We spent Easter in a pretty unconventional way - no Easter egg hunt or chocolate bunnies or ham dinner for us! Instead we steamed from Allan's Cay out on Exuma Sound to Norman's Cay and fished for mahi - better yet Colleen caught one, so we all feasted on fresh mahi last night! Now that's an Easter dinner!!!
We finally met up with Norm and Vicki on Tide Hiker and Rick and Lynnie on Rickshaw (charter members of the Original Marathon Gang of 12) in Allan's Cay the other day. We all met them out at the pass in our dinghies to guide them in - really we were just excited to see them. After they got anchored and settled in, we picked up Tide Hiker in our dinghy (Hobos) and September Song picked up Rickshaw in their dinghy (Half Note) and we took them exploring up around the cays and over to the iguana beach on Leaf Cay. The iguanas were out in force to greet us!!
That evening we all gathered on September Song for a magnificent dinner of lasagna, salad, garlic bread and a chocolate silk pie that was to die for - Doug was overheard asking Lynnie (the pie maker) to marry him and become his third wife (Colleen already being his second on board!) Just kidding!! It was great to catch up with Tide Hiker and Rickshaw - we hadn't seen them since the end of February back in the States! It was very cool to see them in the Bahamas - we all had been talking about getting to the Bahamas for so long!!!
Easter morning after a beautiful sunrise, we all set out for Norman's Cay about 12 miles away. The weather was to die for so we decided to go out on the Exuma Sound (you can either stay on the west side of the islands which is the Bank side where the water is anywhere from 2-20 feet deep with lots of coral heads but where you are pretty protected from winds and waves or go out on the east side of the islands in the Exuma Sound which is thousands of feet deep and a wide open body of water so can get really choppy) - we wanted to go fishing!! Ever since the excitement of fishing our way to Nassau on the Tongue of the Ocean and having fresh mahi and tuna dinners, fishing is in our blood now! So we followed the weed lines (where mahi like to hide and feast) and watched where the birds and flying fish were (another sometimes sign of fish underneath) and got nothing....all was quiet for our foursome and Life's2Short who we caught up with again. Only Lucky Stars had caught a tuna but we figure that really doesn't count since they are "professionals"!
All of a sudden I heard "fish on" from Colleen and Doug and as I slowed the boat to neutral, the fight was on - the adrenaline on the boat escalated and from my vantage point on the flybridge I could see that Colleen had a beautiful mahi on the line. There's really no words that can adequately describe what a mahi looks like coming out of the water - they are this magnificent shade of cerulean blue and turquoise green and beneath the gin clear Bahamian waters they just sparkle. I saw it jump several times and yelled encouragement to Colleen who pulled it in like it was nothing!! Doug waited at the swim platform with the gaff and soon enough that baby was on board and Doug was trying to spill gin (it was the cheapest liquor on board) down its gills to stop it from flapping around (like humans when fish drink, they get happy...) Colleen was grinning form ear to ear (in fact I don't think that smile has come off her face yet!) as she held up her first big fish of the trip!!
Yippee - Gypsies could contribute to dinner tonight - we got skunked last time so Gypsies' honor was restored! Off we went in search of another....but it was not to be. Doug had a bite and we thought we might get another but all the fish wanted was part of the lure - he made off with most of the skirt on the lure (everything but the hook)!! Bummer....but we had dinner for the night!
Unfortunately no one else in our group had any luck so we all headed through Norman's Cut and on into our anchorage off of MacDuff's beach bar avoiding all the coral heads on the way in. Passing through the cut was pretty cool - we had lots of current, a fairly shallow passage with the most beautiful little white sand island complete with a lone palm tree on one side (truly something out of a Corona commercial) and a submerged small plane (formerly of the drug smuggling variety - after all Norman's Cay used to be the hangout for the drug lord Carlos Lehder). Once safely anchored Colleen set to cleaning and filleting her mahi - but only after many pictures were taken to commemorate the moment!
We dropped the dink and headed to the beach where we met up with Tide Hiker and Life's2Short for the afternoon.
Dinner that night was on Gypsies - plenty of fresh mahi to go around!!
Along with some great appetizers (including some tuna sashimi brought over by Todd and Brenda), we had a dinner fit for kings and queens - mahi basted in white wine, butter and lime, wild rice, salad, cole slaw and corn - and what dinner is complete without key lime pie!!! More than anything, the company was the highlight of the evening - we watched yet another amazing sunset as we all toasted to how truly lucky we are to be doing what we are doing and living this life!!
Tomorrow we go exploring on Norman's - maybe we'll even go snorkel the drug plane...or visit the lone palm island!!! But I definitely see a cheeseburger at MacDuff's in our future!!!
Click here to see a Google map of our location at Norman's Cay.
No comments:
Post a Comment