Lionfish and Sharks and Pigs, O my

Saturday the 11th we arrived back at one of our favorite spots, Staniel Cay!

And we just happened to walk in during a Lionfish competition.  Lionfish are small fish covered in poisonous barbs.  Because of this they have no natural predators and are over populated.  The Staniel Cay Divers sponsored an event to help fish them.  

Two teams caught over a hundred Lionfish that day with spears.  We arrived for the good part, the music and Lionfish cooking competition.

As people were gutting the Lionfish a bunch of sharks came to feast on the scraps.  They were circling all around the fish table and really big.  We have never seen so many sharks even at the Nassau Aquarium.

The band was an acoustic duo that played a lot of songs we liked so that was really cool.  For the cooking competition 5 chefs made 5 distinct dishes and everyone was given a plate to taste and vote.  There was a onion and pepper fish, jelly sauce fish, curry fish, teriayki fish, and our favorite and the winner, a sweet and sour fish.  Mmmmm they were all served over rice and delicious.  They were also selling Lionfish cookbooks and serving free drinks.  The winners of the competitions received over $3500 in total prizes.

Staniel Cay Divers sure know how to throw a party!

We fed our left over rice to these hungry fish.

As we mentioned before, our underwater camera never came into George Town.  So we bought a disposable underwater camera at Staniel Cay to take pictures of Thunderball Grotto.  We need to get them developed so we still can't post pictures of the amazing, fish filled cave.  We hope the pics turn out.

We left Staniel Cay Tuesday and stopped just around the corner at Big Majors, home of the pigs!

We noticed Thunderball Grotto and Big Majors were a lot more crowded this time with visitors, but this piggy must have slept through his last meal because he was hungry!

As soon as we got to the beach he came running out and would sit with his mouth open waiting for us to drop Graham Crackers in.

Then as we tried to feed the other pigs he got a little rude.  He would follow us and nudge his nose into us and  once he even bit me and then Christine!  It was just a nibble on the thigh with no teeth but it was still surprising.  Most the pigs were so well behaved.

Me in a stare down with fatty.

Our old friend baby piggy. 

Then as we were about to leave, the trouble maker thought we were holding out on him and tried to jump in our dinghy!  I had a cracker in my hand and had to yell for him a couple times before he got out, although we think he was stuck for a second.

We said goodbye to the pigs and continued north.

Our next few destinations were just beachy islands we decided to anchor at instead of skipping them.

We stopped at Thomas Cay which had an odd make shift hut that said "Pipe Creek Yacht Club"

From inside the "Yacht Club". There's our boat.

We found a few conch laced trails that led into the jungle island.

We crossed to the other side after a short safari.

Here's our boat from the top of the jungle with our kayaks landed on the beach to the left.

Next we kayaked over to Joe Cay!

It was a small cay that was mostly sand and had a few tiki huts in the middle.

Welcome to my island!

And Mrs. Joe

We then found out why it was so sandy with huts and a single dock in the middle.  It was private.  Kicked off our on Cay, shucks.

We kayaked back to the boat, kinda.  We actually got stuck in the strong channel current going out to sea but managed to land on the other side of Thomas Cay that we found earlier.  We then had to carry our kayaks through the safari and then kayaked back to the boat.  It was quite the work out for two lazy beach bums.

From Thomas Cay we anchored at Pipe Cay and then Belle Island near Cambridge Cay.  We attempted to anchor at Cambridge but the mooring balls took up most of the anchorage and we didn't know how to obtain a mooring.  (We later found out that there is a drop box on the beach that you just put $15 in for a mooring)

From Belle Island we slowly sailed to Warderick Wells Cay which is where the Exuma Land and Sea Park HQ is and Boo Boo Hill.  

This is where we currently are.  We hiked Boo Boo Hill again and saw our spray painted log with our name on it still there.  This time it was high tide and we had to cross a small 2 foot high stream.  Then we did a little snorkeling around Emerald Rock.

We went to the main office and after some thought coughed up the $35 for a mooring ball and one day of internet.  It had been 8 days since we had internet and we don't want anyone worrying out there :)

Next we will visit a few more Exuma Cays before hopping over to Eluethera by July 1st which is about when we should have internet again.

George Town Exumas Bahamas, Virtual Tour

After the last blog with the lack of pictures we realized that we hadn't taken many pictures of this wonderful town we've called home for 6 1/2 weeks.  So here is George Town in Pictures..

Our view of the town from our boat

To get to the dinghy dock we have to go under this narrow bridge that creates a super fast current. Going in is like hitting a booster in Mario Cart, and coming out we go about .0001 mph while waves crash into us.  It's fun every time!

Here's the cruiser parking lot. Its June 1st so most cruisers have left, but the dock used to stay very crowded

Our first spot is the newly founded Bikini Bottom which serves great food, ice cream, and is a local hang out. The owner was very friendly.  From here you can pull the Exuma Market Grocery store internet.

Which means next in line is the grocery store, Exuma Markets.  The mail boat comes on Tuesday so Wednesday is the best day to see the store packed with food.

This lil hut didn't have a name but the guy here sells bbq pork, chicken or ribs with macaroni and corn for $10 and it was the best we found around!  It was so hard to walk by as her was constantly grilling.  That should be illegal advertising because it smelled so good!

This is also where Darren the peanut guy hangs out and you can get a bag of roasted peanuts for $1

Next is the park where we spent many nights.  The school kids come here after school to hang out.

Across the street is Top to Bottom which has a lot of marine stuff and will help you ship stuff in via DHL.  They also have cheap movies on dvd.

Then come Two Turtles which is the other place besides Eddies Edgewater (on the other side of the lake) that the locals hang out.  They have a cool tiki bar and a big movie screen against the building wall to play sports.

Across from Two Turtles is a straw market with lots of home made gifts

Then comes the quaint library.  For $3 per couple you can rent books here and the selection is pretty good.  The only downside is that they are only open Mon-Fri 10-12

We saw this guy with a cage full of land crabs.  They were bulky and green and very creepy looking compared to our Maryland Blue Crabs 

Another great place was Pets Place which offers internet and food and usually had baked goods for us to snack on

A walk down the one way street

Theres our boat from the view on top of that narrow bridge

Down the street the other way from the dinghy dock is J&K which sells computer stuff and some groceries but most importantly frozen juice treats for 30 cents which we loved and got almost everyday on shore

Here is our view of the other side of the harbor, Stocking Island

We have left George Town and are making our way back up the Exumas chain, blog to come.

We made it to Florida!

Thursday we spotted Florida in all its sunny glory!  The wind and rain disappeared and the sun came blazing out to greet us.

Factory or awesome water park?

We anchored outside the Fernandina Beach Marina, mile marker 716, and quickly dinghyed to shore.  We were greeted by this big birds who act like they own the dock.  It was their feeding time and a local fisherman through them scraps, yum!

We strolled around the warm town and we astonished at all the people and cars everywhere.  We were back in civilization.  No more cold!

We grabbed dinner at the Green Turtle Tavern (not the real one) and even splurged on some fudge, mmmm.

We headed back to our boat and checked the internet, full bars from our anchorage!  So that night turned into cockpit internet cafe.

Friday we wanted to visit the town again but it was really windy and the waves deterred us.  We decided just to relax and spend the day in bed.

Saturday we awoke to a beautiful warm day, maybe 60!  We were supposed to head out that day but we had an extra day to kill so we decided not to leave yet.  Now that the weather is so nice we can drag our feet a little and just enjoy relaxing :)

We even opened up our cockpit hatch for the first time this trip and ripped down some of the bubble wrap insulation.  It felt good having a cool breeze run into the v-berth.

Later that day Christine was outside and saw a Trimaran coming into port.  We had been keeping an eye out for another blogging cruising couple that we knew were close to us, Hans and Laura aboard Knotty Cat.  And sure enough it was them so we started waving and yelling toward them.  Laura hailed us on the VHF and asked if something was wrong and we just nope this is Bright Eyes saying hello!  They were very excited to hear it was us and invited us over that evening.

It was a fun evening getting to talk to another couple experiencing the same things as us.  Not only cruising but almost our exact time and route.  They have a very friendly pit bull on board named Wilbur who must have smelled our cats cuz he couldn't stop hugging us.  After a great evening there we headed to shore for dinner.

Hans and Laura, and Wilbur, aboard Knotty Cat can be found here:

http://knottycattales.blogspot.com/

For dinner we googled McDonalds and found there was one about 2.5 miles away so we started walking.  We really should have brought our bikes but it was nice out so the walk wouldn't kill us.  However once we got to the shopping center we found a Chinese Buffet!  I guess we worked up quite the appetite during the walk cuz the next thing we know we have a ton of snow crab legs piled onto our plates.  Owell maybe McDonalds at the next city.

One of our many weaknesses

Next up: Jacksonville, St. Augustine, Daytona, and Melbourne!