Drum major

Hi kids!

Here at the finalé of the Georgetown Regatta the Royal Bahamian
Defense Force Marching Band gave a concert. They were GREAT!

The guy in front was the drum major. He doesn't play an instrument in
the band. He carries a fancy staff with silver and leather all over
it, twirls it around in a fancy way to keep time for the band and
blows a whistle to start and stop songs. He was a big, handsome black
man dressed in a fancy uniform. Needless to say the girls fell for him
left and right. At one point a woman came out, wrapped her arms around
his neck and started dancing with him. He managed to extricate himself
professionally and continue the performance, but, man, it's gotta be
great to have that kind of power over the crowd!

They were all dressed in fancy uniforms with bright white pith helmets
topped with spear points, white jackets with lots of braid and sashes
and stuff. Some of the drummers had leopard skins draped over their
front with the leopard's head over their shoulder and the leopard's
tail hanging from the back of their belts. Very, very African, for
some reason.

All in all it was very different from the Wyalusing Valley marching
band Jen and I were in years ago. But, Jen observed, the same type of
girls are always the majorettes and cheerleaders no matter where you
go, and I think she's right.

Be good, kids. See if you can march in a straight line for the teacher
today and give her a break. She deserves it!

Quiet place

Hi kids!

Here's old Angel Jen chatting up Cat Man Jim at the quiet place we
finally found to watch the races in Georgetown. See all the people
sitting on the wall. There were a lot more you can't see. Looks like a
lot of people wanted to escape the reggae rap blast.

Jim owns a catamaran. That's why we call him Cat Man. A catamaran is a
boat with two hulls instead of one. He's from California and he's
headed for the Dominican Republic. He doesn't know why and neither do
I. He doesn't have a life raft, an EPIRB, a dinghy anchor, not even a
hand held VHF radio. He has a shortwave receiver that he doesn't know
how to turn on so he can't get weather reports. All of his flashlight
batteries are dead. But he's out there, doing it. He's a tribute to
optimism. The world needs optimists. Of course, Darwinian principles
would suggest that there are fewer and fewer every day, so we need
more all the time.

So be good kids, race your boats hard and be an optimist!

Hiked

Hi kids!

Here's a picture of the crew of a Bahamian racer hiked out on their
boards. Man, who's steering this thing?

Next entry...

Boat races

Hi kids!

Old Angel Jen and I are in Georgetown on Big Exuma Island. This week
they had the Family Island Regatta. It is one BIG deal, believe you me!

The Bahamians make these boats from wood by hand. There are three
classes, A,B, and C for long (25'-29'), medium (22'-25') and short
(19'-22'). They rig them with these HUGE sails in a cat boat rig (one
sail, one mast way forward). Since they have way too little ballast to
hold themselves up under these giant sails, the crew has boards they
stick out over the side and then climb out on to serve as movable
ballast. When the boat changes direction, the crew clambers in off the
boards, shoves the board out off the other side and climbs out over
there, usually with a lot of hollering and shouting.

The boats are light, the sails are huge and they really fly along.
There were over sixty boats competing from thirteen different islands
in races from Tuesday until Saturday.

On shore there was the Bahamian equivalent of a big county fair going
on. A big county fair where every booth sells the demon alcohol. True,
they usually sold conch, jerk chicken (whatever that is), ribs or
something but massive quantities of C2H5OH everyplace.

They had many racks of big outdoor speakers set up and fueled them
with some of the worst quality amplifiers imaginable and blasted
reggae rap you could here for miles. Each of these racks was within
fifty yards of another so you got to hear several at once.

Now I have been known to go clubbing myself, but this was too much. I
was so glad to find a quiet spot at the end of the road to watch the
races.

Next entry...

Georgetown Family Regatta

Hi kids!
We went to the Georgetown Family Regatta races today. We are in
Georgetown on Great Exuma island. This is a 'big town' in the Bahamas.
The races here are famous throughout the Bahamas. Each island builds
a boat and sends it here to compete. The boats are hand made wooden
boats with a single sail. The sails are huge relative to the boat and
the only way they can make the boat sail is by using humans as movable
ballast. When they need ballast to one side to keep it from tipping
over they rig a board up way way out to the side and make the crew
climb out there. In this picture you can see several crew members
hanging way out over the water riding on said boards. It's nuts.
Extreme agility is required to keep the boat balanced. Some of the
crew have compromised their agility by having a few ounces of ethanol
(C2H5OH, for you chemistry buffs) before the race. As a consequence
several of the boats tipped into the water during the race. One of
them T-boned a competitor while attempting to round the mark (many
many words were exchanged, quite heated ones at that), and one boat
sank into the harbor before the race even started. How you even begin
to sink a race boat at the slip I have no idea. But there it was. A
dozen guys trying to raise the thing before race time. And it was
still there the next day.
Luckily, most of the competitors survived.
Ashore, loud music played, conch were sacrificed, school children
performed and a fair was held. It was a celebratory day.
I had an offer to rode on one of the boats but I decided to go ashore
and eat conch salad instead.
The conch salad was good.

Sharks!

Hi kids!

While we were hanging out at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club experiencing
the ambiance, the mileau, the je ne se qua there was a guy cleaning
and fileting fish by the dock. He has friends. Friends of convenience
and with a one way attitude about the relationship, but friends. As he
tossed innards and pieces into the water, these rays and sharks were
there to suck up the easy pickings. How many sharks can you count?
How many rays? How many people swimming in the water?

No me, that's for sure! Stupid sharks aren't getting my leg for
dessert!

Beach bar!

Hi kids!

Here's a picture of old Angel Jen bellying up to a sailors beach bar
on Staniel Cay. This is another example of the iconic experiences of
a Caribbean cruise. Sailors brave the raging seas, clawing their way
from island to island, conquering all the difficulties of nature then
they tie up the boat, sidle into the local sailors beach bar and tell
stories about what great times they had. And decide to have another
drink and not go out again for a while.

In the more remote islands of the Caribbean, I understand, they order
cheap meals which take forever to arrive.

In the Bahamas, however, they order extremely expensive meals which
take a very long time to arrive because Bahamians may be islanders but
they ain't stupid. Once you've been out on the water for a couple
weeks bouncing from lonely deserted isle to lonely deserted isle,
you're ready for a burger and a cold one. And there's only one
restaurant in town. Our two burgers and three drinks cost us $60. Yeee-
ouch! But, hey, we checked another box on the list!

Pah-tee!

Hi kids!

When we went cruising we heard about these convivial beach parties
that the cruisers have wherever they congregate. Parties where they
have cocktails, talk about the bad winds and seas, their broken
something or other and how it's impossible for them to do anything bit
stay where they are and have more cocktails at their next beach party.

Man, that sounded like it had Pirate John written all over it!

Here at the Headquarters of the Exumas National Land and Sea Park on
Warderick Wells Cay we found one at last. We were checking in at the
office and some park ranger came around saying,"Its my birthday
today! Bring your drinks, I'll bring the food!"

So at four pm all the dinghies from all the boats headed for the
beach. Pah-tee!

There was something like an old army mess tent from the Korean War or
M.A.S.H. or something. (Don't know the old tv show ' M.A.S.H.'? Ask
the teacher. She can remember it. She was even alive during the Korean
War.) The park rangers and volunteers were cooking up a storm,
grilling wings, ribs, burgers, dogs, buns and more. Salads all over.
Even soda pop.

The cruisers were busting out their enhanced cola colas, enhanced
Goombay Punches, something called 'Bahama Mamas' which despite the
name were red, not black, and seemed to have a much lower fat content
than the namesake article. Pretty soon they were discussing all the
bad seas out there, how amazed they were that we attempted sailing
yesterday, the terrible weather, busted gidgets, the impossibility of
attempting repairs and how long they would stay put. Man, it was
textbook cruiser living!

We met people here whom we hadn't seen since New Jersey. Seems they
reported to Angel Jen discussing us several times in the intervening
months wondering if we ever made it. They were surprised and pleased
to see here and alive.

Hmmm... I wonder why they talked amongst themselves wondering whether
we'd make it? Hmmmm....

We talked to Canadians from Calgary, Alberta and I got to tell my
story about hoboing a train from Calgary to Toronto in 1972. We talked
to a union man from Detroit and I got to tell my story about my
grandfather going to work in the coal mines 12 hours a day six days a
week when he was 12 years old and what great things unions had done
getting the forty hour week and industrial safety standards
established. We met sailors who had been to Maine and swapped tales
about favorite anchorages there.

After being shut up in a boat for a few weeks with just ourselves to
talk to it was nice to have a gab fest.

And man, can those Bahamians barbeque a rib! MmmmmMmm!

Since our sodas were unenhanced it was fun watching the various
cruisers who had enjoyed their enhanced versions wading out to get the
dinghies that were floating off in the rising tide and pouring
themselves happily over the gunwales for the ride out to their yachts
to sleep sweetly until morning's light.

Cruiser beach party! Another box checked in the last great adventure
list!

Killer Ray!

Hi kids!

Here's a picture of Angel Jen hovering over one of those rays like the
one that killed The Crocodile Hunter, Steve SomethingOrOther. We were
rowing around and we saw a rock move. We're like,"Wha?"

So we chased it.

We tried to look inconspicuous as we got closer, feigning disinterest
so as not to startle our prey. When I got over it I donned my snorkle
and mask and stuck my head in the water.

I immediately recognized the murderous animal below as a sting ray,
only three feet away!

I popped up and took a picture then Jen took the mask and had a look.
Luckily, we made it away from the beast before he went mad with rage
and stuck us with his barbed tail.

Man, we are living on the edge!

The future? One word. Plastics!

Hi kids!

We are lolling about, wasting time on a remote uninhabited Bahamian
island again. This time it's Shroud Cay, near the top of the Exumas
chain.

'Shroud' can mean several different things. It can be the cloth a dead
body is wrapped in for burial (ee-yoo!), a cover (an engine shroud) or
a piece of boat rigging that runs from the mast to the beam of the
ship to support the mast. Isn't it funny how the same word can mean
different things? Like 'kid' could mean you, for example, or a young
goat or a kind of joke. Man, language is great. But I digress.

The Bahamians have established this national park here on a stretch of
small islands out in the middle of nowhere. It's about a 22 miles long
and 8 wide. There are twenty named islands and many small ones. No one
can fish or hunt or take anything from the land or sea here. It's the
place where a fish is allowed to be a fish, a bird can be a bird and a
conch's day is worry free. They say this place is the source for a
lot of the good fishing in the other islands since these fish grow up
and go get a job on another island when they're bigger.

We went exploring in the mangrove forests in the interior of the
island. Here's a picture of old Angel Jen lugging plastic crap
shefound on the beach back to the ranger station so Mr. Park Ranger
can dispose of it.

We hate people who throw plastic in the water! It always washes up on
shore and makes a mess and plastic is forever. If you throw out a
paper towel, that's not good but the bugs in the dirt or water will
eventually break it down. Nothing eats plastic. It lasts for hundreds
of years, literally. In this case some nitwit threw an empty five
gallon pail of diesel oil overboard, a whiskey bottle, an egg carton
and a hunk of black rubber. So, like a good, conscientious hard
working Protestant Camptown woman, Angel Jen is soiling her hands
lugging trash out.

Well, kids, be good. Don't litter! And sail straight!

Oasis

Hi kids!

While we were in Nassau we found an oasis. Do you guys know what an
oasis is?

There will be a moment of silence while teacher explains 'oasis' and
briefly explores the concept of 'metaphor' in literature.

Ok, got it? Oasis=metaphor for 'place of respite' in this case.

While waddling around Nassau's nastiest neighborhood looking for a
place to mail a letter, we came across, halleluja!, a Starbucks!
Cappucinos! Ice coffee with hazelnut and skim! Internet! Little
tables and comfy chairs! AIR CONDITIONING!

Dude, you don't know how pleasant it is to slide into a Starbucks when
you've been off America's shore for a while. Finally, something
recognizable.

I had 240 emails to read. I could get Weatherfaxes again (a service of
our benevolent federal government that makes a sailor's life much
easier by distributing weather information).

I drank so much iced coffee I was about to have a heart attack from
the caffeine.

Man, was it good!

After plugging in again, we packed up Mr. Computer, Mr. iPhone, Mr.
Camera and Mr. Backup Hard Drive and schlepped back to the boat
refreshed, renewed and ready for the simple life again. Until the next
time!

Goombay punch

Hi kids!

We went food shopping in Nassau when we got into the harbor to get
some fresh vegetables and fruit. Of course, we don't buy soda. It's
way too much sugar for us. Did you know there are sixteen teaspoons of
sugar in a can of soda? That's nuts! If I saw you putting sixteen
teaspoons of sugar in a glass of water and drinking it, I'd go,"Dude!
What?"

But anyway, we were shopping and this sixpack of soda caught Angel
Jen's eye. Who could turn down Bahamas Goombay Punch?

Me.

"Put that right back!" I said. "You can drink tea or water!"

So we didn't get Bahamas Goombay Punch after all. But isn't it a happy
little can of soda?

Moving to the Berry Islands

Hi kids!

Here's a picture of Angel Jen raising the old anchor ball in Great Harbor off Big Stirrup Island in the Berry Islands.

As you students of the International Regulations for the Prevention of Collisions at Sea, 1972, (COLREGS), are certainly aware, Rule 30 requires vessels at anchor to display a black ball aloft. Soon as we dropped anchor Angel Jen sprang into action hoisting said symbol.

True to her Camptown roots, old angel Jen had made the ball symbol by appropriating a handy round object, our radar reflector, sewing up a black cover from a tee shirt she got in the Salvation Army for ten cents or something and, voilá, cá, tres Bon, suffis*

(French-  it means "you see, there, very good, good enough")

The thing flapping around in front of her face is a flag of the Bahamas. It's considered polite to hoist the flag of the country you are visiting. It's called a 'courtesy flag'. Well!  It'll take more than a dumb flag to make a pirate courteous!  And there's never any worry with Angel Jen. Courteous is her middle name. 

We made it into this harbor after 24 hours of sailing. It wasn't that far but we wanted to arrive at noon so we could see the bottom and avoid rocks, sand bars and other Bahamian bottom biters. So we loafed along most of the night just taking it easy.

The winds were light and agreeable. The full moon on the water was beautiful. The dirty rotten killer cruise ships and freighters didn't come too close. I listened to a beaucoup of podcasts about healthcare, financial reform, poetry, chimpanzees and history.

Angel and I took turns at the helm. First her for four hours, then me. It's hard to get your rest doing that but we managed.  That's the way sailors normally do it when they have to travel for overnight or for days on end. It's called 'taking a watch'. It has nothing to do with swiping timepieces. It means 'taking a turn watching out for the boat'.

All in all, a very good evening was had.

We napped on arrival. Then ate, watched the sun set, then slept.

Tomorrow we move again.

Life is going well.

John

New pinnacle of island cuisine!

Hi kids!

So after our long, dangerous over night trip to conquer new islands,
old Angel Jen was ready for dinner. We whipped up some pork chops,
macaroni salad and, best of all, cottage cheese and, super best of
all, the king of vegetables, bok choy. For you young hill people, bok
choy may be an unknown treat. It's a tall, leafy green vegetable that
grows in a clump of stalks like celery. But it's sweet and green and
white with none of the stringy things inside that celery has. It is a
member of the Chinese cabbage family of vegetables. Celery is a member
of the cardboard family.

After slowly savoring her bok choy with its vinegar and brown sugar
dressing, Angel Jen's ever active mind cast about for a dessert to top
off the meal.

I poured my dessert into its usual glass, added tonic water, ice and
lime and watched the wheels of her mind spin. I knew something great
was going to come.

Sure enough. Angel Jen invented a new dessert! She sent me to our
starboard fore locker where she knew the ingredients lay. "Chips
Ahoy!" she cried. "Marshmallows!"

Taking two chocolate chip cookies and a marshmallow, she made a
dessert sandwich that adds the nutrition of cookie dough to the
delight of her previous invention, the smasher (marshmallow smashed
into chocolate chips). Angel Jen is one amazing dessert chef!

The only thing is that the intense cookie rush wiped out her head and
she can't think of a name for it. She needs you guys to come up with a
name for it, so get to work! Put your little fuzzy heads together and
come up with a name for the new dessert delight.

Angel Jen says she's going to try grilling a half a marshmallow onto a
chips ahoy, too. Man, her mind never stops!

So keep your little minds a working, too, kids. It might be your one
ticket into the second grade.