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. :)

More of Staniel Cay

Today we went to the Staniel Cay Yacht Club to watch a World Cup game (Brazil v. Portugal) with Dan and Amosh, but instead we watched Korea v. ICD because their ESPN2 channel worked while ESPN didn't. We ordered a Kalik ($4) at the bar and watched the first half of the game, then we left to see if we could catch some fish with bait and a line. We found that the current was too strong and the dinghy was pushed in a different direction with the wind so we gave up and headed back to the boat. We were able to get internet miraculously on the boat and we used it to check our emails and get weather information. We ate a light lunch and JR went back out around 3pm with Dan & Amosh to go fishing. When JR came back they had caught a flounder, 3 groupers, 3 squirrel fish, and a parrot fish. They had even hooked a nurse shark but it was too strong and broke the line. It turns out hermit crabs are good bait and of course using the head of a small squirrel fish was good as well. I gathered the fish cleaning materials and hopped into the dinghy to help JR clean the fish on the nearest beach. We filleted the parrot fish for Amosh because Dan didn't want any fish. We were asked to not clean our fish at that beach by the people visiting the house because the two children wanted to go swimming and couldn't with us cleaning the fish there. It was interesting we had seen a sign posted in town regarding the fact that all beaches in the Bahamas are public just yesterday and now these people are telling us we can't be there to clean fish. We told them we wouldn't clean fish there next time because it really isn't worth the trouble of dealing with these kind of people. We are doing our best to live stress free and karma will come back around. So we finished cleaning the fish and headed back to Frodo to clean up ourselves from all the scales and fish smell. We steamed the two squirrel fish but over cooked them due to using too high heat for too long (5 min), but we still enjoyed them. Then we boiled the bones and fish heads for a fumet to make fish bouillabaisse tomorrow with the fish fillets we saved from the grouper and flounder. On a different note, we saw that the weather will still be windy so we won't be leaving for a few days until it settles. This is the life on a boat with weather dictating your travels.

Staniel Cay

Today we went back to Titta Emil's Bread House and picked up some freshly baked Bahamian bread for $5. Then we went to the Blue Grocery store, which is right next to the pink grocery store, to pick up some eggs ($3.90/dozen). Then went walked back to the beach and enjoyed the cold waters during the hot morning. After cooling ourselves off we headed back to the boat and ate some lunch of bread mostly. I worked on my sketching and then we set off for Thunderball around 1:30pm because it was low tide. The moment we got into the water we had tons of fish surrounding us and coming up to us without any hesitation. Later we learned that some people feed the fish and that is why those fish were so friendly and one even brushed up against the inside of my hand. After snorkeling around outside of the entrance to the Thunderball cave we entered with a current against us, but we made it inside and looked around us at this huge cavern inside this rock. It was pretty neat, but the fish surrounding us really made the moment really cool. Schools of fish were just following us around and I suppose now they were just waiting around to get a morsel of food. I was naive in thinking these fish were just curious about us and not afraid. There were Sargent Majors, grouper, parrot fish, snapper, angel fish, and so many others swimming around us and so many types of coral with even a donkey dung sea cucumber hanging out by the sea fans. Later we found out there was so much life around these rocks because they are in a protected area and that means it is a no take zone. We took the dinghy back to talk with Dan and then picked up my camera phone so I could take a pic of Thunderball at low tide since the entrance was exposed, too bad there was now a whole group of people in the cave. Then we snorkeled around the grotto and then took the dinghy past the rapids to check out the ship wrecked on Fowl Cay and when we brought our dinghy to the beach we didn't stay due to the boat getting a little swamped from the strong waves crashing into our dinghy. We turned the boat around and bailed out a little before jumping back in and motoring out of there. We went through the rapids on the counter current side which was much calmer and we could actually see the bottom of the water, which was very deep. Then JR dropped me off at the boat and went with Dan to try and spearfish near the moorings. They turned up empty handed because the grouper were very scared and retreated into their holes when you were within 10 feet of them. I worked on my sketches while he was gone and began cooking up some fried rice when JR returned without any fish. We ate an early dinner and I did the dishes and cleaned up while JR napped. We planned out the rest of our trip and determined we wouldn't make it to Georgetown with the weather against us and my time constraints due to going back to work. Well, I have about a month left to soak up the sun and make the most of my time out here in the beautiful waters of the Bahamas. I am very lucky to have been able to go on this trip and have the experiences on Frodo.

Sampson Cay

The holding was very good as we didn't move at all, but we had the GPS set just in case the anchor tripped at night to sound an alarm to wake us. We slept well even with the strong winds and we were much more protected than in Warderick Wells because we weren't bouncing around even with the stronger winds here. We are glad we left Warderick Wells to come to this anchorage at Sampson Cay because we are much more comfortable. After having some breakfast we headed into shore to use the internet at the Sampson Cay Marina. We were there all morning and I checked out the store to compare prices of food. The Bahamian bread cost $7, the chicken cost $10.29/lb, steak was $14, shrimp cost $38/bag, and the French wine we got from Nassau for $5 was $9 here. They also didn't have any eggs which we were looking to purchase. I snapped pics of wildlife and scenery while JR was on the computer and then I got on my email long enough to reply to a couple people and quickly updated my blog without attaching any pics due to time. Then we headed back to the dinghy and we saw a nurse shark right on shore in the shallow waters! This is the first time I have seen a shark on my trip and it was really cool. I was able to snap a few quick pics with my camera phone and then we headed out to Frodo. On our way back we saw several nurse sharks swimming at the bottom of the water very close to the marina. Then we pulled up our anchor and headed out of Sampson Cay around 1pm and headed for Staniel Cay. We took the inside passage during low tide and it got a little rough when we approached the opening into the Atlantic where we could see white caps. The wind was blowing 15 knots from the southeast and we motored the entire way not bothering to put out our sails. We got to the anchorage near Club Thunderball around 2pm and saw the Hungarian family anchored here. The current is very strong here and we had to get through some rapids to enter the anchorage. We threw down a second anchor to help pull us out of the strong current and then went inside to eat some much needed lunch. Then we looked at the charts and decided we didn't want to back track to get into a better anchorage so we pulled up both anchors and got closer to shore so we wouldn't be in the strong current area. Then we rested and read for a short while before heading into shore looking for the general store and the dinghy dock. We took the dinghy all the way past the small bridge to Isle's General Store and found that they had their own dinghy dock, which is nice. We looked around and saw there wasn't much as far as groceries so we asked if they had bread and eggs, but they didn't stating the supply ship would be in the following day and to come back. The lady did suggest for us to visit a yellow house for some bread and so we hopped back on the dinghy and headed into town to search for this yellow house. It really is too bad she was not more descriptive because there were several buildings painted yellow around town. So after wandering aimlessly we went into a BATELCO building and asked for directions. They gave us directions and we were off... we walked and walked until we passed the yacht club and saw some new development so we asked the man walking from a house and he informed us that there weren't any shops where we were and we were far from the bread house. So we listened and followed his directions bringing us back to the dinghy parked on the beach, which we made a pit stop to get some water as we were dehydrated by this point in the hot sun. We continued walking down the main street and eventually saw a yellow house, which we didn't think was the right building because it just looked like someone's house. JR kept walking down to the Happy People Marina and I saw that the yellow house we just passed was indeed the place of the bread. So I got his attention and we made our way into the kitchen asking for some freshly baked bread. We were too late in the day and there was no more bread so we would have to return the following morning around 9:30-10am when they are finished baking the bread. We found the Pink Pearl Grocery store up the hill from the bread house so I decided to check it out since we were here. We bought a couple of Kalik's and drank them at the counter while chatting with the old woman working the store. She was quite delightful to talk to and we discussed all sorts of topics. We finished our beers and walked back to the beach to cool off in the nice cold water. As we got in our dinghy we saw a couple nurse sharks swimming near the shore line. Then we decided to stop by Thunderball Grotto to check it out. We set our anchor and tied a stern line to some rocks on shore and gingerly stepped off the dinghy onto the sharp, uneven rocks. I wore my wet Crocs sandals (bad idea) to climb up the sharp, craggy rocks with the assistance of an old rope to see the Thunderball cave from above and snap a few pics. My sandals slid out of place and my big toe got a small laceration from a protruding rock while I was walking around the top of the big rock taking some pictures. JR found the top of the cavern and it was really neat to see how big the cave was inside and to see the blue water below with the light on the other side of the rock shining through the water because it was high tide. Then we hurried carefully off the top because we saw all the stress cracks from the top of the cave around the opening we were looking through, which we never know when it will give out. So now we knew more about Thunderball and we would return the next day at low tide to explore the underwater area. We headed back to Frodo for some dinner and a movie because with all the wind we have been getting our batteries were full from the wind generator. I completed a sketch and read to end my day.

Leaving Warderick Wells

We woke up and listened to the weather to determine if we were able to leave with the wind and waves. We decided with 15-20 knots winds and waves from 2- 4 ft. was alright to leave so we pulled up anchor and headed out of Warderick Wells at 8:40am. We were traveling at 5 knots with only sails when the wind was coming from the east, but then of course the wind shifted to southeast and we were beating against the wind for the rest of the trip and we had to put down our sails because the wind was too strong and we couldn't reef in time with the short period waves hitting us. It was the roughest passage we have had in a really long time, but I didn't get sea sick so that was good. We got tons of sea spray on deck and even our anchors were dipped into the water when it got really rough. We were digging into the water and we were heeled over a lot, to the point where stuff literally flew out of our cubbies even with the cushion covering them. We were only traveling about 1.2 knots at this time and so we turned on our engine and put down the sails. We decided to anchor at Sampson Cay because there was more protection than Staniel Cay. We anchored in front of the beach to the right of the yacht club because there was a sandy bottom with good holding and we would have coverage from the wind with the land. We arrived at 1:30pm and dropped our anchor not too close to the beach because there were people on it. We jumped in the water and snorkeled to check the anchor setting and enjoyed the cool waters for a few minutes before our hunger got us back on the boat and me into the kitchen cooking up a hearty meal of tuna salad, sweet peas, and mashed potatoes. JR signed up online and paid $10 (200MB) for a day (you have 24 hours to use it) of internet service but as soon as he got into his email and was about to respond to one he was kicked off and wasn't able to get back on. This deal is better than Warderick Wells because they charge the same amount but only give you 100MB and they require you to pay for a mooring ball to get the wifi access and because you have to sign up at the park office for a user name and password. We determined we were too far from shore and we would have to get closer to use it. It is strange how we could use it for a few minutes and then just getting kicked off and never able to get back on with either computers. But we will try again tomorrow on shore to check our emails. Then we read and I took a nap until it began to rain. We hurried to grab some bowls and pots to catch water as we haven't gotten rain since Nassau and we haven't refilled our water tanks since Miami. Our water tanks are running low and I am not sure how much longer they will last, but we still have our jerry jugs of water on deck that we haven't touched yet so I am not worried about running out. We only use our freshwater supplies to drink, cooking, and brushing our teeth. We do our best to use salt water for everything else like doing the dishes or washing our hands. We ended up catching about two gallons of water because the rain wasn't very long or very heavy, but it is better than nothing. I cooked dinner of rice, creamed corn and Chinese sausage and ate while watching a movie. We chatted for a little while and then JR went to bed while I began a new sketch and later read myself to sleep.

Another Day at Warderick Wells

Today we stayed on the boat during the morning while it was very hot outside and I read and did some sketches. Then we ate lunch and finished watching the movie from last night. Then we chatted with Dan for a little while and then we headed out to Emerald Rock to do some snorkeling and we got to see some fish that we haven't seen before. :) At the second dinghy mooring we got to see a bunch of fish and it was like an aquarium. Then we headed to the park head quarters to park the dinghy and then we hiked on Boo Boo Hill trail to the top of the hill and it was very hot so we consumed almost all our water by the time we reached the top. We snapped some pics and read a few of the many boat signs left at the top of the hill and then we were on our way back down to Powerful Beach. We were going to hike over to the blow holes, but it was low tide and we wouldn't have been able to see them so we didn't bother. When we returned to the trail we saw that the tide was rising and Banshee Creek was filling up so I had to remove my shoes to get across the trail at that section. Then we snorkeled around the beach and the mooring field, which I got to see several young conchs, a flounder and a few yellow fin tuna under a boat. Then we just stayed cool in the waters by shore for a while and we chatted with Fred before leaving to return to our boat. We made an early dinner of yellow rice with beans, onions, and celery. We watched a movie while eating dinner then I sketched a drawing, cleaned up the boat and strapped everything in the cabin down for departure and before bed we spent some time under the stars on deck.

Warderick Wells Staff

We were invited to have “dinner” with Fred who is the head of the Bahamas Defense here in the Exuma Land & Sea park. It is Father's Day and to celebrate we had a nice big hearty meal consisting of steak, barbecue chicken, ribs, potato salad, peas and rice, salad, and plantains. We ate while Micheal Jackson the movie was playing and everything was so delicious that we pretty much ate in silence. After eating until we couldn't eat anymore we chatted a bit with Fred and he had to leave to go on a fishing trip with one of the park wardens, Justin (?), so he left us with Saunders to keep us company. We got to talking with Saunders and found out he works in the IT department for the Bahamas Defense. He was here for a break from his regular post. Everyone we met here has been so friendly and nice except for the guy, Andrew (I believe) who was the white guy we first met here and also informed us that we couldn't pay to use the internet because we weren't on a mooring ball. We don't understand why this makes sense because they are only losing money by not allowing everyone access to their amenities by requiring certain stipulations, but maybe the guy recognized us and wanted to give us a hard time. The people from Moxie told us they went to the office to use the internet the other day and they were anchored out so I don't know. We didn't talk to them afterward so maybe they couldn't use it either, who knows. Fred was super nice and even gave us a bag of precious ice when we left. We were so full that we were practically waddling out of there. We haven't eaten so much food in a really long time. For me I think it was when I was back in California the last time I stuffed myself with food. We returned back to the boat and took naps and read the rest of the day. We had a light dinner and watched a movie because we had so much power from the wind generator keeping our batteries full. Then we went out on deck and did some star gazing enjoying the wind blowing in our hair. It is so quiet and peaceful here under the stars and with enough wind to keep the bugs away from our boat. :)