Holy Nurse Shark Batman!

We set out on a true adventure when Dan & JR decided to try and catch (yes, I said catch) a nurse shark. The nurse sharks are quite common in the Thunderball area and we have seen them scavenge the area when we clean fish on the beach. We found out from both locals and the internet that nurse shark meat is very tasty and so began our adventure. First Dan caught a parrot fish and then we went to a small beach to clean out the fish and JR hooked the fish head with a metal leader line to his fishing pole and tossed it into the water to attract the sharks. The current was taking the fish blood in the wrong direction, but eventually a shark came to check out the beach. Interestingly, it left without ado and then it or another one came back around and found Dan's piece of fish attached to a hand line. As expected the shark ate the piece of fish right off the hook and didn't even break the line. Then after a few passes back and forth the shark came to eat the fish head off JR's rod line. But JR used a bigger hook (#2) with metal wire (90 lb strength) attached to his rod and reel with a fighting belt to help pull in the shark and tire it. The shark fought hard, but we expected a lot more fight from a shark. Eventually JR was able to reel in the shark to the beach and Dan proceeded to kill it with brute force using a fish billy club and a hammer to bludgeon it to death. It was amazing how resilient the shark was and crazy how long it took to kill the shark. We all felt bad for its suffering and pain. We were able to get an up close look at the shark and learn about its anatomy after it died. The colorful mosaic patterned skin of the shark felt much smoother than we thought and much tougher than anyone would expect. It was impossible to skin the shark with the tools we had to be able to save the skin for future use and I was disappointed at the waste. We read online also about the huge liver having a lot of oil good for lamp fuel, but we didn't know how to extract it so that also was given to the seagulls. We cut up the meat and split it between Dan's family and us, but the remaining meat was thrown out to sea to be recycled and eaten by other fish and organisms in the water. While JR & Dan were preparing the shark meat, I was cracking open my first conch after Dan showed me how he does it. It took me a long time to crack open the conch and I had to destroy pretty much the entire shell to get the organism out. I used Dan's hammer and I found out how hard the conch shell was because some of my strikes didn't do much damage to the shell. It was interesting to see a bright yellow-green ink that was emitted by the conch which has stained my hands before. The slime that accompanied the conch was very sticky and I has a difficult time cleaning it off. Eventually, I was able to get at the conch and found him quite tough to pull off the remaining shell. After removing the conch I removed all the parts except for the white muscle to the foot, which is the edible portion of the conch. I tried a small piece of the conch and found the meat to be quite tasty after all the slime removal of course. Then we returned to the boat and we hurried to prepare the shark meat for lunch. We pan fried a filet of shark with salt and pepper finishing it with a little lemon juice. We found the shark meat to be delicious. I was amazed how it wasn't fishy. Then I ate the conch meat thinly sliced with a little lemon juice. Unfortunately, some parts were a little chewy while other parts of the conch were tender. I suspect it was because it was not consumed immediately and I had it sitting in a Tupperware container under the shade of a tree for a while. Then I cleaned up the boat and we grilled some shark steaks for dinner with only pepper and little Teriyaki sauce. It was very good. We watched a movie and later Dan came over to do a movie exchange and chat. When I woke up in the middle of the night I noticed the shark meat was glowing with phosphorescent organisms on the surface of the meat and within the meat. I have seen these organisms floating in the water, but never inside the flesh of another organism. It really freaked me out and the glowing animals probably came from my washing the shark meat with salt water with no filter, but it doesn't explain the glowing from within the flesh. The shark meat was no longer appetizing to me and when we woke up the next morning we found the shark meat was covered with hordes of flies that had gotten in even with our mesh screen up. We threw out the meat and I didn't protest. I noticed some small itchy bumps on my torso, which I am not sure what their origin was from the shark meat or conch. But either way I wasn't going to eat any more shark. I have eaten conch before in conch fritters, but not raw. So whichever is the culprit I may never know, unless I decide to try and crack some conch again. :)
The next day we went to shore to buy some bread ($5), three onions ($4.80), and a small block of cheese ($6). We also found out about the international phone card from BATELCO so I could call back to the US for my interviews. Then we returned to the boat for lunch and afterward I worked on cleaning the beard off the hull. When I was tired from cleaning the hull we went to shore to hike on the trail to Ocean Beach. It was a short hike there and the wind felt great to cool us. We saw white caps and waves probably 2- 4 feet with winds around 15 knots. Then we returned to Frodo for dinner and a long talk about what JR plans to do. We said our goodbyes to Dan and his family because they were planning to leave the next morning to continue south towards Georgetown and eventually to Dominican Republic for hurricane season. It was really nice traveling with them and we learned a lot about spearfishing. We have met a lot of really cool and interesting people during our travels. I look forward to seeing them again some day. :)
When we woke the next morning Dan's boat was gone already and the anchorage seems empty with only our boat on this side. We went to shore and bought a couple of phone cards ($30 worth) from BATELCO because calls to the US cost $0.51 and I needed to make sure I enough for the phone interview. We found out that the marine boat yard in Georgetown cost $0.35 per foot per day and $11/ft for a haul out. We were surprised to learn it didn't matter if we were trying to leave the boat there long term and after doing the math decided it was too expensive. After my hour long interview I got a very good response and not officially offered a job but essentially I was given the position. I have one more interview and I informed them I would give them my response as soon as I could after talking with the other school. It was so hot in the phone booth I was sweating profusely and as soon as I got off the phone I went to sit on the porch of the Staniel Cay yacht club bar & restaurant with JR and got a nice cold Kalik to celebrate. After sitting for a while chatting we were driven away by a dirty flea covered dog that kept following us. We returned to the boat and had some lunch while watching the end of the movie we didn't finish from the day before. We jumped into the cool waters because it was so hot. Then I did some laundry in the cockpit while JR looked for other boat yards to leave our boat for a while and plane tickets to fly back home. After I finished the laundry we snorkeled around for a while to cool ourselves. I am going to miss being able to just jump into the clear cool waters when I got hot. It is like we have a pool right outside our house that completely surrounds us and is beautiful with marine life everywhere. We had our dinner and a movie then spent some time on deck star gazing, which was a particularly great night due to the absence of the moon reducing almost all the light pollution from the sky. Millions of stars could be seen and we saw a few shooting stars before we headed back into the cabin. I read myself to sleep but awoke in the middle of the night pondering my decision about work and which job I wanted. After finishing the phone interview I actually felt excited about returning and doing something different. I really hope things will be different when I go back to work because if not I am doing something wrong. I need to make changes to reduce my work load and stress level so I can enjoy my job more. I really do enjoy working with kids and teaching them. :)