Church of stone work

I went for a walk around Jacksonville and came upon this church. The founders must have loved stone work for the outside is covered with some of the best that I’ve seen since the National Cathedral in Washington DC.

The gargoyles were interesting in that they carved them actually tearing the stone apart with their claws as they clung to the top of the walls. I even ran into this stone lion at one of the corners as I walked back to the boat. I was a hot but rewarding walk about town.

Washing the windows

As we were motoring up the Saint Johns River toward Jacksonville Fl we came upon this carnival cruise lines ship.
It wasn’t until we were right next to it that I realized that the small thing on the side of the ship was a window washer, scrubbing windows!
I guess, if they have people on the outside of the tall buildings cleaning windows then they would also have a guy scrubbing the windows on an ocean liner.

Glass blowing

Back in the states we stopped at Stuart, Fl , manatee pockets to be precise and were walking around the town when we came upon a glass blower. It was fascinating to watch him working with molten glass in the 85+ degree heat. He would get a glob out of the furnace and roll it to give it spiral marks.


Then a bit of air and a round globe would form, after some shaping an opening would be made in the top.


One more heating and it’s ready to be “whirled” into the shape of a floppy dish. So simple…. Only 13 years of experience to get to this point.

Caves

The islands of the Bahamas are made of old coral and limestone and are riddled with caves. Some are right on the shore and you can swim into them. Others are a short hike up the trail. Anna and I went into one of these caves when we hiked over to the other side of the island. Other cruisers had picked up shoes and sandals that they found on the beach and every once in a while you would find another flip-flop sitting out marking the trail.
Just before the entrance to the cave someone had left a construction hat for people to wear when they were entering the cave.
The entrance was hidden under trees but was very large.
There were formations throughout the cave.
Someone had left an old metal bucket under a drip point and over the years, the bucket has become covered with stone!
There is a large underground pool in the cave that goes down 60 feet (so we were told), but we didn’t try it to see if it was true.

Toilet

Our daughter, Angie, came down to Georgetown for a 10 day visit. Before she got here I had been having a problem with the toilet so I broke down and rebuilt the thing. Yuck. The day that she arrived the toilet backed up completely and would not work at all. YUCK. I had to bail it out YUCK! and then take the place apart so that I could get to the toilet hose and remove it from the boat. YUCK, YUCK YUCK!!! The inside of the hose had built up solid calcium deposits along its entire length. Now, you might think to yourself,,, “how do you get calcium (rock hard) out of the inside of a hose?” You take the hose and beat it until the calcium breaks up and can fall out of the hose. By the time I had the hose out of the boat and was “whacking” the hose against the side of the boat, it started to rain and then to pour. So, there I was, standing in the rain, whacking my hose. And you think that life on a boat is nothing but sundowners and warm breezes. .. have I got news for you!

Friends

We had to go over to town to PU food every week and while in town we’d meet with friends for dinner or occasionally go over to other people’s boats for pot lucks and beach bonfires. It was a great time and I hope to get back to Georgetown again next year.

Out to dinner in Georgetown.
A "bring anything but meat" pot luck on the Maggie M.
Beack bonfire, singalong.

Coconut challenge

Then came the big day, the “coconut challenge” when they dumped 600 coconuts into the bay and your team (4 people per dinghy) had to paddle a dinghy without using any paddles, out to the coconuts and gather as many as possible. Oh, you are encouraged to bring a bucket along to defend yourself from other from other dinghies. Costumes were required (I think). What fun!

First came the teams!!! The French Team!
The girls showing off their coconuts
Of course, everyone had to where lifesavers, They just didn't say where...
Then they had to empty the bags of coconuts into the bay.
OFF the teams go!!!!!!
It was a mad scramble for the floating nuts!
Lots of coconuts were recovered.

The day went on to several more tests of skill and the winners received a bottle of rum as their prize!

More events

One day was filled with small boat contests: sailing dinghies, sailing inflatable dinghies (you must make your own sail), kayak events and kids model sail boats. The sailing races were won by the (store) bought boats but several people entered their own dinghies with home built sailing rigs.

Then they had inflatable dinghy sailing races using only what you could put together to make a sail out of. There were many different types of rigs from a large square rigger that was built onto a dinghy tone that was propelled by an umbrella. One person tried to fly a kite as a sail. It was lots of fun.

Events at the regatta

They had a dog show one day so Anna put Edie into the show.

Edie only won some dog treats but we sure had a good time.


They also ran the tug-of-war contest. I anchored the winning side every time!

Georgetown

When we got there it turned out that the annual cruisers regatta was starting in one week. This is a two week regatta that not only had boat racing but also had many other events spaced over the course of two weeks. There was everything from tug- of-war to poker tournaments, trivial pursuit tournaments to games for the kids. One of the main activities every day was volley ball and crafting: knitting, painting, jewelry making, etc. Lots of things to do all kicked off by a big party.
Anna went to several seminars about the weather put on by Chris Parker. He comes on every morning on the single side band radio and gives a very professional dissertation of the current weather in the Bahamas. He also gives weather routing info for the boats at sea.
Here Chris looking very professional leading the seminars…
Later that night at the party. (would you trust getting weather from this guy?)

There was free food and three 55-gal barrels of rum punch donated for the party. It was a great kick off to 2 weeks of events.

Winter in the bahamas

It’s been awhile since I’ve put anything onto the blog. A lot of things have occurred over the winter in the Bahamas so, since we now have a working computer and my list of maintenance projects is getting a bit smaller I thought that I’d go back over the pictures that we have taken and try to give you all an update… that is if there is any of you still looking at the blog, so, here goes.
We sailed south from the northern Abacos with our goal being Georgetown stopping here and there to walk the “flats” looking for shells and sea life.
One big fat star fish!
Anna! Don’t drop the Goose!!!!