usually I’m thinking up presents for people way ahead of time. I love decorating the tree, looking at all of the colored lights around the neighborhood, the cold air, eggnog, fires in the fireplace, maybe even a little snow… It just doesn’t feel like yuletide, by ourselves on a boat in the Bahamas. With palm trees. And sand fleas.

I’ll admit it, I’ve been pretty down lately. My episode with the no-see-ums has left me constantly itchy, and even though we’ve gotten the bites down to about five or ten new ones a day, my image of life in the Bahamas has taken a big hit. Our internet connection is pretty spotty here too, so I don’t even have that to keep me distracted. Not that news of the latest Trump catastrophe would be particularly uplifting, but I don’t like being cut off from all the people I love, particularly during the holidays. I’ve been spending most of my time inside the boat, fully clothed even in the heat in order to prevent more midge bites. I’m sure it’s a sin to not be ecstatically happy while wintering in the tropics when others in the US are freezing their butts off, and I feel a little guilty about that, but I just can’t seem to shake off my blues.

We’re anchored in a little harbor just off of Chub Cay, hanging out while we wait for a good weather window to cross over to Nassau. Chub is a privately owned island, and there’s really nothing there except a fancy resort on one end, including a string of pastel colored time-share houses and a high class inn. They can’t stop us from anchoring here, but we are not allowed to go ashore. Well, that’s not entirely true; you can bring your dinghy into the marina, but you’ll get hit with a fee. For the privilege of simply setting foot on the dock, they charge $107. That’s one hundred and seven dollars! Anything you might want to do, eat or drink once off the dock is similarly high-priced. At the moment, almost no one is staying at this resort (we’ve seen a total of three people who look like guests), and it is depressing to see all of the empty beach chairs while listening to bad music and advertisements being blasted over the resort speakers. Apparently the upper one-percent choose to spend Christmas at home.

There are plenty of other boats though. Our neighbors include a few sailboats, undoubtedly cruisers like us, and a couple of mega-yachts anchored farther out, fully equipped with jet skis and enormous water slides. Rick has been working hard to improve my spirits, taking me on swimming excursions and illegal beach walks on the other side of the island, each time returning to our original anchoring spot at the end of the day. On our way “home” from one of these mini trips, we are both excited to see two sailboats we recognize from a week or so ago at Honeymoon Harbor.

The owners are young people in their early thirties, a rarity among distance cruisers who tend to be older, usually retirees. These two couples have been on a similar winter voyage to our own, meeting at the beginning of the ICW and traveling together ever since. Back at Honeymoon, they seemed to me to be quite the adventurous types, the women with tans and bikinis and the men with full beards and spear fishing equipment. They invited us to their evening bonfires on the beach, but we never did join them. Not because we didn’t like them. They reminded me greatly of Rick’s nephew Ross and his girlfriend Anna who last year quit their jobs and traveled around Alaska in their make-shift-live-aboard SUV. Even though I love Ross and Anna, I still felt like we would be the old fogies crashing the young people’s party, so we left them to it.

Now here they are, the day before Xmas, lighting up the area simply with their presence! One of their boats even has a tree fashioned out of colored lights decorating her bow. Suddenly I start to feel some holiday spirit. We invite them all over for Christmas Eve drinks, and they arrive ready to celebrate.

Rick, Joyce, Matt, Sarah, Mike, - and in the foreground, Johnnie Walker and friends

Joyce and Matt have completely cut loose of their former land lives. Joyce is an accomplished former dancer – she was Elmo in Sesame Street Live (OMG!), and spent a number of years touring. More recently she became a massage therapist, and Matt was a driver for UPS. Married for a number of years, they lived in upstate New York but grew dissatisfied with their long hours at work and the consumerist culture they were a part of. Work more, play less, spend more, owe more - it was time for a change. They radically reigned in their spending habits in order to pay off their debts, sold their house, and even moved in with Matt’s mother in an effort to stockpile money. This last spring, they bought Duchess, a thirty-two foot Allied Seawind ketch, moved aboard, quit their jobs and left the rat race for good. This is their first visit to the Bahamas and who knows where life will take them next.

This is also the first time for Sarah and Mike, but they have a totally different story to tell. Mike is an engineer who is taking a six month leave from his job in order to make this trip. He has a collection of sailboats at home in Annapolis, and chose Intrepid, a thirty-six foot center cockpit Beneteau for this voyage. Sarah works at a veterinarians’ office in north-eastern Maryland, and lives at least two hours away from Mike. I don’t know how long they have been a couple, but they have never lived in the same community, let alone together - until this trip. Talk about taking a giant leap of faith. Sailing is not everyone’s cup of tea, and small spaces can really put a strain on any relationship. But they certainly seem happy! It obviously was a good move for them.

Age was a non-issue as we exchanged histories and entertained each other with sailing horror stories, as boaters are prone to do. We had such a good time together that Christmas Eve drinks turned into an invite for Christmas Morning brunch onboard the Beneteau, and then Christmas Night drinks on the Seawind. And in between, a group snorkel at the nearby choral reefs. What a blast. You guys really made my holiday. I can’t thank you enough.

Merry Christmas, one and all!