We’ve been in the Jumentos for almost a month now. After six weeks of what seemed like non-stop travel, it feels nice to slow down. The kind of feeling where you lose track of days and dates and get into an onboard routine without moving your anchor each night. There is something about waking up each day and letting the day unfold before you with no agenda, besides maybe food…
It’s great to have lobster and conch in season and mature, rather than seeing juvenile populations decimated by overfishing elsewhere in the Caribbean.
Conch salad & conch tacos are on the menu again!
There is nothing that can touch lobsters Bahamas-style. We thought this 3 1/2 lb lobster was a lot of food until we caught another along with a 5 1/2 lb one. There is so much meat in the head that two heads fed us for lunch for three days.
The cruising here is right up our alley ~ water, sun and beaches… i.e., snorkeling, stark beauty and occasional treasures. There are just enough boats to be social comfortably, no more than four or so at any given time. John & Barbara are right there with us getting sucked into island-time.
We took a kayak ride in the shallows on a calm day and the water colors were so unbelievable that cameras can’t even do it justice.
Spending a few days in Little Ragged and Ragged Island we had great water-time and got a few errands done in town, taking trash to the dump, getting sparse supplies from the store scoring eggs (!), and getting gasoline for the dinghy. It was sleepier than normal here with many residents away for the holidays. The kid goats were playing king-of-the-hill.
The Royal Bahamas Defense Force are now patrolling this remote area with boats and training care of the US Coast Guard.
So far, they have boarded us on two separate occasions (different crew) for a routine inspection. They are patroling for fishing “poachers” from Cuba, Haiti and Dominican Republic, and this zone has historically been a refugee (Hatian) and drug traffic expressway.
As far as cruiser inspections go, they were friendly and say they are here to keep us safe. One inspection was very thorough, looking through all drawers, closets & guitars, but having all of the correct permits we didn’t fit into any of the above categories!