The story continues.....

I am writing on the evening of our anniversary after a very busy day. Bill went racing on ‘Sea Echo’ leaving very early to make the tide out of the harbor (‘Sea Echo’ needs lots more water under her keel then ‘Interim’). This was the 3rd time he raced. I stayed on board ‘Interim’ with Reta, whose husband was racing. I made her a bookmark and we had a lovely time. At noon she, another racers’ wife and I went to lunch. There is a wonderful coffee shop that also has pastries, quiche and ‘Antioxidant smoothies’. I never noticed the smoothie section on the board until today and although quite pricey I ordered it and it was absolutely delicious. I might have to make this a daily ritual.

One very important feature of this island and others in the Bahamas is the effect of Hurricanes Floyd, Francis and Jeanne. It seems there was incredible damage and devastation throughout the Bahamas. The government, in order to stimulate rebuilding, has for the time being stopped the 30% import tax on all building materials needed to rebuild damaged or lost structures. Unfortunately, people are taking advantage and new structures are being built everywhere without thought of how they affect the very thing that makes the Bahamas so different and special. As the song goes “they paved paradise and put up a parking lot”. Some of these buildings are beautiful but others are just out of place. We saw a home built on a high spot of a fairly small deserted Cay. It was built to take advantage of the view of the ocean. To prevent it being swept out to sea when the next hurricane hits the owners attached 4 heavy chains, one on each corner, to try to keep the home in place. There are still many building sites as well roads and commercial buildings that have not been repaired or replaced.

There are many volunteers who are trying to aid in the rebuilding as well. Bill and several other men are working at the Wyannie Malone Museum continuing the tradition that the cruisers in the harbor use their skills for a variety of construction and maintenance projects. The museum is wonderful and filled with history and artifacts.

We continue to make friends and it seems that most of the Canadian boats have left to go further south and there are more American boats in the harbor. Simon has even made friends with ‘Penny’ a miniature poodle on a boat called “Chris Deke”. Chris and Deke also helped us in the search for Conch. We have gone to several different areas, looking and looking without success. But when we went with Chris and Deke we found a great spot. We went snorkeling to look at the coral and fish and Deke found the first Conch. Then Bill started looking and I saw him dive twice and then he started swimming to the dinghy. As he got closer I saw that he had a Conch in each hand. You can only collect 6 Conch per boat per day and between the two dinghy’s we collected 7. Bill and I then went out again on Monday. He wasn’t too happy looking for the illusive conch, I was looking through the bucket at some lovely coral, fans and fish and he was making noises about going back to eat lunch. All of a sudden I though I spotted a shell in the water. We dropped the anchor and Bill, reluctantly put on his snorkel and went in the water. Needless to say we were incredibly lucky and within a very short time we had 5 more shells. We were also fortunate that the sea was the calmest ever (during the other trips to the reef the rollers were 2 -3 feet).

Now, why do you suppose we are doing this…well, one of the Conch Shells is going to be turned into a horn and I have been successful in blowing a fairly good tone from a borrowed Conch. There is going to be a competition on Feb. 28. Also, horns from all around the harbor are blown at sunset. And then there is the meat of the conch that turns into conch fritters, conch soup, and conch salad. I don’t like the texture of conch but Bill does and he just made the first batch of fritters from our recent catch. There are various opinions about how to clean the shells and extract the meat, we have tried several, and Bill has finally found the ‘perfect’ way to do this pretty disgusting job.

We are also continuing to look for sea glass and saw many different designs for jewelry at the Man o War Cay fair on Saturday. We were going to dinghy over there but the weather wasn’t great so we invited the other 2 couples to go with us on ‘Interim’.

Bill and I also went up to the top of the Lighthouse. The view was wonderful and we thought we were on time to see the keeper light the light. Well the sun set and no keeper so we walked down. As soon as we got to the bottom the keeper came and Bill then walked up the 101 steps again. I took pictures from the ground. Bill was in heaven taking part in lighting one of the last 3 kerosene lanterns lighthouses in the world. He climbed all the way up to the Fresnel lenses, got inside of them and helped preheat the kerosene chamber which took about 10 minutes. Then the light was lit with a match. The lenses rotate in a bath of mercury and the weights that rotate it must be cranked up to the top every 2 hours. Bill did not volunteer his services. The keeper lives at the base in a separate house and goes up the 101 steps every 2 hours.

To help keep Elbow Cay a little neater one of the members of one of the oldest families on the Cay worked up a promotion asking for donations to purchase a new garbage can which would be personalized and gaily painted. We bought one and hope that before we leave we can find a can with ‘Interim’ painted on the top. Buddy (one of the members of the family) asked me what the word ‘interim’ means and I think the person doing the painting is going to paint a small, medium and big ketch on the top of the can.

Two of the special moments in the day occurs at noon and 6 pm when the church bell chimes. However, all of a sudden we realized that for several weeks the bells weren’t working and we didn’t notice their absence until a few days ago when they were working again. We were with several people and we all stopped talking and just listened. Tonight there is supposed to be a lunar eclipse that begins at 10:01 that will last 51 minutes. However, I just looked out and there are clouds covering the moon. Hopefully by 10 there will be some breaks in the clouds.

Bill and I have begun discussing and planning our departure from the Sea of Abaco. Mixed feelings are surfacing.