Day 278
April 14,
2016
NM Today: 26
NM Total:
4206
We left Warderick Wells Exumas Land and Sea Park at 8:30 on
our way to Blackpoint. After three and a half hours drive we arrived at
Blackpoint at just after noon.
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| Blackpoint Anchorage |
We had a list of items to take care of here. Garbage
appeared first on the list. Collect drinking water came next and then food. In
addition I had laundry listed with a question mark. As opposed to $27 at some
places in the Bahamas for a single load of wash, here I could do my laundry for
$7.00 ($3.50 for a wash and same for a dry). We read mixed reviews on the best
place to dock to go into town. Some reviews on Active Captain said go to the
town dock (government dock) and others recommended the laundromat dock. I could
tell that Clark thought we should do our laundry if we used the laundromat dock
which seemed only reasonable to do so.
We opted for the government dock. I did not realize that the
dinghy dock was “hiding” behind the huge ship that was at the main dock
unloading supplies until Clark kept going past the main dock.
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| Supply Boat at Blackpoint Government Dock |
With no marina in town the anchorage here is quite full and
the dinghy dock very busy. Because of the items on our list we made several
trips throughout the course of the day (four trips actually). On our first trip
over, we took the garbage and one of our 5-gallon blue water containers to get
fresh water. I decided we needed to bring the trolley I had for carrying heavy
items. Water is free here but only available to hand-carry. Garbage is almost
free with a suggested donation that goes to the school of $1 to $2 per bag. We
saw places that wanted as much as $25 per bag of garbage (small bag of
garbage).
To avoid the added time of locking up our dinghy I decided
to sit in the dinghy and wait for Clark to come back with the water. He took
the garbage, water bucket, and trolley and disappeared down the road. A while
later he came back dragging the trolley behind him sans garbage, so it appeared
he was successful on his first venture into town.
Five gallons of water is surprisingly heavy so it was no
easy feat to get the water jug into the dinghy for the trip back to Sea Moss, but we managed. We had decided
to get water, drop of the jug, and then go back into town to find lunch and
groceries. Pretty quickly after getting back to Sea Moss, we were on our way back again. For lunch Clark said I had
two choices – pizza or Lorraine’s. I said, “No pizza!” He then called
Lorraine’s to be sure they still served lunch at 1:30 in the afternoon. With a
positive answer we were on our way.
Given the time approached 2:00 and my stomach had started
complaining before noon, I insisted that lunch be our next highest priority. We
walked through town until we found Lorraine’s. I expected the place to be
almost empty at 2:00 for lunch. It was packed! Two people were just leaving and
told us we could have their table. They also said that the horde of people
there had only just arrived. “Oh no!” I thought. “We’ll never get served.”
As it turned out the horde was with “4 Seas Adventure Tours”
and had come under special arrangement for a buffet-style lunch. At least they
did not all have to be waited on and served before we could order our food. A
woman I believed to be Lorraine herself asked all the “4 Seas” guests to
identify themselves. She asked us if we were “4 seas”, we said no, and she said
I have to do “4 Seas” first and then I’ll get back to you.
Smelling the buffet and watching others fill their plates
did nothing to alleviate my feeling of starvation. I wondered why no one came
to wait on us. Lorraine had told me she was sending someone over to help us
right away at least 10 minutes earlier. Finally, with Clark’s nose in his phone
using free WiFi, I got up disgusted to go find someone and ask if I could at
least please have a menu. A waiter took pity on me and brought me a menu and
two bottles of water (one for Clark). Now at least I could see what options I
might have for lunch if anyone ever decided to come back to take my order.
The water helped to “take the edge off” my hunger.
Eventually Lorraine came to our table and saw me with the menu. She asked if we
wanted to order from the menu or eat from the buffet. Clark and I ran to look
at the buffet. Lorraine explained that the buffet was specially made for the
tour group, but since they had all been served and food remained, she could
sell us lunch from the buffet for the bargain price of $15 each.
Since the food smelled and looked wonderful, and we did not
have to wait while it was prepared, we quickly decided that we wanted the
buffet. The food did not disappoint. We had Bahamian rice, seasoned chicken
wings, fried snapper, macaroni and cheese, meatballs, and coleslaw. It all
tasted delicious – seasoned by not too spicy! I shoveled the food into my mouth
like I was afraid someone would take my plate away from me. In fact the same
waiter that brought us water came by while I was eating and asked if I was
done. I waved him off in a hurry. “Oh”, he said, “You like it!” I nodded my
head rapidly in the affirmative as I continued to shovel in the food.
Lorraine even offered that we could make a second trip for
more if we wanted, but I was stuffed and satisfied. She told us to go up to the
cashier and tell her “You are the boat from the harbor.” She said she would
tell them that meant to charge us the $15 each.
When we left Lorraine’s we headed down the road looking for
grocery stores. We found two – Adderly’s and The Straw and Food Mart. I had
seen a woman weaving baskets, so I assumed that was the straw part. We stopped
their first. The store was very small and the selection naturally limited.
Clark asked if I wanted anything and I suggested we try Adderly’s first.
At Adderly’s we found bread, canned goods, and some fresh
produce. They had an almost completely empty meat freezer. I had seen meat at
the Straw Mart, so we went back there for another look. I did buy chicken and
ground beef there to complete my list of food essentials. We took our groceries
back to Sea Moss, dropped them off,
and then went back into town once again.
For our third trip into town, we wanted to get more water.
We emptied the two five-gallon containers of fresh water into the boat’s water
tank and brought both of them and the trolley with us. Once again we docked at
the dinghy dock shoving other dinghies out of the way so we could find a place
to tie up. I sat in the dinghy to mind the boat while Clark went with first one
and then the other container to get the water. Then it was straight back to Sea Moss to drop off the containers.
With all the trips back and forth, I got a good look at the
anchorage. We even saw another Great Loop boat – Coeur Lion from Montreal. As
we moved through the anchorage, I found the views fascinating. Many sailboats
filled the anchorage, but I found two in particular to be of interest. The
sailboat nearest to us and the one just beyond that each had two men on board
and not one of the four men wore a stitch of clothing. They paraded around the
decks of their sailing vessels without a care in the world for all to see all.
While at the docks, we saw a fisherman cutting up his catch
for the day. We also saw sharks and sting rays circling by the dock. “So”, I
thought, “in Florida we had pelicans waiting for the fish guts, but here we
have sharks instead!” Playing in the water at the docks is a favorite pastime
of the local children. When one was in the water and the sharks and rays
appeared, the rest screamed and pointed until all she scrambled out of the
water.
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| Shark near Fish Cleaning Table at Docks |
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| Sting Ray Keeping Pace with Sharks |
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| Town Directory Signpost |
When we came off the town dock on my first foray into town,
the restaurant and the other groceries we visited were to the right. Darlene’s
was to the left of the docks. We turned left and walked to King’s Highway where
we thought we would find Darlene’s store. We walked quite a way down King’s
Highway through an all residential area. I wondered if someone operated a food
store out of their home.
We passed some nice houses (two nice houses) compared to the
normal style of home. Then the road continued but the houses did not.
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| Nice Yellow House in Blackpoint |
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Road after Nice Yellow House in Blackpoint |
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| Looking back towards town from Nice Yellow House |
We had given up on finding the convenience store. When we
got back to the main street in town, we turned right just to see what was up
there. We found a church and then nothing. Heading back to the dock, Clark
looked back to see if I was following and what did he see? Darlene’s
Convenience Store! Right there on the main drag. Since it was after 5:00 we
worried the store might be closed, but the sign said it was open until 10:00.
What a surprise!
We walked up to go into the store and the owner was sitting
outside. As we approached, she said, “Have a nice walk?” Clark said, “Yes, we
were looking for your store.” I wondered if she had guessed that. The door to
the store was closed but she told us to open it and go on in. She did not have
much that I needed but I did see canned tuna fish, so I bought four cans of
that for sandwiches on board.
Having been on the boat at anchor for more days than I could
remember I needed my time walking around town. However, even at 6:00 at night,
the sun was unbelievably hot. The long walk out King’s Highway was a hot one.
Clark said he wished he could get ice cream. Darlene’s store had Butter Pecan
and that was it. I knew that the Straw Mart had ice cream, so we walked back
there and found Vanilla. I told Clark we had to hustle back to the boat now
because if we didn’t hurry back, we would have pudding instead of ice
cream.
We never did get to the laundry part of the to-do list.
Having spent a large portion of my time in my swimsuit, I felt I had better
things to do with my time than laundry. At the end of the day, since we had
such a big, heavy lunch, I used many of my newly acquired food items to put
together a fresh green salad with tuna salad and deviled eggs on the side. That
fresh salad on a hot day certainly hit the spot.
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