Thompson Bay, Long Island – 38 nautical miles sailed, 2 miles in dinghy, 5 kilometres walked
We slid out of the anchorage at 6:30 am and began our crossing to Long Island, passing the many anchorages of Elizabeth Harbour and the three hundred plus boats currently calling it home.
Our thoughts on Georgetown. Many cruisers head straight to Georgetown in the fall, racing through the ICW as fast as possible to get here. Once they arrive they drop anchor or get a mooring ball and spend the entire winter here, presumably participating in the many cruisers activities, hanging at the Chat ‘N’ Chill, running around in their dinghy, going to town, walking Stocking Island, snorkeling, and daily sundowners. There are plenty of things to do in the area, but after a few days here we were ready to move on. It is a great place to pick up supplies and water, and we had fun, but it was no better or worse than the other locations we visited so far in the Bahamas. Did we like it? Yes. Is it the ultimate winter destination in the Bahamas? It’s one among many.
Our initial plan was to sail to the north end of Long Island to an area called Calabash, but the wind forecast had changed and it looked like stronger north-west winds were coming for a few hours in the afternoon, which was not good for this anchorage, as it is already not optimal, but with winds from the west it would become very uncomfortable, so instead we set a course for Thompson Bay, in the south, near the community of Salt Pond. I was excited to fish, with the depths on our original route plunging, creating the opportunity to catch a dorado or tuna, but on our new route the depths were shallow, which typically means the most likely fish to hook would be a barracuda. But that was fine with me so I put out the hand line and fished. As I watched the lure trailing behind the boat, giving it a hard jerk once in a while to create some wounded fish action, Ana spotted a shark just to our starboard side. It was a big one, probably a reef shark, but it was hard to tell for sure as we weren’t close enough. I considered turning the boat around to have a closer look, but with the jib flying, the fishing line out, and Stella still in bed, we decided to keep going.
My cedar plug lure did absolutely nothing so I switched it up for a flashy orange and red lure and got a hit! I saw a big silvery fish surface and roll as it took a swipe at the bait…but missed. With that shot of adrenaline I focused on entirely on fishing and soon after, with a new silver and blue lure, got another hit and was able to set the hook. I pulled in the line, hand over hand, thinking maybe I had lost it, then pulled a small barracuda up to the boat. He wasn’t any more than five pounds, but we all got to see one of these toothy ocean prowlers up close and I finally had one on the board and some fish stink on the lure. I removed the hook as Stella took a couple of photos then let him go. Reef barracudas are delicious to eat, but not recommended as they are more likely to be infected with ciguatera, so we didn’t want to take any chances on getting sick.
We stopped for a morning bath in the shallows just before entering the harbour. The water was a pleasing 29 degrees and only about 9 feet deep with no fish or sharks or rays as far as we could see across the plain sand bottom.
The anchorage was very big and there were already about 25 boats there, more catamarans than monohulls, plus one superyacht that arrived shortly after us. We locked up the boat, jumped in the dinghy, and motored into the dinghy dock, which already had at least six other cruiser dinghies tied up.
Long Island is a long island, about 80 miles from end to end with what looked to be one main road running through it. With dusty dry brush on either side, and hot sun rays beating down, we started walking and with the help of our Noforeignland app found a skinny trail leading through the bush to a cave. It was a good cave. A big cave, and easy to walk as long as you didn’t fall into any of the exposed holes or cracks, which plunged a dozen feet down to the next level. We had brought along headlamps and walked in far enough to stir up a couple hundred bats, who took flight and swerved and flapped all around us, but never made contact. I could see light at the far end of the cave, so it may have been possible to transit the entire length and pop out somewhere else, but nobody was interested in walking through a cloud of bats and getting guano bombed.
From here we walked north on the highway to the liquor store and grocery, passing a small roadside bar along the way with a few cruisers drinking Kaliks. The liquor store was closed so we went into the grocery to have a look. It was quite amazing as they had an even wider grocery inventory than the shops in Georgetown, plus a large section of housewares and hardware. Ana had struck out for popping corn in Georgetown but found two bags of it here, which brought a huge smile to her face as that’s her favourite snack. The smile grew wider when the girls bought ice cream sandwiches.
We turned around at this point, retraced our steps, then continued southward. The drivers of every vehicle that passed us gave a mighty wave. After walking for a while we found a marine store and were shocked to find it particularly well stocked with not just boat supplies, but also regular hardware. As we browsed, two little bichon shih tzu dogs wandered out from a stockroom and laid down in front of Stella for a belly scratch, which she happily provided. This sparked a later discussion as we continued our walk across the island, past a big salt pond and to a beach on the Atlantic side, covered in plastic refuse, delivered by the sea.
“Those dogs look just like your mom’s,” Ana said.
“I miss Grandma’s dogs,” said Stella.
“Yeah, those were good dogs,” I said. “And they lasted a long time.”
“Oh yeah. You guys didn’t have much luck with pets, did you,” Ana said, mischievously.
“Like when we were kids? I don’t know. Let me think. We had Foxy for a long time, that was our first dog.”
“Didn’t she get hit by a car?”
“Yep. And it popped her eye right out. The vet had to sew a button over the eyehole.”
“OH MY GOD! Gross!” said Stella. “Just like Coraline. I hated that movie.”
“But she was okay after that, at least until she got cancer and developed this bag on her underside she dragged around for a year or two.”
“Right, then you had another dog.”
“Yep, Rex. He was one of Foxy’s puppies.”
“What happened to him?”
“Hit by a car on the highway at Foam Lake. Dead.”
“What other animals?”
“Marty had rabbits. When they got too big we had to donate them to one of the power substations Dad used to work at. They got eaten by coyotes almost immediately.”
“What about the hamsters?”
“Yeah, the hamsters! Sneaky and Elmer. Sneaky escaped from his cage and crawled beneath the kitchen cupboards. Never saw him again.”
“And Elmer?”
“Yeah, that was a real shame. We used to let him walk around outside on the concrete patio while we played basketball. Well one day we forgot about him and left him in the sun when we went to do something else. Came back and he was lying on his back, totally parched, dead. I guess we should have left him some water.”
“What else?”
“Marty had an iguana. One day Mom noticed his room was smelling worse than normal. She asked him if the iguana was okay. He said it’s fine. Then why is it all grey? They change colour sometimes, don’t worry about it. When’s the last time you fed it? Well…can’t remember. Mom poked it with a stick and it fell over, stone dead.”
“Didn’t you guys have fish?”
“Yep, a huge goldfish. We blew it up with a firecracker. That was pretty awesome.”
“Any cats?”
“God no, cats wouldn’t have survived our place. Nobody in our family liked cats.”
“How on earth did your mom’s dogs last so long considering the Olson family’s history of pet carnage?”
“Hmmm,” I pondered as I stroked my invisible goatee. “I guess it was probably Dad. He’s not good with animals. I mean, look at all the moose, elk, geese, deer, and coyotes he’s blown away over the years.”
“I think you and your brothers are derelict.”
“Well, maybe. Anyway, is that a lizard over there?” I said, pointing to nothing in the bushes, tactfully changing the subject.
We met an American couple at the dinghy dock who had just rented a car for the day and had an amazing time, telling us about some of the places they’d visited. So over a sundowner back in SeaLight’s cockpit we decided to try and rent a car the following day. There was much to explore.
No comments:
Post a Comment