Spanish Wells 3/25/22

When I was a child I would visit the Pink Sands Club on Harbor Island, Eleuthera, every couple of years with my grandfather. I would hear stories of Spanish Wells, a town on an island to the north of Harbor Island. It was, like Harbor Island, a town that had been colonized by loyalists of England during the Revolutionary War era. The difference was, according to Harbor Island folks, the people on Spanish Wells were now all inbred, and the island a very strange place. I had visions of deformed white people of sub-par intelligence.

Years later, Nico and I were looking for a place for school vacation week and we rented on Spanish Wells. I was surprised to find a thriving, economically stable community of intelligent, friendly, and decent people. So much for the tall tales based on inter-island rivalry.

As we have been cruising I have been intrigued by the similarities and differences of the towns and islands we have visited. There have been simple, small settlements on the isolated islands such as Long or Cat and there have been wealthier communities that benefit from a strong rental or resort market. A few towns are almost all White, some are mostly Black, and many are diverse. All settlements have a few things in common - mainly the ubiquitous Batelco (BTC) tower for communications (3G), a government dock, small convenience stores, a gas station, and chickens.

Any settlement with more than ten people will have a small store selling just about everything in a tiny space. There is a freezer for meat such as cryovac steaks from the States ($30), local pork or mutton, and chicken. Turkey wings sawed into one-inch chunks are quite popular, as are big bags of huge frozen turkey necks. There are usually fresh onions, cabbages, plantains, tomatoes, green peppers, and eggs. I broke down and bought a Chobani yogurt for $12 at our last stop. The rest is usual convenience store fare. We have found several small home farm stands and farmer’s markets.

Houses are built out of concrete or pressure-treated wood. Many are small, unpainted, and without plantings. There may be a dog, or pack of dogs lying about and chickens running about, usually with little ones trying to keep up. Mornings are a chorus of cocks crowing - we often joke, when we awake at dawn, that we know we are the Bahamas by the roosters crowing.

The homes are very small by our standards. If they get run down they are abandoned and quickly get covered up by vines. As we head north we have encountered older communities such as Governor’s Harbor and the houses have become progressively bigger with landscaping.

Rental properties are everywhere. We were told that VRBO has had a large and beneficial economic impact on these islands, with rental money flowing to agents, food stores, landscapers, maintenance people etc.

Just about every island has a small airport but the lifeline for these communities are the small inter-island freighters that only draw a few feet, and unload off a beach ramp or ramped pier

The ships must stay in a narrow channel and have to come very close to cruisers in order to get near the dock. In Elizabeth Harbor, last trip, we anchored a bit in the channel and were awoken at midnight with a ship's horn blasting and its searchlight lighting us up! (We started the engine and ran up on the anchor chain, to clear the channel.)

Rock Sound, south Eleuthera. The government dock where the freighters unload.

Some of the older colonial buildings. They either get fixed up by people from away or they go back to the land.

A restored home in Governor's Harbor

They are usually rentals now.

The laundry and liquor store in Staniel Cay. We took advantage of both. In Black Point Settlement Nico had a haircut last trip by a woman who also ran a hardware store and laundromat. Many of the small businesses are woman-owned, and many women run several little enterprises.

A little restaurant on Cat Cay where we had a cracked conch burger and a grilled grouper burger - and the Bahamian beer, Kalik. The owner's husband was the fisherman.

The view while we ate.

There are always parks of some type. Often there is a park by the harbor to view the sailing regattas, in which traditional sloops madly compete. In Rock Sound there was a town park around a giant blue hole, right in town. People would swim with the colorful fish who somehow came in from the sea.

The reviewing stand for the Rock Sound regatta.

Most settlements have a fish cleaning station in the harbor.

I saw evidence of elementary schools in the settlements but hardly any middle or high schools. I think many go away to boarding schools. These two girls were on their way home at the end of the day.

The primary school in Rock Sound.

There is usually one long road running north to south in each of the islands. Every motorist in the southern islands would wave or honk as they passed us.

The layout of a typical town.

Every community, no matter how small, seemed to have an Anglican church and many communities had a variety of denominations.

The Methodist church in Cupids Cay, and a resident dog resting in the shade of the sign.

Graves were above ground and usually colorfully decorated with flowers and trinkets.

The children's section of the Governor's Harbor library.

A lovely place to read, with breezes flowing through and the sound of waves. The upstairs, just as nice, had many computer workstations.

They are very careful about COVID. In the southern islands, everyone wore a mask, but not so much in the white communities.

Many communities have fish frys every week.

A front yard vegetable stand.

A side yard with chickens.

A typical street in Rock Sound.

Cotton growing in an abandoned lot - a remnant from an earlier era.

Some landscaping on Spanish Wells.

Father Jerome, Cat Island 3/13/22

At the moment we are waiting out a northeast blow of 20-35 knots in a marina on Cat Island (more on marina life later in the post). The day before we came in here we were anchored by a town called New Bight. Nico had been there over 40 years ago when he worked on Geronimo and had visited a hermitage on the top of Comer Hill, the highest point in the Bahamas at 207 feet. It made such an impression on him that he really wanted me to see it. We tried to get here on our 2019 cruise but couldn't, so Mount Alvernia was an important goal this time around.

Father Jerome was born John Cecil Hawes in England in 1876. He actually started out his career as an architect before he became an Anglican priest. In 1908 there was a terrible hurricane in the Bahamas and he was sent to oversee the construction of new churches. His style featured thick walls and barrel-vaulted roofs to help withstand future blows. After this project was complete it is said he had various jobs such as a wagon train driver, horse breeder, monk, and missionary before he became a Catholic priest. He came back to the Bahamas and built more churches before seeing Comer Hill and deciding to build his retirement home there. He created stations of the cross leading up to a tiny chapel for one person and an even smaller living area and a separate building with room for one platform bed. It really is a one-person monastery, peaceful and holy.

The hermitage and one of the stations of the cross, the empty tomb and a rock that rolls aside.

The approaching path becomes steeper until it is just steps leading to the building.

Comer Hill has amazing views of Cat Island and surrounding waters, including the barrier reef.

The solitary pew in the chapel.

Father Jerome's sleeping quarters

Looking up the bell tower. Nico climbed up, retied the bell-rope, and rang the bell for all to hear.

We were the only people at the hermitage when we visited early in the morning. It is a very peaceful, special spot, and Nico was so glad it seemed unchanged since 1980. 

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Marina Life

It may seem like we are living the good life sailing through the Bahamas - and we are - but also keep in mind that sailing our 34-foot boat is really like glamping, and we have been at it for nearly six weeks. A few days ago the thought of a shower without worrying about using our precious water supply became really attractive. I was having a lot of difficulties getting the brush through my salt-encrusted hair. Everything, and I mean everything, has salt in it and never truly becomes dry - sheets, towels, books, seats, and the cabin sole or floor are some examples. So, when a cold front was forecasted to hit Florida and the Bahamas this weekend we decided to come into Hawks Nest Marina at the southern tip of Cat Island. 

The marina is the little turquoise square partway up the inlet. 

The entrance was really narrow and a good, swift current up to six knots can roar through. We were going to wait until slack high tide to enter (and we anchored for lunch where the dot is in the upper picture) but a powerboat offered to go in first and radioed back that there wasn't much current so we headed in. If the tide is coming out fast and hits wind pushing against it there can be some huge waves in the shallow water of the entrance to the inlet. Many of the marinas can be tricky for that reason.

We got fuel while the tide was high and the current low. ($6.80/gallon for diesel, but we only needed six gallons!)

It was nice and calm inside!

Far and Away with her neighbor, Quite Nice, a 56 foot Bertram, who gave us the entrance info - although they hit bottom making the turn into the marina. Cruisers are so helpful. Everybody came out and helped with our lines. Later, we met at the resort at one big table and had complimentary rum drinks and conch fritters for happy hour. The next night there was an impromptu party on Quite Nice and we had mahi-mahi they had caught. Another couple lent us a hose for water. Rick, on Quite Nice, gave us ice because they can make 1,000 pounds a day for the fish.

You can see how they carved the boat basin out of the limestone. The gauge measures our water usage. Freshwater is hard to come by in the Bahamas. Some marinas use reverse osmosis but here they had filtered well water. It costs $.35 a gallon. We filled up our 105-gallon forward tank. We had to empty our 40 gallon aft tank because the filling cap was loose (my fault?) and saltwater got in when we came over from Florida. I tasted the Hawks Nest water carefully before I started filling.

The much-needed showers and laundry! One night a couple of local men pulled up in their mini-van and sold bread, vegetables, and homemade tomato sauce to the cruisers. It was very welcome. The farmer's market came to us. 

The laundry was air conditioned, so cool and dry!

They had bicycles we could use to get to the small resort 1/4 of a mile away.

We could use the resort amenities - their slow Wi-Fi, pool, bar, and lounge chairs.

To get to the resort you had to cross the runway. There was no fence or gate, just a stop sign. Nico and I rode our bikes down the runway one night.

The fishing boats clean their catch at the marina and as a result, a lot of sharks come in. Every town dock and marina has its resident Bull, Reef, Nurse, and Lemon sharks. No swimming here! Another woman and I wanted to use the marina kayak but they had just fed the sharks and there was a frenzy going on where we were going to get in. We ended up carrying the double kayak to another part of the marina.

On the kayak trip we saw dozens of baby lemon sharks, bonefish, turtles, tiny conch and hundreds of shorebirds and herons that were hunkered down in the mangroves, waiting out the wind, just like we were in the marina.

After two nights of luxury, the wind died down and the rain stopped. The front had passed, so Far and Away headed back out filled with fuel, water, food, and clean crew.