Monday, February 21, 2011

Hanging out at Emerald Bay

Friday 11 February – Monday 21February

Our mail never arrived on Friday, in spite of Fed-X telling us it would. Saturday, Tanya from the marina was finally able to reach Troy the delivery guy by phone to find out he was still in Nassau and would be on the evening flight back to Exuma. So we will be staying here waiting for the mail. A front with some strong winds is predicted over the next few days so we switched out our dock lines to the stronger nylon ones. Steve worked on an air leak in the fuel line to the generator, thought he found the problem by splicing a new piece of hose in, but it continues to get air in from somewhere?? By 5 pm the winds have picked up to 25+ knots. Sunday is a cloudy, windy day so we decide to walk down the road to a restaurant we were told was just maybe 2 miles away. We found Big D's after 4 miles and being Sunday of course they were closed. It was a good day for a long walk and we caught a ride ½ way back to the marina stopping at the Pallappa restaurant at Grand Isle for a late lunch. Monday we had decided to rent a car and tour the Island. Heading to George Town first. Driving a car with the steering wheel on the right, and on the left side of the road is a strange feeling. It does not take long to see the sights of George Town, the capital of the Exuma's but still a very small community. We stop at the grocery store to see if they have anything different. We do manage to pick up a few things (we have a car) but glad we have the convenience of the grocery store at Emerald Bay with their decent selection. Watching the cruisers take off or put on their weathers at the dinghy dock for the trip across the harbour to the anchorage makes us glad we can provision at Emerald Bay instead of George Town. Stop at a marine store to get a replacement block for the one on the traveler that had broken. Too early for lunch so continue south to Little Exuma and Williams Town stopping at a couple of heritage sites along the way. Back to George Town for lunch at the Club Peace & Plenty. Back north stopping at the boat to drop things off then figure we might as well see the north end of the Island. We drive up to Barraterre and Rolleville, seeing almost every settlement on Great Exuma all in a day. Back to the marina by 6 and YEAH our mail has just arrived. Better late then never which could have been the case as the driver told the marina staff he no longer works for Fed-X and was just being nice by delivering our mail. We missed a good weather window last Friday so even though we now have our mail we will be staying here a few more days until winds & waves are better for heading out. Plenty of walking paths along the beach & golf course, and with free laundry and the big showers not a bad place to be “stuck”. Enjoying the use of the cruisers lounge for “game night”, to watch cable TV, doing a few more boat projects, having happy hours with other boaters, meeting up with old friends and meeting new ones as we are waiting on the weather. It has been a very pleasant & fun stay here at Emerald Bay but 2 weeks at a marina is 1 week too many. We have a good weather window on Tuesday & Wednesday February 22nd, 23rd so we will be taking advantage to make up some miles. We will bypass some Islands in the Bahamas we were going to try to stop at and do a 40 hour passage down to the Turks & Caicos Islands.

link to pictures;  https://picasaweb.google.com/103931849054358791487/EmeraldBay2?feat=directlink

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