Evaporated & Condensed
Milk and Their Many Uses...Slowly Discovered: March 21 2017
The
winds are coming in tomorrow but today we will scoot around while conditions
are calm. Priority number one – collect
our friend from the airport. We headed
into town for a quick taxi ride to the airport.
But first – a couple of odds and ends.
Like Chris getting a haircut.
Gilbert did a great job at Count Your Blessings Unisex Salon (tough to
fit all that on a biz card).
Leslie
of Taxi number 12 whisked us from Exuma Markets to the airport about 20 miles
north of town where we waited at Kermit’s airport lounge for Tracy’s plane to arrive
(3/3). “Lounge” is a fancy word for this
casual café and bar with picnic tables and domino tables under the shade of a
few trees…but…they have ice cream sandwiches and it is a nice place to wait for
plane arrivals. Planes are easily
spotted because the runway is less than 300 feet away with a mere playground
style chain link fence barrier. Tracy
has landed - welcome!! She left sub-zero
temperatures behind in Boston and will soon have sand between her toes. We love having visitors on Barefeet but the
Bahamas is trickier than you might think to make a connection because it has the
infrastructure of a third world country despite being just 90 miles from the
USA. The turquoise blue water and white
sand beaches beckon but flights and island connections are notoriously unreliable. We have met many Bahamians who have to get to
Nassau from the Exumas for business appointments and they leave one day ahead…honest…and
even spend a night in a hotel in order to better guarantee that the one hour
flight transports them in time for their appointment. Sheesh.
As soon as we arrived in the “Big Smoke” of Georgetown Tracy checked her
calendar and made flight plans within a week.
Way to scramble and get it booked.
After
the taxi back to the dinghy dock, the dinghy ride across Elizabeth Harbor, unloading
at the boat and changing into sunshine gear we headed to Chat N Chill for a welcome
drink. Cheers! Welcome to paradise. We watched sand volleyball, checked out the
shoreline stingrays and marveled at the great weather. Shadows began to lengthen so we headed back
to the boat for a dinner of grilled steaks, baked potatoes and a greek salad.
The
next 72-hours proved the weather forecast correct as it blew like STINK – the
boater’s version of snow days where life comes to a screeching halt. Winds stayed at a solid 25-30 knots with
gusts to 40 knots. Anchoring behind
Stocking Island kept waves in the anchorage manageable since the wind direction
held constant but getting off the boat was not happening. We played Mexican Train Dominoes, read…and
slowly moved happy hour and dinner earlier and earlier in the day. Hey, it’s four – it’s time to pour. I know that according to many people boaters
tend to get really worked up about wind but this was crazy. Friends on s/v Island Girl had guests arriving
from the states only to have their plane waved off in Georgetown because the
plane was coming in sideways (3/4).
What?! They rerouted back to
Nassau and then back to Fort Lauderdale and will attempt again in two days. Yikes!
The winds
continued to blow but we were snug aboard Barefeet relaxing on the top deck
looking for the random meandering turtle or dolphin (3/5). Salt spray was building up crunchy and opaque
on windows and hand rails without much easing in sight. Waves building hourly in the sound could be
seen from the anchorage rising ABOVE the trees (to the right of the catamarans in the above left photo).
Holy cow! Later in the afternoon,
Mother Nature allowed us some optimism as the storm front visibly passed with a
clear cloud line of demarcation. But we
kept things civilized with fresh squeezed orange juice/vodka sundowners and
nibbles followed by a dinner of Caesar pork tenderloin with mashed potatoes.
Yep,
you guessed it - there are still white caps in the anchorage but it is time to
head ashore since the wind has lost a teensy, tiny bit of its bite (3/6). Cabin fever sets in regardless of the
view. We dinghied to Sand Dollar Beach
and headed across the island to the sound side.
Wow – the sea is impressive (and humbling). Waves are big and the time between them is
miniscule. Our anchorage is definitely the
place we want to be right now. We walked and
walked the beach enjoying the movement and the sunshine. Back aboard for dinner where Chris made
hamburger and jalapeno pizza and Tracy made a side of skillet Mexican street
corn (recipe below). Yum!! Thanks Tracy.
And imagine that everything was already in our larder – no trip to the
market today (even if we could dinghy across the harbor).
This like every
morning starts with a review of the weather on windyty.com and the cruisers’
net (VHF 72 at 8am). Folks are
definitely getting a bit stir crazy – deciding to make trips around the
anchorage in full foul weather gear and dinghys that bounce and buck like rodeo
bulls (3/7). As for us, we kept our trips short and
made another excursion to shore with the specific purpose of finding sand
dollars. We clued Tracy in on what to
look for to find them and we were off and running…with lots of stops for
pictures because the watery vistas are amazing.
Winds
slightly lessened in the afternoon which was all the encouragement we needed to
be sure Chris got to the poker tournament at St Francis and Tracy and I had
dinner at Lumina Point (http://www.stfrancisresort.com/ and http://www.luminapoint.com/). Dinner was a delicious girl’s night affair
with fruity cocktails, grilled steak and cracked conch. Lumina Point is a short dinghy ride into
Turtle Cove from St Francis but the winding route is not without its excitement
in the dark and at low tide. The moon
helped but I still had to pop-up the engine in order to get across the sandy
shallows. Over
at St Francis the poker
tournament was still going strong when we arrived after our dinner;
however, tables were starting to be combined as players were
knocked out one by one. The field dwindled from 63 to 2…and it was
down to Chris and Pam (yes, our Chris).
Pam is a cruiser of the Bahamas for 15 years and won the night –
congrats! Chris came in second with a
prize of cash, a bottle of dark rum and a St Francis golf shirt (and a big hug
from owner Jillian). Well done! Back to Barefeet for a celebratory cocktail
and to get Tracy to bed because she has a full day tour of the Exuma Cays
tomorrow. Elvis will pick her up in his
water taxi at 7am…sleep fast.
Now
for us to chisel off the several days worth of accumulated salt spray…well, soon. We are back to the two of us and looking at
weather forecasts with traveling in mind.
Top of the list is when to head north back along the Exuma island chain? Hhhmmm.
But we’ll take it slow and enjoy the new calm weather
conditions…including an ARG meeting on Honeymoon Beach at 4.30pm (Alcohol
Research Group). The meeting was well
attended with more than thirty dinghies anchored along the shoreline. You know it’s a cruiser party when some of
the dinghy anchors could anchor the mother ship, too – never take a chance. We chatted, shared itineraries and grazed
from a groaning table of nibbles. Our
contribution was Cathexis Glazed Kielbasa Bites (recipe below). We learned this aboard (you guessed it) m/v
Cathexis one evening. The
Bites are sweet and savory and they fly off the serving plate. And with only two ingredients they are a snap to
make. Thanks Gary and Tina.
Alright,
it’s really time to get the salt off! I
was armed with a 2-gallon bucket of water/vinegar mixture and a sponge. It’s my favorite sponge. Okay, stop laughing but, yes, I have a
favorite sponge. Chris was armed with
the 50-foot hose and the fresh water was “on.”
Chris did an initial soak, I sponged stainless, windows, etc. with my
vinegar water and then Chris rinsed it all off.
It only took about 30 minutes and now we are ready to play (3/11). And play we did. Off we went with Melanie and Paul on their
barge for a bit of sandbar exploring followed by lunch at February Point. The barge is utilitarian in order to help
them maintain their island but it also provides a solid platform for shallow
water fun. The draft is a mere inches
below the water's surface and takes nothing more than Chris giving her a shove to get us
back moving again. Wow – the Bahama
waters simply do not disappoint. Thanks
for a relaxing day.
The
weather forecast says we will have good weather in a few days to depart
Georgetown, jump out into the Exuma Sound and then pass back into the Bahama Banks. That is fine by us – no drama is no
drama. While waiting we walked the
backbone trail to the southern tip of Stocking Island then returned along the
beach. Drat – there simply are not many
beach treasures this year…and not a single sea bean. Returning to the dinghy we had a fun meet-up and
chit chat with PDQ owners as well as Belize rally boats thanks to an invite
from s/v Echo. We learned about great
cruising grounds like the Yucatan, Honduras and Belize (Cuba not so much)…maybe
we should check them out for ourselves?!
Next year?! So much to see!
In
our four visits to Georgetown over the past ten years we have done very little
land exploration. With tips and
recommendations from Melanie and Paul we made a day of terra firma fun. Off Chris and I went with a rental car from
Berlies Car Rental picked up at the Exuma Markets (http://www.berliescarrental.com/). Our plan was to drive from Great Exuma onto
Little Exuma and to its tip and check out the sights between here and there
(3/13). This is not a far distance at
only 17 miles so we should have plenty of time to stop as we like along the
way. Directions are pretty straight
forward because there is only one road that connects the island from stem
to stern – the Queen’s Highway. It was
paved 25 years ago by the USA and hasn’t really been touched since. The road is one narrow lane in each direction
that crumbles quickly at the scalloped edges.
Oh – and the driving is UK style…on the left. Got it.
Our first official stop was the Tropic of Cancer Beach. Is that it – the beach access road?! Nope but it is a stunning beach. On a little further and we found it. Oh, there actually is a sign – there it
is. The beach is on the meridian line of
(you guessed it) the Tropic of Cancer which is the northern border of the
Tropics. It is said to be the most
beautiful beach in the Exuma chain but we are hard pressed to say that any
beach in the Exumas is “ugly.”
Back
on the road and just before Williams Town we spotted “The Pillar.” The view was again spectacular with the added
detail of a clear reminder of a product that helped shape the Caribbean in
general and the Bahamas in particular - salt.
Lore says that the 30-foot Tuscan pillar was built in the Loyalist Era (late
18th/19th century - that’s when the folks in the American
colonies who were still loyal to England skedaddled out of North America with
land grants to set up plantations and other businesses in the Bahamas). However, that might be a bit more lore than
fact but who knows...the pillar was built at some point in the past. Regardless, the
pillar marks the “Great Salina” salt ponds where salt was raked, harvested and
loaded onto ships. Salt - the seemingly mundane
and abundant product of today found on every restaurant table and hot dog cart
was once no less than an empire builder for those countries that controlled its
production and distribution (like Venice). Due to the
great value of salt (back in the day) the Bahamas was also valuable; producing
salt by the bushel to the amount of 10,000 tons per year from the 1670s to the 1860s. Even today Morton Salt produces over one
million tons per year on nearby Great Inagua; however, the rarity of the
product has certainly changed…and Morton is not ruling any empires.
Our
stomachs started to growl which meant we needed to keep moving. We drove to the end of the road at the tip of
Little Exuma and there we turned around.
Incidentally, it absolutely looks like the end of the road – no doubt
about it – it's the tip of Little Exuma. It was just one
more stop before lunch. It was a humble church with colorful stained glass
windows; biblical scenes on one side and secular scenes on the other such as
sailboats on the sound and the salt pillar...beautiful.
Lunch
was at the well-loved and delicious Santanna’s Bar and Grill (https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g147429-d1526324-Reviews-Santanna_s_Bar_and_Grill-Great_Exuma_Out_Islands_Bahamas.html). This beach shack has only a few things on the
menu; cracked conch, lobster, shrimp, grouper and chicken…each topped with
grilled sweet onions…served with sides of coleslaw and corn. Once our orders were taken place mats were
set and sterno cans were lit (that’s to keep the flies away from the meal – and it
really works). The meal was fantastic and
filling. We liked it so much that
we tracked down the word “cracked.” What
makes this sooo tasty?! Cracking seems
to be a method of cooking where meat is pounded thin and tender then fried in a
light batter consisting of eggs, flour, condensed milk, salt and pepper. Condensed and evaporated milk (sweetened as condensed and not as evaporated) is
abundantly displayed in every meager market inventory in the Bahamas and
certainly winds up in loads of things from cocktails to desserts to mac and
cheese…to cracked everything. Let’s
try
this at home for a bit of the Bahamas in Boston. And while on the
boat - these ingredients have a long shelf life...perfect! I'll
keep sleuthing for more recipes.
Santanna’s
marked the end of our land tour. We
leisurely drove back north with full bellies and a greater understanding of the
area. Some last minute provisioning,
parking the rental car at Exuma Markets (keys left under the floor mat) and we
were back aboard Barefeet ready to pull up the anchor in the morning. Our nearly three weeks in Georgetown were
full of fond memories and reminders of the past as well as new friends and
experiences. As Ollie on s/v Dejarlo
says each night on the VHF, “Goodnight Georgetown.”
The
winds mellowed throughout the night and conditions were as hoped for in the
morning when we pulled up the anchor from Sand Dollar Beach (3/14). We exited Elizabeth Harbor into the Exuma
Sound and it was a gentle 42 mile ride to charming Little Farmer’s Cay. Back inside we picked up a mooring ball from
Little Farmer’s Cay Yacht Club. While on
the move we ran the watermaker. The
watermaker has been going strong then all of a sudden…stopped. Chris sleuthed and investigated but could not
find any indication of why it would have stopped. But deeper investigation found a burnt out
fuse and a section of the circuit board in need of soldering. A spare fuse was found and the soldering gun
heated up. Voila! Chris did it again! Well done.
Now
it is time to shower and head to Ty’s Bar and Grill. It’s my birthday! Chris took me for a laid-back meal on the
beach; spicy chicken sandwiches with french fries and rum punch. The restaurant is on the island’s runway
which can provide a bit of a floor show.
Two small planes were parked with students from a Florida aviation
college visiting for Spring Break. They
departed after an afternoon in the sea and sand (and before our walk back to
the dinghy along the runway). Later, the
sun began to set which was our cue to go, too.
On our way out the ladies in the restaurant learned that it was my
birthday as we thanked them for the meal.
They gave well wishes and the lovely lady in the beads sang Happy
Birthday to me with a blessing. Her voice
was beautiful and it was a thoughtful and warm ending to a lovely night.
Next
stop – Staniel Cay and Big Majors anchorage.
Winds made the sea choppy but not bad since we were inside the Bahama
Bank. It is a good day to move and we
see many other boats doing the same – both north and south (3/16). Wow – there are more mega yachts than last
month in the anchorage…complete with inflatable slides from the top level into
the sea. Maybe Spring Break? We tucked close to shore but not close enough
on our first attempt so we pulled up the anchor and moved even closer to land
and it is, indeed, less rolly.
Phew. We will hang out here until
friends arrive Mar 23rd.
Being in one place for a few days gives Chris a chance to do a few boat
projects. He has been perfecting the
gasket seal on the pilot house door and it is coming along nicely. It is slow because the gap is uneven and
needs more here and less there and even more over here…additional layers were
added once the lower ones had dried. Done and ready for a rain test. The
engine room provided another project – engine mount painting. Chris stripped, primed and painted a corroded
engine mount in the engine room. The corrosion comes from a nearby zinc that needs to be routinely changed. Corrosion cannot always be avoided but it can be managed…right Picasso?! Looks great!
March
weather in the Bahamas continues to be its squirrely self. The winds continue to pipe up then mellow
back down every couple of days...and we find that if we turn sideways in the bed we
roll less in certain wind/wave conditions while trying to sleep. Who
knew?! Temperature is also fluctuating.
One day we are in bathing suits and the next we are “bundled up.” Another cold front rolled through at 74
degrees F which actually had us in fleeces...seems our blood is thinning again.
Today
is a calm day so we went exploring in Pipe Creek (3/19). This was a great tip passed along from new
friends Pam and Bob on m/v Mint Julep. We
met them the day before on the beach with their guests (her sister and nephew). It was so
windy that sitting on the beach in the protected cove was the best plan. It is good to have options. The whole gang is from Louisville, Kentucky,
and a pleasure to chat with. I tried a coconut
bread recipe that I brought to the beach to share. It was okay but may
have suffered because I goofed and used baking soda instead of baking
powder...that's okay because the leftovers were good for french toast this
morning.
We
dinghied all the way to Compass Cay then slowly made our way back to Big
Majors. The swirls of ocean blue colors
looked more like they belonged in Willy Wonka’s candy store as they changed
from sapphire sour blue raspberry twist sticks to turquoise ribbon candy to
aquamarine butter creams…even baby blue raspberry salt water taffy and electric
jolly rancher sours. What a sight!
Back
aboard we ran the watermaker and readied for sundowners with Pam and Bob. As I mentioned earlier regarding the cracked conch –
I need to better understand the true breadth of the uses for condensed/evaporated milk
(sweetened and not) because the Bahamaian market shelves are packed with the
stuff. The recipes are slowly being discovered and I will keep at it. One more recipe has been found - in
the category of cocktails. Specifically, the gully wash
or sky juice cocktail. I was a bit
skeptical but Pam was game so we gave it a try; 1 oz gin (or rum), 2 oz coconut
water and ½ oz sweetened condensed milk. We used gin.
Shake in a shaker with ice until frothy (makes one). Skeptics be damned this was good…and as Pam
said, “This dog can hunt.” Needless to
say we made another batch. The sun
slowly sank as we nibbled, shared boating stories (they have done the great loop – super
cool) as well as future itineraries.
Thanks for the fun night.
Skillet
Mexican Street Corn
(Tracy and simplyhealthykitchen.com)
Ingredients
6
ears fresh corn, husks removed and kernels cut off cob (about 4-5 cups)
1
Tablespoon vegetable oil
2
Tablespoon mayonnaise
¼
cup green onions, thinly sliced
1
jalapeno pepper, seeded and stemmed, finely chopped (optional)
½
cup fresh cilantro leaves, finely chopped
juice
of one medium lime
2
ounces cotija cheese (or queso fresco, or feta)
1
tsp chili powder (more or less to taste)
salt,
to taste
Instructions
Heat
oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add corn and cook without
stirring until corn begins to char (about 2-3 minutes). Toss corn and let cook
for an additional 2-3 minutes (without stirring). Give the corn one final toss
and repeat cooking for additional 2-3 minutes until corn is charred on all sides.
Turn off heat.
Add
remaining ingredients and stir to incorporate. Add salt to taste. Serve
immediately.
Note:
if fresh corn is not available you can use frozen (thawed) or canned corn. (4-5
cups)
Cathexis
Glazed Kielbasa Bites
(Tina m/v Cathexis)
2
lbs kielbasa
12
oz ginger ale
Directions
Cut kielbasa into 2-inch slices (cut
slices into crescents if smaller is desired…they are easier to eat).
Place in a large skillet with the
ginger ale (regular, this does not work with diet ginger ale).
Bring to boil, then reduce heat to
medium. Do not cover pan.
After 15 to 20 minutes, ginger ale
will be reduced and start to caramelize.
WATCH CAREFULLY because you don’t
want it to burn.
At this point, keep stirring until
chunks are glazed.
Serve on a platter with toothpicks
inserted. They are sticky and yummy!