Stay in Nassau, Bahamas

Tuesday, December 28

Yesterday morning after listening to Chris Parker, Phil and I took the bus to the City Market to get groceries.  We also took the bus back and think that is the way to go.  Then we woke Katie and had lunch and went back to the shopping center to get on internet.  We also bought another $20 phone card for the cell phone.  We visited the local liquor store and I'm trying a box of Chablis after my wine runs out (have about 6 left).  Phil also got 2 bottles of wine and a bottle of rum.  After that, we went to Starbucks and got on the internet using Lorraine's laptop.  You buy something and then you get and code to use the internet for 1 hour.  We were there for about 2.5 hours so Phil was able to pay his bills, Katie downloaded some pdf books for her Nook and I was able to check email and update the blog.  Afterward, we decided to walk to the dive shop by Nassan Yacht Have and Phil bought me a short wet suit for Christmas.  It's a ladies vs man style and fitw well.  Everyone assures me that have the short type for here will work just fine.  We also bought a cedar plug fishing lure to see if we can have better luck catching a fish.  Phil picked up a couple zincs for the prop shaft and then we started walking to Potter Cay.  Along the way, as gentleman had a table and conch that he was selling.  This is something I've wanted to eat since I've been here.  It was interesting as he encouraged us to have it raw and Katie and Phil were brave enough to try it.  Katie didn't like it at all and quickly swallowed it.  We bought 4 conch for $12 and  a Bahamian woman gave me directions on how to make cracked conch and conch fritter, which I dutifully wrote down in my little black book.  Then we continued walking to Potter's Cay which is a solid road/dock to the Potter's Cay Dock.  Along this there are many small shacks that are restaurants selling conch specialties and other food.  There were also some produce dealers that were packing up as it was close to 5pm.  Phil bought us a order of conch fritters for us to spit.  They were good, but spicy (burned the mouth a little).  Concy is very mild and I can't taste in it the fritter.  Then we walked home. 

After home, I started making "cracked conch" which is cutting it into bite-sized pieces, dipping into beaten eggs and coating with flour.  Then you cook it in hot oil.  I cooked 3 of the conch this way and it tasted good.  I had made sure to tenderize it even more than the gentleman did at his stand and good thing.  I fixed potatoes and butternut squash to go along with it.  I was going to fix plaintains for dessert, but we were too full.  Phil washed the dishes and we read.  Katie did some of her packing for leaving tomorrow morning.

Later in the evening, I tried to call the taxi driver that Jeff  from S/V Boundless had recommended, but go only a message that indicated this number wasn't working or something like that.   I was reading this book in the Nook that expired in 15 hours, so I stayed up the latest (till 1am) finishing the book as this was the 2nd time I had taken it out.

Wednesday, December 29

Katie left for the airport at 10am and I was feeling emotional after she left.  Communication is so much harder here outside of the US.  We got on a bus to the Marathon Mall outside of town to look for digital cameras.  It's a smaller mall than what we are use to at home, but the stores are accessed inside like the older malls in the states.  We stopped by a small electronic store and I found a semi-prof digital camera that I thought about buying, but wanted to check out the John Bull store that we had passed on the way in.  At the John Bull store, I found a Pentax digital waterproof camera which was way smaller and had everything I wanted except the viewfinder, so I bought it.  It had been reviewed in Cruising World so hope that it works out for me.  I want to have an extra rechargable battery, but won't be able to get it until we're in Georgetown as they are out of the and won't get replacements until Jan to February.   Please check out the web site - It's a Pentax OptioW90  if you want to see what I bought.  I was looking to replace my current camera with something that I didn't have to worry with about with water and which didn't eat batteries.  Hopefully I made a good choice.

Phil and I are going to be staying here in Nassau leaving Monday or Tuesday to start meandering down to Georgetown in the Exumas with our first stop to be Normans Cay.  Junkanoo will be on New Years Day so we plan to attend since we couldn't attend the one after Christmas.  While we had hamburgers at Bennetons, a local couple told us to go early before sunset but not when it starts at midnight.  Don't take any money and take any purses and don't wear jewlery.  We appreciate the tips and plan to try to arrive about 4am.  After we're done at this internet cafe, we will go back and fill out our water jugs and go back to the boat.  Tomorrow we want to visit the water tower and do other sight seeing activities.

Lorraine