Day 271, Thursday March 20th - a land tour

Day 271, Thursday March 20^th 

We get the call at about 8:30 on the VHF from Lucy that there is supposed to be a car available for them to rent ready for 10:00.  They had arranged on Monday for a car rental pickup on Thursday morning for 24 hours to ensure they could get their son Jim to the airport for 6:30 a.m.  All week they have been assured a car, but it was iffy until this morning whether it would actually fall into place.  Lucy had mentioned to us if the car was large enough we could join them for the Thursday field trip.  We get the next call at 9:45 that yes indeed there was an old beat up van that has the left hand steering wheel  (same as Canada), but for left lane driving (like England),  with no fuel in it available, so we head to shore with our bathing suits, cameras, snacks, etc. ready for a day of car vacationing and glad to be included.

A trusty well used Mini Van - 230,000 miles on it

Lucy and Dawson in the Van, note the surf board 

We are happy it is a van as Jim has his surfboard loaded in and although it blocks one of the windows, it fits very easily.  We head north as we all want to see the Glass window which is a narrow bridge connecting North Eleuthera with Central Eleuthera and provides view to both the east, the Atlantic ocean, and to the west the Exuma Sound.  It is an interesting stop as the ocean swells are pounding the shore even though the winds are not high.  Originally there was a natural rock arch connecting the north and central but a big storm, and years of waves bashing it took it away.  Now you can drive across it whereas the old natural bridge I doubt any cars could use it.  We are all suitably impressed.

Glass window, Exuma Sound on the left and Atlantic Ocean on the right

Next stop was to pick up propane at Upper Bogue a few miles north, then on to the water taxi terminal over to Harbour Island.  Harbour Island is a famous tourist stop for the wealthy.  It is dangerous areas for sailing unless you pay a pilot to help you weave your way in between the coral heads.  We don’t think we will get there by sail so we want to at least have a look across the bay and view the island from shore.

Patio at the Lizard Cafe

We then head south looking for a lunch stop and come upon Lizard Cafe which has organic foods and is an excellent choice for some healthy eating at a reasonable price.  Next stop is Surfers Beach where Jim wants to do some surfing.  We drop Jim off at the crest of the hill as the lower road is too bad for driving.  Rainstorms have caused huge ruts in the road ready to swallow the van.  The vans shocks are not very good either.  The 4 adults then head over to a local farm which is only a few miles away.  The name of the farm is the EIO Farm (Eluethera Island Organic Farm).  We chat to the owner, however he has nothing for sale as he has to fill cooperative orders (weekly family orders) tomorrow and he only has sufficient to meet those needs.  

Entrance to EIO farm, with old silos

Bananas with protective plastic bags (prevents sun and salt burns)

It is a nice chat to him though about the state of farming in Eleuthera.  He tells us also that the cattle farm just south of us got their cows by rounding up the wild cows from the Rock Sound area that were left over from the cattle hey days of the 50’s and 60’s. Eluethera has the most agriculture that we have seen in the Bahamas with small holders across the island.  In the 50 there was a large cattle operation which had concrete silos built all along the highway.  The project failed as they required more water then was available.  An error that the owner of EIO will not repeat.

World class surf beach

The Surf Shack, Jim is in the middle

We head back to the beach area and walk down to the surfers area.  Jim has been out once to ride some waves, but currently back on shore.  No one is actually surfing as the waves are much larger than usual.  Some of the sand has also been taken away leaving some nasty sharp coral on the shoreline.  We find a great shady spot to sit and enjoy the view.  Jim decides to head out for one more hurrah, Lucy watches with concern and we all get our cameras out.  Just watching Jim make his way to the outer surf is interesting as the waves just crash over him as he pushes his way out on his board.  We had done surfing lessons in Peru and found it a lot of work just getting out to the outer waves and our waves were much smaller.  Finally Jim is just a dot at the outer reef.  Everyone on shore is watching him go up and down as he assesses the waves and picks the one he wants to ride.  He often disappears in the swells also.  After about 15 minutes he picks a wave.  They come in sets and he has chosen one in the middle of a set and manages to ride for a minute or some, but gets sent crashing.  He surfaces and paddles a bit back to his starting point and we watch him sitting on his board assessing waves again for about another 15 minutes.  This time Jim catches a good one and manages a full ride.  It is very cool to watch him change directions and control the board.  After this ride which probably only lasts a bit more than a minute he paddles back in to shore.  Even this is tricky as landing with the crashing waves and undertows requires paying careful attention to the water.  This beach is well know in the surfing community, having hosted world surfing championships in the past.  

The five of us then head back to the car, and head south towards Governors Harbour.  We do stop at one more farm to buy a few tomatoes.  Governors Harbour is a very pretty town.  We had missed sailing to it as its anchor holding and protection is not great and the weather was not suitable so we sailed on past.  Governors Harbour is a quick stop as it is getting late and we did not bring lighting for our dinghy rides back to our motherships.  We do want to see the pink sand beaches that the west coast brags about.  We once again head down some roads that are not in the best nick, however we proceed slowly.  Eventually we find a pink tinged beach so we can now tick that off our list of things to see.  It is now almost 7 so we point the car homeward and get back to our boats before darkness.

Selvie on the Pink Beach at Governors Harbour

A quick dinner and then we have a picture downloading session as Dawson has captured a few good surfing photos of Jim we want to share.  Managing pictures takes quite a while because with digital technology we take so many, and have the opportunity to then engineer them and then many options for presenting them such as movies, slide shows adding music etc.  We could work full time just managing photos.  We do manage to copy the pictures of the last couple of days onto a flash drive and Jim and John pop over for a visit.

We do not manage to fit in the traditional kings cribbage game, although we do manage our evening coffee then off to bed.  Amazing how we can sleep given we fill up on coffee just an hour before bedtime.  We must have no stress or worries on our minds.

Cheers

Julie and Dawson