www.leeciaprice.blogspot.com

When we get a sailboat again I’ll start a sailing blog linked to the site above.  I may even convert this content & delete this blog very soon.

 Since they normally feed on flowers, not refined sugar, they have these long, narrow tongues they feed with at a speed our eyes can hardly catch, and for whatever colorful reason their mouths and “lips” are bright red.

 They met us at the beach as soon as we landed our dinghy, and escorted us onto the porch of the park headquarters where they clearly pointed out the container of sugar that we were to open and feed them from…

 Since there are not enough birds and fish around to keep us occupied all the time, we have become avid beachcombers:  finding beach glass, shells, sea beans, ceramics, and, well, trash.  I found an aluminum buoy and Les this large, plastic (hideous) Chinese buoy. 

He has it prominently placed in one of our fishing rod holders…despite my protests.  As you probably know, these buoys are used on large, industrial fishing nets and wash ashore occasionally.  The glass ones are the real treasures, not so commonly found.

 Until yesterday we were in the Exumas Land & Sea Park which is the one area in the Bahamas where you can easily stub your toes on huge conch shells with the animal still in residence.  No fishing, conching, lobstering, even no shelling inside the park (some folks can’t tell shelling from harvesting mollusks until a day or so later…then, “what the hell is that smell coming from!?”).  Snorkeling there is the most excellent ever until today which rivels it.  But there we saw a school of eagle (or bull-nose) rays swimming along “just like on a TV documentary”, they were about 8 feet from wing-tip to wing-tip, swimming oh so slowly, very surreal, very unforgetable.  Sorry we have no underwater camera. 

That’s all for today.  We are using the wifi at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club bbar and I don’t have my pics uploaded from the last week, that’s next.  Almost sunset, must go post watch for a green flash.  We are updating the islands on the where we are map (on the right margin) today…

 We spend a lot of our free time wandering different beaches.  There are so many miles of them you can’t walk them all.   On the left above is a wide sand flat beach that is crystal clear and covers a huge expanse; on the right is a muddy sand, suck-your-sandal-off, beach.  Granted the vista is lovely at both but one will take up hours and hours of exploration time and one but minutes.   There was little more than tubeworms at the clear beach but at the slightly stinky mud beach we found many (immature and untakable) conch, crabs gallore, plus lots of tiny guys that attracted the many shorebirds feeding there at low tide.  And I picked up lots of broken pottery pieces that have been spread here by shipwrecks and hurricanes, even a very old marble.  They have a small, interesting museum here (Spanish Wells) that clued us in.

We will be moving along soon, so much water and sand to cover.

(be sure to click on the thumbnails if you would like to see Les better…)

I’m alone among the furry family in liking this boat life.  When milk or tuna cans are opened, and when that prissy Puff gets canned food, I ALWAYS get some.  I mean I’m right there yelling for it!  And every morning I go dashing outside to lick the dew off the deck, it has that refreshing rainwater taste I love, and a bit salty but I like that too.  And getting enough exercise? Well I just run around the deck and inside like a bunny, like I always have. 

Happy ’08 to anyone who happens to visit!

 We are happily as possible sitting in Spanish Wells, Eleuthera waiting on weather to move on.  We had a short stay in Little Harbor, Great Abaco (pictured above) and made our roughest yet crossing (to here) last week.  Our steering went out (cable bolt broke), yes a bit stressful, but we made it into an open anchorage with our autopilot working but not our hand steering, where Les was able to get a part and fix it the next day.

Figure this one out: Spanish Wells is the lobster fishing capital of the Bahamas but it cost $22/lb here and it is not on any menu…

To see lots of pic of the Abacos look at the site www.abacoescape.com someone put together primarily for cruisers.  More pics than I could ever post although I will start posting to flickr again very soon.  The abacos are sort of unusual bahamian islands for 2 reasons at least:  mostly all white folks & more trees and elevation.  The beach on Elbow Cay has this lovely dune all along (pic above).  If you go to the site check out the link to the Hopetown slide show, where we took a mooring for a month.  Yesterday we motored a couple of hours over to Marsh Harbor which is the big city of the area to provision.  Today we shop a bit again and then move to a prettier, quieter anchorage, it is a bit industrial here.  In Hopetown, the cute, quiet town turned overnight (boxing day) into a busy tourist mecca.  It is packed with people mostly from the states. No quietness to be found there for several months, long after we are gone.

 The temperature is great, mostly 78-80 during the day, mid 70s at night but it is still unbelievably humid?  I thought if it were cooler then it would be dry too but our sheets are so sticky that I have to take some time to adjust to them each nite.  Sure washing helps but not as much as you would hope…It is just a matter of adjusting.  It will get much cooler here as winter progresses but warmer as we move south. 

We will move in about a week towards Eleuthera, staying briefly, and then on to the Exumas which is the island group that cruisers generally love most but they are not yet loved to death:  fairly remote, good fishing & snorkeling, fewer motorboats, good anchorages with pretty little white beaches. 

Beth aboard “Grateful Attitudes”  gave me sourdough starter and I have just made my 1st ever batch of punch-knead-rise heavy labor bread…It will be handy to know/have in the out islands. And yes, it even tastes good!

I like to watch the cats and I want to chase them but they won’t let me off the leash, ever!

I would not run away for very long.  I like chasing cows the best and squirrels next best but cats and roosters would be great at this point since I don’t see  my 2 favorites anywhere.

 They take me to shore 2 times a day and I love to ride in the little dinghy boat.  I have given up and see that I have to poo-poo dance on a leash though it gets in the way when I turn and turn and they watch me.  I don’t like that.  I still don’t like to use the green carpet on the boat. 

I ate some fish and some conch the other day.  I love seafood!! 

Please help me I’m trapped in a picture postcard life!  They feed me well but I do miss the yard.