Guana, Treasure and back to Marsh

Our first 'night out'

After spending a nice morning on the boat, reading and relaxing in the sun we decided to venture to Great Guana Cay and check out 'Nippers,' the place to be in the Bahamas. It was still early, around 2 o'clock, but nevertheless when we arrived there was an array of rather drunk 50-60 year olds dancing away. We decided that we weren't ready to start drinking so early in the day so we made our way down to the white sandy beach. We relaxed in the most uncomfy hammock ever for a while, chatting and taking in the amazing veiws. Then Caroline invited me to play my first ever competetive game of HopScotch, after a breif explanation of the rules and having to draw the grid several times due to the incoming tide, we began the battle of balance, Caroline won.

Having had our fill of 'childhood games' we made our way back up to the bar, drinks on our mind. After seeing even more drunk embarrassments and deciding that if funds are sufficient this is where we are going to retire we took a perch by the bar and over our first slushie we admired the dance moves of one especially drunk woman, we later named her Barbs (it seemed appropriate at the time.)

It didn't take long before, I'm sorry to say, some rather large black Bahemian men offered to buy us a round of drinks, which turned into quite a few. After making friends with and accepting more drinks of Tuna, Malvin, Mark and  Rat, we headed down to the pool, though rather sensibly decided not to go in. When we got back to the bar our free drinks were thinking about leaving for another bar, we happily agreed but soon realised they were leaving the island to go to this 'other bar' so decided to head back to the safety of Nippers. We found a group of Americans to talk to ranging from Tommy, 24 to Jim, 54 and the uncle which we didn't catch the name of. From here on (6.00pm) conversation turned to plans for the future and God, looking back on it I'm not sure what was said but we made some life long friends in those Americans and got invited for a game of poker the next day. Unfortunatley we couldn't remember the directions to their mansion.

We moved towards the bar with promise of more drinks, but sensibly stuck to the water for now, not from lack of trying on their behalf. Caroline fell in love with the Bar tender and we found some people more our age in Christian, 19 and Andrew (black and bahemian) 24 and struck up conversation with them before being offered free shots by the bartender (of a nice something called 'Fire-in-da-Hole, The erotic rum). The bar quickly emptied at the late, late hour of 7.30. After a quick golf cart ride with Andrew and Christian we made our way to the near by beach where we talked and enjoyed the beautiful sounds of the waves crashing on the pier, whilst sobering up before we were picked up by Simon at the late hour of 9.00pm.

Transit to Treasure Cay

The incoming windy weather meant it was a perfect time to practice our sailing skills, so we made our way to Treasure Cay where we were promised turtles and dolphins. Although there were no turtles to be seen as of yet 4 or 5 dolphins did come and play around the boat while we sailed along. The weather really was becoming too windy and it even started to rain so we happily stayed on the boat, baked a chocolate cake and watched some movies, it's crazy to think all this is possible on a yacht in the middle of the Bahamas.

A day in Treasure Cay

We ventured onto Treasure Cay, which is one of the more resort style islands. We lay on the beach, reading our books and laughing at the middle aged man attempting to walk up the beach with his flippers still on. While Caroline read her book, I occupied myself with a volley ball doing keepsy uppies before we made our way back to the boat for lunch. After lunch we ventured back ashore where we read some more in the sun and played volley ball and football, laughing at each others inabilties to play volleyball and Caroline's inability to do anything with it.

Following a Dolphin and our aimless search for Turtles

Knowing that for the next few days the weather forcast wasn't great we decided to take advantage of the sun so we set out on a nice canoe trip around the canals leading from the harbour at Treasure Cay and through the breathtaking houses. Caroline managed to spot a dolphin about 10 feet ahead of us so we set out on our pursuit. After a few minutes of zig-zaged path we finally managed to move in a straight line and we gained on the dolphin before completley losing sight of it. We settled at admiring the houses and searching for turtles, but to no avail. However when we returned to the boat 2 or 3 turtles surrounded the boat so we qucikly readied ourselves for a snorkel. Despite our attempts of silence we managed to scare them away and by the time we got in the water they had vanished. It was still a lovely snorkel that finished with Caroline jumping off the top of the boat and me unable to make the plunge. After lunch we went back ashore and had a nice relaxing swim in the fresh water pool before heading back for dinner and movies.

Back to Marsh Harbour

The next day we set to set sail to Marsh Harbour again, Caroline taking the wheel and me watching as Simon sorted out the sails. The wind was strong and we got up to an impressive 7 knots. Once back in Marsh Harbour we couldn't resist Maxwells and the many workers in which I fell in love with so we went ashore with our bikes for a ride around the island. We spent a gentle 3 hours cycelling around, stopping only to have a look in the few shops dotted around the island.

More drunken men in Marsh Harbour

Caroline and I were left to enjoy more reading and relaxing on the boat while Simon went ashore to sort out some paper work. In his absence we decided to busy ourselves with making some chocolate brownies. On his return we made ourway to 'Lazy days,' a boat that belongs to a friend of his. In inspecting the boat we became very thankful that we had been so lucky to land on such a good boat as 'Observation', although Lazy Days was lovely it wasnt as spacious and didn't have as many luxuries. We decided to make our way ashore again and do some more exploring of the island on our bikes. It was a lovely bike ride and although the lack of road rules scared us at times it was very pleasent. While waiting for Simon to pick us up, true to form, we were approached by a drunken man asking for food and assuring us that his name was 'Thank God I'm Forgiven', his speech became progressvily jumbled and ended with a round of 'goobediboogied blah'... Luckily the homeless drunks on the Abaco Islands, although a little scary, are still friendly.

Lobster, Lobster Lobster

Another relaxing day on the boat meant more reading and enjoying the sun. Simon impressively managed to catch 10 lobsters in which we later enjoyed for dinner, but not before extracting the meat and playing with their remains.







Our second, less eventful, trip to Nippers

Our awesome captain

The Epic breakfast made by Caroline of apple and cinnamon pancakes got us ready for another pleassent and speedy sail back to Great Guana Cay. Again, we ventured towards Nippers. Being a monday afternoon, the bar was almost empty only with a few old and rough looking men sitting around sipping their beer. So we made our way to the beach where we had a very lovely chat as we made our way to the end of the beach where we clambered onto the rocks and took the traditional tourist photos of us looking and pointing into the distance. after making our way back to the boat we continued the Crow tradition of Meatball Mondays.