Georgetown, Great Exuma

We are up at 6:00 for an early breakfast to get to town by 7:00 to catch a taxi to the Airport to get a rental car. Unfortunately the Exuma Airport is a 20 minute ride, so that will make this an expensive car rental. We drive to the northern end of Great Exuma to the Barraterre Settlement, the northernmost town. From there we can see our Lee Stocking anchorage where we were, 6 miles to the north. A lot of the day fast boats that take tourists up the Exuma Island chain leave from here. We arrive after they have all left.

We then head south to Coco Plum Beach which has been a recommend stop. The one mile or so road out to the beach is very rough. A jeep would have been more appropriate. We get to the beach and Mark gets out his drone, which he has been itching to play with. At Great Harbour the close proximity of the airport kept the Drone from flying. Gee these things are smart. Anyways no problem here. From here we head south to the Marina at Emerald Bay where we have stayed before. On the way there we stop at Eva’s Place, a “bakery” that was recommended by our taxi cab drive. I’m looking for coffee and pastry. The Bahamians view cake a pastry. Eva has a couple good ones, Linda and I split a large piece of coconut cake and Mark and Karen split a pineapple upside down cake.

We stop by the Emerald Bay Marina and are surprised to see a lot more boats there than our last visit 4 years ago. Still a lot of surge. A very protected marina, but the ocean swells come down channel and constantly move the boats tied to the docks back and forth. No waves, just a back and forth current.

From here we head to the south end of the island and stop at Browns marina and purchase a few items. Then we head to Santanas Grill on the water in Williams Town on the far southeast end of Great Exuma. Have a very nice lunch overlooking the area we sail through one mile off shore on our way to Long Island. On our way back north we stop at Tropic of Cancer Beach. 

 

Mango daiquiris at Santanas Grill

Tropic of Cancer Beach

 Back in Georgetown we head to another market north of town and buy number of items we could not get at the Exuma Market. We make a dinghy run back out to our boats to unload and then return the car to the Airport. We had planned to full the gas tank at the gas station by the Airport, but our Taxi cab driver tells us it will be closed when we get there around 5:00. The line at the gas station in town is very long, so we don’t bother going back and refilling. We pay the penalty for not returning it full.

Eddie's Edgewater

We go to dinner at Eddie’s Edgewater and are pleasantly surprised to have a very good diner. Both couples split a dinner, because they give you so much. Linda and I have curry chicken, not something Linda normally would not pick, but it is very good. We head back to the boat in the dark. Before we left I have turned on the mast light, not particularly helpful when there are a couple 100 other boats. What I do is take two low power flashing bike lights that go on handle bars, turn them on and aim them towards the direction we will be coming from and hope the wind direction does not change since these little lights are very directional. We can see these lights over a mile away, as long as they are not blocked by another boats, which does happen, but not for long as we move towards our boat.

A long day. I fall asleep watching TV.