Christmas Eve at Highbourne

 It's December 24th, no rushing , no stores, no baking, no worries.

Could be snow & ice but its salt water & sand.

Perfect boy in the tender.

I think his early canoe training has paid off, Zeke literally jumps in the tender and stays in one place unless told to move.

Another beautiful sunset!

It is hard to believe that it is Christmas Eve, not because we are in the Bahamas, but because there is just no commotion. Everyone is just chillin and taking in the peacefulness of this relaxing island.

Highbourne Cay

 WOW, you be the judge of this islands beauty!

The fanciest stop sign I have ever seen.

The Highbourne Lemonade Gang!

Highbourne Cay, Exumas, Bahamas

Time travelled:  20.5 hours
 Nautical miles:  120
 Docked at:       Highbourne Cay Marina

Sherri's Beach Bar. Judy is always prepared -our take out bags await.

Well I left you hanging in regards to a few things from Bimini! First of all the fishing, Garth lost his favorite lure to a huge barracuda – they had lots of bites, nibbles and tugs. If you ever look at the spot and see that Algonquin appears to be very close to a land mass and going every which way but straight it is Garth and Dan out in Con, Quests tender. Kind of a big tender, but I am told it is needed for fishing.

Sherry herself, cook extraordinaire!

Luckily we had prearranged dinner from Sherris cause the only thing they came home with was the rays they had caught from the sun.  Sherri made us fried chicken, plantain, coleslaw and rice with peas. We took it all back to Quest and had a feast.  We may have to stop back into Bimini on our way home in the spring. Bimini is truly a wonderful little island.

We took Zeke for a one last walk and swim around noon but only made it as far as the trunk feast.



Doesn't matter how you spell it, Sherris Beach Bar was the best until we got to the trunk!

The trunk feast!

 So, in the back of her car she had, spare ribs, lamb chops, fried conch, baked chicken, fried chicken, mac & cheese, potato salad, corn on the cob and green beans.......the hot food was in the trunk and the cold food in the back window. We all got lunch and proceed quickly back to the dock to eat it. There was enough left over for a midnight snack.  At that point Garth and Dan thought they had better sleep to prepare for the 20 hour run to Highbourne Cay.  Judy and I took Zeke for a walk along the beach.  He sat in the pools on the coral heads as if he were in his own private pool and chased the ball for a long time. However, when we got back to the boat he was sick – I think he had taken in too much salt water. Boy guy, not only was he feeling under the weather but now he was about to embark on a twenty hour journey across to the Bahama Bank!

 Quest at the beginning of our night run

The only other time I was involved in a night run was across the Gulf of Mexico last December. It was dark, deep and scary.  This time the depth gage hovered between 10 and 20 feet. It was dark but at that depth I figured when the boat sank we would all just put on our life-jackets and go upstairs. I had other escape plans conquered up but that made the most sense at the time as I was assuming the boat would sink straight down no listing, no tipping. A tired mind and no lights.

Zeke did not sleep all night.

Garth and I took turns but actually Garth did most of the time at the helm. I spent a great deal of time on the floor with Zeke. Eventually we gave him half a gravol and that seemed to ease his stress a bit.
Of course on my watch the GPS alarm went off and the screen below says - A DANGEROUS TARGET WAS DETECTED. The target turned out to be a big tanker /barge carrying propane. When I woke the captain he sat up on the couch and said " unless it is right in front of us don't worry about it"!! Great, the snoring started again and Zeke and I were left to save the boat from impending dangerous targets!

A dangerous target was detected.

UK at Sea

 Do you recall the most famous .....no that 's not it .... do you recall Garth driving around North Palm Beach in the Aston Martin? Well, the owner Archie, who is our friend Linda's brother, also has this yacht. As we were settling in to Highbourne I looked out and saw him coming into the marina. Unfortunately, Archie is back in Canada and the boat is here. What's wrong with that picture!

Although the 20 hour run from Bimini to Highbourne was exhausting, in hindsight I am glad we did it as the weather has changed. Although Bimini was great we wanted to spend Christmas in Stuart - I mean the Exumas!

We will be staying here until Boxing Day then heading out. Will try to post some pics before we leave. We were told the internet was not working but it doesn't seem to be a problem right now at 4 am.

Deep Sea Fishing Rules and Rum Flows

Time travelled:  11 hours
 Nautical miles:  79.6 NM
 Docked:          Bimini Blue Water Resort

Manatee Pocket  fuel stop. 

Lake Worth Anchorage - nice spot

We left lake Worth at O dark thirty. Our anchor set into some really sticky mud and was so well set that it took us (Garth) over a half hour to set it free. Dan on the other hand woke up and found Quest sitting in four and a half feet of water after turning through the night, so they did the hurry up and got out of there fast. Finally were all on our way through the Lake Worth inlet and out onto the deep blue ocean about 5:30. The beautiful sunrise we sailed into left us feeling that all was right in the world, and we are very fortunate to be having this wonderful experience.

The seas were relatively calm until we hit the western wall of the Gulf stream about 8nm out. For about an hour we got tossed around pretty good. While it wasn't all that bad for us poor Zeke was a little panicked. The last time we had seen him so disconcerted was while crossing Lake Ontario, poor guy. He jumped on the couch, drooled, and there was no calming him. Considering his heritage goes back to a working breed dog on the Portuguese fishing boats we now think that he should thank his lucky stars he wasn't born during those days or....... Anyway, once we were fully into the stream all was well and things calmed down again so  Zeke and I sat out on the bow for awhile. Then at around one o'clock we hit the eastern wall of the Gulf Stream and, like the western wall, things again got bumpy. The water never really did settle again until we arrived in Bimini. Dan and Judy aren't stabilized and didn't want to change their tack into the wave trains we were heading straight into but Garth decided to change it up quartered the waves so it was not so bad for Zeke which made a little difference albeit for a short while.

Following Quest into Bimini

Algonquin and Quest at Bimini Blue Water Resort

 We arrived into the Bimini channel about 4 pm.  Dan and Judy have been here three times before so for Dan it was old hat.  We passed Browns Marina and then saw Bimini Blue Water Resort, Home of the Hemingway Tournament. Well we really did not see it but we did see the man on the dock waving madly at us. I am not sure if they do not have radios or if they lost them but I do believe this is the first place we have ever arrived where the dock hands did not have radio communication with us. Dan got on the radio and told Garth just to pull in beside him. So, it is my job to put out the lines and have the fenders ready. Garth wasn't sure if he was going to bow in or stern in until he could get a feel for the the water. Our arrival time meant the current was ripping pretty good and the tight quarters made him decide to stern in. It was not the prettiest job of docking he has ever done but we got in. The tender did gently kiss the dock a couple of times but with no harm done.

After all the entry paper work was filled out Dan and Garth got changed into their Sunday best and headed over to the customs office. Customs was open and the boat is now allowed to stay in the Bahamas until June. Immigration on the other hand had already closed for the evening.  Zeke was very happy to get off the boat and Judy and I walked him around a bit.  After a much needed shower we all headed off to the Bimini Big Game Club for dinner. Conch, conch and more conch...burgers tacos and salad !! It was a long long day. Once back at the boat we literally brushed our teeth and crashed.

December 18th

How do you say, HAPPY DOG!

What can you say!

Woops!

Did someone say bakery? As we were all having our morning coffee on the dock a man mentioned he had been to the bakery and ordered coconut bread . Sounds like a plan! While Garth and Dan started washing their respective boats Judy and I walked to the bakery, ordered bread, and then proceeded to walk Zeke along the beach. Talk about a dog in heaven.  Zeke had a blast! There were conch shells everywhere and even a shipwreck. While the boys were washing the boats Carson, who works here, came by to see if they wanted to buy lobster and so we had a dozen tails waiting in the fridge on our arrival back at the boat.

The one thing you notice right away about Bimini is just how friendly the people are. Everyone is obliging and happy.  I tried out the marina showers, at 60 cents a gallon for water we are into conservation.

The four of us rented a golf cart and our first stop was the Famous Stuart Conch Shack where we had lobster salad, conch salad, a few ice cold beers along with a few rum punches. Life is good and boating is fun! (wish you were here Frank!) The last time Dan and Judy were at Stuarts they were filming the series Hook, Line, and Dinner there so if you ever see the show look for Dan and Judy's tender to Quest in the background. Last week they filmed The Housewives of Miami there, humm. We all left full and happy.

Never seen Garth down a beer so quickly, check out the difference!

Fabreeze aka The Boss Lady is bringing the rum punch! Yumm

Conch Hill

 Moving on to Bimini Bay Resort we toured the facility and even stopped at the sales center. A cool million buys you an ocean front property and then you build the house. HOA fees run around about a thousand a month. After getting a bit of a laugh about that we tootled along to the drugstore and then over to Bahama tel office. Bahamian phones and internet are in the works and we were told to come back tomorrow as a new bunch of phones might be on the plane. We hope it isn't like last year experience where we ended up having to wait a week or so for the deed to get done. The women said, "they forget about us out here on the little islands". They being the people from Nassau she means.  On the way back through town we stopped to get Zeke who had been left on the boat and headed up to the end of the island to catch the sunset. We were merrily walking the beach when the golf cart nazi came looking for us. Apparently we had gone over our time so we all jumped back in and returned the cart.

Dan, 4x4 ing on the beach!

Ahhh

Not to be dismayed we walked up the hill for sunset. We were accosted by screams of "come here for the view", "the drinks are great"... so twist our arms and off we went to Sherri's Beach Bar. She made a pretty good rum punch. So good in fact we are going back for fried chicken and punch at sunset tomorrow!!

When we got back to the boat Dan BBQ' ed the lobster tails and they were amazing!!! As he was bbq-ing Carson came over and asked Dan to BBQ his dinner for him, a piece of fish. He also made sure to ask Dan to season it well for him before he cooked it, and then asked if he had anything cold to drink. So, Dan bbq-ed his dinner, added salad. rice and peas and then threw in a cold beer!  It's Bimini!! Isn't it wonderful?

December 19th

Does it get any better? This morning we woke up to fresh hot cinnamon buns, and coconut bread. Unfortunately the baker did not come in yesterday to make the bread we had ordered but he must have shown up pretty darn early today! Dan and Garth took off fishing, Judy cleaned and blogged, and Zeke and I cleaned, blogged, and went for a beach walk. Yesterday when we were walking on the beach I lost a ten dollar bill. Now this is a large beach where it was lost so I just chalked it up to gone and hoped that someone deserving sole would find it. This morning when Zeke and I were walking I found a ten dollar bill!!! Is there a casino in the hood!!! My luck may not last!

 Brumer this ones for you!

Paradise

Off to get the big one!

Life is good and Boating is FUN!!!

From the Waterway guide book - The pictures of Hemingway and earlier times tell it all ...."This is a special place where the only laws were "anything goes. deep sea fishing rules and rum flows". Today it is tamed and much more family orientated. but the ghosts of that enchanted era still roam the narrow streets of this historic settlement"

We are heading out for bluer water, like greener pasture, tomorrow. Luckily we were able to catch a signal here but who knows when it will happen again. So I am just going to post some random pics below!

Fresh conch!

Ice Cream truck! Same music as the trucks in Toronto!

Sand from the entrance channel.

Closed up tight.

The original lunch truck

Sherris - dinner tonight!

The Grizwalds of Bimini!

An update from Zeke!

RUFF!!!

Grrrr, this is Zeke! Kathy and Garth are busy so I thought I would take a shot at this. First off, I am kind of sad to leave Stuart because it's a very dog friendly town. You can tell by the number of water bowls left out on the street for me. I just wish the people who leave them would clean them out once in a while. I really like the man at the hot dog stand downtown because he gives me fresh cold water! I made the mistake of jumping in the water the first time Garth took me downtown so now they put me on the leash to walk past that area. I didn't know the water was polluted!!  

I sure will miss my friends on B dock. Lily is a chocolate lab who lives on a Cat. I just don’t get that! Anyhow, Lily is so sweet. She told me that she is coming to the Exumas in January so perhaps we will get together once again. Salty Dawg has already left and gone up north for Christmas. I wish Kathy had taken a picture of Salty cause he is the spitting image of me only he’s a something poo and very small.  I will not miss Fuzzy the Golden from A dock.  I just hate Fuzzy!! He is tall, handsome, and unneutered!!!!! I have a friend on C dock named Winston and he is also coming to the Exumas in the new year  - WOW, I hope Lily , Winston and I can get together on the beach, swim have dogtails and chill!  I will also miss that bone shaped swimming pool at Fur Seasons. How cool is that! The good news is that we are coming back here in the spring and I am sure they will take me back to the pool! I will miss the cookies at the marina office. They have this big jar of cookies just sitting there and I pretty much get one or two everyday, yeah. Last week my friend Daisy from A dock jumped off her boat and went to the office by herself to get a cookie. They are still talking about it around here, it was quite a hike!

So, my peeps have been out almost every day. You should see the amount of dog food they have for me...... 120 pounds! I did not see any treats or greenies come aboard but I am pretty sure they would not have forgotten those.  The cupboards are full, the dishwasher is now being used for storage. Hey, maybe my cookies are in there! There are so many cubby holes and hiding spots on this boat you could hide a small army of cats. Besides Fuzzy, I also hate cats! Most cats anyway but not all cats I suppose. Why do they say that Lily lives on a Cat? The crew shower is full of water and toilet paper and I also saw some new dog toys in a drawer in there the other day.  Yes, Santa I have been good!! Ok, except when I see Fuzzy on the dock. But Santa you understand, don’t you?

Garth and Kathy drove to Miami on Tuesday as Garth had to get a new passport. Would have been simple to get one in Toronto when he was there a few weeks ago but he did not realize that it was due to expire until last Wednesday. They are still talking about how fast they got it - delivered to Miami on a Thursday and picked up the next Tuesday. Date and place of issue reads Miami on Thursday Dec 6th. Wow, in reality it was same day service! Anyhow, I got to spend the day with Judy aboard Quest. We went for a few walks and she even took me out for a drive! I tell you I was exhausted at the end of the day. Judy just moves a mile a minute and of course I had to follow her all over her boat, up and down all day long! Thanks Judy for taking care of me, it sure beat sitting in the car zooming down I-95.

Oh No, Garth just said he has to go out and find a spear. A spear?? Oh, it is for lobster fishing. I tell you this fishing business is pretty serious stuff. Garth went to a special fishing store with Dan a few weeks ago and he is always saying I need 30 SPF for fishing, I need a small cooler for fishing, I need a .....for fishing!!! I think our time in the Bahamas will revolve around fishing....... instead of me.

I think we are ready for Christmas. Kathy has been shopping for weeks and Garth and I walked downtown yesterday and finished our shopping in an hour. I don’t get that myself but I guess Garth must be a much better shopper is all I can figure. 

They left me alone today on the boat when they went for  dock tails. I could see them from our boat so finally they came to get me so I could talk to Lily. You know, Lily who lives on a Cat? Now, they are talking about organizing tomorrow, the last day with a car. Garth has to go get his spear, Kathy wants paper towels, and hey let’s make a stop at Petsmart just to see what’s new!!

Well, I will share the plan with you as far as I know it. We leave here Sunday and make our way down to Lake Worth to anchor out for the night. I really do not like to anchor out cause there is nothing for me to do and they encourage me to do my business on that fake grass stuff they bought. Maybe Garth will dingy me to shore and I can run around a bit....time will tell.  Monday morning we will leave Lake Worth and go across to Freeport. Things seem to be changing a bit and we could be heading farther south and heading over to Bimini. They don't tell me much about that stuff. What I heard was that if we go to Freeport and the weather gets bad then we may have to sit for a few days before making a run to Chubb Cay or beyond to Nassau.  It all depends on the weather!!!! I think that's why Garth is thinking about going further south before going over. The weather might be a little bit more dependable is what he's thinking. He and Dan will come up with a good plan I'm sure.  Remember you can always see exactly where we by clicking on the "CLICK HERE FOR OUR CURRENT LOCATION"

This is Zeke signing off and wishing you ....

A Merry Christmas 

Counting the days!

 We are not counting the days until Christmas but counting the days until we move.

 We really quite like Stuart but we have been here long enough. The town itself is very quaint with deco style buildings, boutique like stores and a variety of restaurants. It has a market every Sunday and there is always something going on. We are less than a ten minute walk along the river to the heart of all the action.

Sailfish Capital of the World

Our first delay was unavoidable, but thanks to modern medicine all is well and Garth has a clean bill of health! Our second delay, Garth had to make a quick trip home, now that we have our own pied -a -terre there are no worries and we can rest assured that our belongs are safe. Our third and hopefully final delay is work related. Dan and Judy - aka Quest have waited patiently for us and now Judy, Garth and I will wait while Dan is up north working. We would all like to have gone with him and helped out  but someone has to stay here, watch the boats and make sure the air conditioning stays on. Dan hopes to be back this weekend and then we are outta here!
We have been keeping ourselves entertained and busy.
The four of us went down to Miami for a day, visited Vizcaya, a mansion built in 1916 by a wealthy industrialist.  Then we stopped by to see Peggy and Steve in Key Biscayne before descending on South Beach for the evening.

The channel entrance to Vizcaya

The back gardens of Vizcaya

I wish I had had the presence of mind to have taken a picture of the drinks we had in South Beach, speaking for myself, we ordered mojitos and I expected a normal size drink but out came these fish bowl size glasses full of mojito!!!! We suffered through them!

We have been making lists of things we absolutely must have in the Bahamas, like twenty packages of Starbucks coffee, 120 pounds of dog food, pill pockets, renewing our insurance, renewing our Spot so that you can see exactly where we are and stocking up on rum and wine...  etc etc....last stop will be for fresh fruit and veggies!

The Fur Season Pet Resort Stretch Limo

While doing some running around we dropped Zeke off at the Fur Seasons. It is illegal to leave a dog in a car in the state of Florida. So, here he can swim in a bone shaped pool and have some dog time. We draw the line at having a limo pick him up!
Once we leave here we have  no real plans other than to spent a few months bumping around the Exumas and relaxing. Garth is planning on getting in some serious fishing! I am planning on getting in some serious reading and beach walking. We want to be in Farmers Key for the First Friday in February Party!  We are hoping to have some company - flights go from Toronto to Georgetown every week!!
So, while we wait patiently for Dan we continue to scour every store in Stuart and Jensen Beach checking out what they have and could we possibly need it. We even went to the flea market - Garth got a fishing tackle box and I bought a "as seen on TV" screen - I don't have great hopes for it working but something may prove to be better than nothing.

Some interesting and amusing boat names:

Yacht To Trot

Broke & Drunk

His and Hers

Follow Me

Algonquin and  Quest

 Even Zeke is anxious to get moving, he loves travelling by boat and kissed his airline cage goodbye this summer!!

Ah, the days of air travel!!

Ontario Beach time!

Long Point, Lake Erie - next beach will be in the Exumas!!