We spent our days touring in our golf cart or at the ocean beach and the evenings listening to live music at the Queen Conch Inn. Life is good!
First class boating facilities are located in the center of island activity. My “boat’s-eye view” of Hatchet Bay as my Catalina 30, Rhombus, “aims” for the entrance during my 2012 voyage.
contemplation, hoping that the entrance was indeed the entrance and not just a shallow break in a large pile of rocks. Navigating a rental car this time with Dave and Phil, it looked pretty easy. After visiting adjacent Alice Town, we continued south to Governors Harbour, for me another special cruising place. Following lunch, we headed back north for our last night on Harbour Island. We couldn’t have enjoyed Harbor Island more, but it was time to move on. The town of Spanish Wells occupies all of the two-mile-long St. Georges Cay and is just off the northwestern corner of the main island, opposite Harbor Island on the northeastern corner. We had a choice of watercraft to get there, two water taxis separated by a cab ride, or the Bo Hengy II. We liked the looks of Bo and she offered the added treat of passing through the famed “Devil’s Backbone,” the shallow and jagged-edged reef that snakes its way around the northern end of Eleuthera between Harbor Island and Spanish Wells. Known as a snorkeler’s paradise, the Backbone has plenty of water, as long as you can find it! Guides are recommended for private boats that transit the waterway, and I hired one for the short piece that I traveled through in 2012. Marine Pilot A1 (yes that’s A1) was my guide then. He’s still at it and we had a nice chat. Charming Spanish Wells is what an active fishing village should look like. The fleet that calls Spanish Wells home fishes a wide swath of the Atlantic looking for their prime catch, Bahamian lobster, also called crayfish. Both the Bahamians and their main U.S. customer—a U.S. restaurant chain—use the former name for the fish, as “red crayfish” doesn’t seem to have an appealing ring to it! After an exhilarating ride through the Devil’s Backbone, we arrived at this picturesque town and were dropped right in front of 38
February 2018
SOUTHWINDS
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