The Crossing and Bimini (17 - 19 Jan)

NOTE: We are havoing some technical problems uploading pictures, so again, we shall go pictureless. I will go to my technical guru, Tim, for assistance. Hopefully, next time we can post picgtures again.

Here we are, thoroughly ensconced in Brown’s Marina in Alice Town, North Bimini. Although it looked like there were some nicer resort marinas in South Bimini, we came to the northern island because it looked like the Customs and Immigration Offices were just a little closer and easier to clear. I may have been wrong about that, though. Oh, don’t get me wrong, they aren’t difficult, but when the Office is about a mile down the street, it is raining and you are wearing what is called a “walking boot,”(which is definitely not designed for walking), it can be a bit of a challenge. Anyway, here we are at Brown’s Marina enjoying what I hope will be the first sunny day since we have been here.

Brown’s Marina, so why are we staying here? Well, I could tell you that it is because I like the name, but that would be only partially true. I could tell you it is because it is only $1 per foot – and that would partially be true. The other reason is because this is the marina where Pilar was docked. Pilar? Who the heck is Pilar? I know you are asking that because I would be asking the same thing were I you. And if you do know, don’t tell your neighbor as I want him to read this whole blog entry before he finds out.

The Crossing

On Thursday 17 January at 0810 we set off from Fort Lauderdale for Alice Town in Bimini, the Bahamas. Crossing the 60+ miles of ocean wasn’t too bad; it wasn’t as smooth as last year, but it wasn’t bad. The forecasters said there would be 2-3 foot waves and they were almost right. I think we had 2-4 feet with a 5 footer popping up once in a while. We have been in a lot worse, however, and we crossed at about 9 knots or 10 statute miles an hour. We saw Bimini on the horizon at about 1400 and closed on the marina about 1500. By 1600 we had cleared Customs so we took down our yellow Quarantine Flag and put up the Bahamas courtesy flag.

On the way across, I was again amazed at the color of the water. I am not sure if the water of the Gulf Stream is a deeper blue than water in other places or whether it only seems like it to me, but the substance that absorbs all the frequencies of light except the one that reflects as deep, deep blue is, to me, stunning. Moreover, the water column, at various points, is about ½ mile deep. When you have only a 2” fiberglass hull separating you from that water column, it can be an eensy weensy bit scary. When these two sensations are combined, it is truly awe inspiring. Enough of this poetry stuff, on to other things.

When we arrived, Tom, the owner and captain of a 65’Selene named Excalibur helped us tie up. Tom bought the boat in Seattle, took it up to Alaska, down through the Panama Canal and into parts of Central America before turning around and heading up to the Bahamas.  He is staying in Bimini through Sunday because his wife, apparently, is a die-hard Patriots fan and wants to see the football game. We only met them for a few minutes, but since they, too, are going to the Exumas, maybe we’ll see more of them. I really want to see inside that boat!

Bimini
 

The largest islands are North Bimini and South Bimini. North Bimini is about seven miles long and 700 feet wide. Its main settlement is Alice Town, a collection of shops, restaurants, and bars surrounding a single road known as "The King's Highway". Although there are some big shops, many are the size of a large close closet and the grocery stores are the size of your living room. As to the bars, well, I can tell you authoritatively that there are more liquor stores in Alice Town then there are grocery stores. We have only eaten at one restaurant so far where we had Ann’s favorite meal, cracked conch and batter-fried onion rings finished off with Kalik beer. Now I know some of you are thinking that meal didn’t sound too healthy, but you would be wrong. We know because the MENU actually had one of those little heart thingies next to the cracked conch – indicating that it was heart-healthy. And EVERYBODY knows that the menu has to be right. Somehow, I guess, the cracked part overcomes the deep-fat fried part of the meal.

We haven’t been to South Bimini, though we know it houses an airstrip, South Bimini Airport, and offers a quieter alternative to North Bimini. There is a small community of homes on South Bimini known as Port Royale. There are also at least two resort marinas that don’t charge much more than they do here.

In general, Bimini has two claims to fame. The first is big game fishing. In the Bimini museum, the locals almost talk about it as if big game fishing was invented here. Although it most certainly wasn’t it is the dominant industry. Even the bars and restaurants depend on fishing as many anglers go to the island by boat to fish during the day and enjoy the local nightlife after dark. The second and related claim to fame is the presence of Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway lived on Bimini from 1935 to 1937, staying at the Compleat Angler Hotel. He worked on To Have and Have Not and wrote a few articles while he lived here, but mostly he fished trolling the deep blue offshore waters for marlin, tuna and swordfish. Even after he moved away he returned to Bimini again and again. On one of his trips he heard of a man catching an Atlantic blue marlin weighing in at 500 pounds caught just offshore. That story allegedly inspired him to write The Old Man and the Sea. Major parts of Islands in the Stream, a novel organized by his wife after he died, took place in Bimini. In fact, there is a scene in one of the first chapters about Brown’s Marina (Brown’s Dock in those days). The scene starts with:

“Just then, from one of the boats tied up at BROWN’S dock, a rocket rose with a whoosh high into the sky and burst with a pop to light up the channel.”

Hemingway notwithstanding, our overall impression of Bimini is that it is kind of run down. The current recession hasn’t helped as the marina occupancy rate is somewhere around 25% and the cottages don’t seem to be doing much better. However, our sense is that Bimini has been on the way down for quite some time, probably since its heyday during prohibition and later in the fifties and sixties. Many of the houses and cottages we have seen are in drastic need of a couple of coats of paint AND some serious maintenance. There are, for example, window air conditioners complete rusted out, bare pipes showing through walls, and chunks of masonry laying on the ground. Even more disconcerting is the trash that seems to be laying all around. Beer bottles, soda cans and Styrofoam are all over the place. Did it look like this when Hemingway was here? I don’t know but I kind of doubt it. Anyway, there are other historical tidbits we have discovered (thanks to Wikipedia and the Bimini Museum):

·         Singer Jimmy Buffett supposedly spent some time on South Bimini while writing one of his books. (If everything we have heard about his presence is true, he must move around a lot!)

·         While not a resident of the island, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. visited in 1964 and worked on his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech while there.

·         Among Port Royale's notable residents was Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., who was excluded from the U.S. House of Representatives because of allegations that he misappropriated committee funds for personal use. He stayed in Bimini from January 1967 to April 1969 in self-imposed exile until the Supreme Court ruled that the House had acted unconstitutionally when it excluded Powell, a duly elected member. In 1972 Powell died of cancer in Miami. Following his funeral in New York his ashes were brought to Bimini and scattered in the waters surrounding the island.

·         In May 1987, Colorado Senator Gary Hart’s presidential bid was derailed after media reports exposed an affair with model Donna Rice. Photos taken of the Senator on an overnight trip to Bimini on the yacht Monkey Business fed the media frenzy. An intimate photo of Rice sitting on Hart's lap on one of Bimini's docks was the nail in the coffin for Hart’s presidential run.

·         The final scene of Silence of the Lambs was filmed in Bimini. I think it is the scene where Hannibal has escaped and is calling the FBI agent.

Ann`s Notes:  We made it!!! I have to admit that when we were sitting in the doctor’s office the thought crossed my mind that we would be spending the winter somewhere down south in the USA. I am just glad that Michael is a real trooper and I can do the wound care or else we would be doing the above mentioned scenario .

The crossing was a good one, we picked a good time to cross the Gulf Stream, no wind coming from the north.  We had to really follow the markers to get into the marina. The channel really hugs the shore line and it is also pretty narrow in some spots. We were glad to finally be in the Bahamas and we celebrated by having lobster tails and boxed mac and cheese.

The paper work that we had to fill out and turn into Customs and Immigration was three pages long – plus the marina’s paper work. All the paperwork plus 300 dollars cash will get you into this country and you get a bonus fishing license to boot.

Alice Town is much like Fox Town, very friendly people but very poor conditions to live in. They have everything they need, power, electric, sewer, churches, school systems, grocery stores (of sorts) but very little industry or income. Plus the island is dirty in most public places. The trash is just people not caring what the island looks like. Beer bottles, take out containers and such…I just don’t understand why people don’t care enough to throw trash away and pick up after themselves. Needless to say recycling has not come to this island yet.

We are looking forward to having Michael’s mother Barbara and his sister Kathy join us on board. They arrive in Nassau on the 23^rd and will be with us until the 30^th. We will be exploring together and seeing what the other islands have to offer.

Traveling Soul….OUT