We spent a night at Johnson Cay and then first thing on the captain's birthday we motored a mile over to Man O War Bay to be ready for the cold front. The captain had a choice of either birthday bread or birthday oatmeal cookies and as you can see from the picture he chose the bread. I had been trying to come up with a nice meal idea for Rob`s birthday dinner but after a month after provisioning options are not too exciting until Raphael came into the anchorage. Raphael lives in Duncan Town and makes his living diving for conch and lobster. We were able to buy 6 small lobster tails from him for ten dollars. So the birthday boy had lobster for dinner and what a treat that was. Many cruisers dive with pole spears and spear their own lobsters. Rob used to have a spear but it didn`t get put on board when we left Bayfield and it is not exactly the kind of thing you want to carry in your luggage. Peter has one so we are hoping that he can be the great white hunter for both First Edition and Celebrian.
I decided to go paddling at Man O War before the wind picked up and also do some snorkelling. The reef on the one side of the bay was beautiful and had lots of fish. We had decided that the smart thing to do in the Jumentos was to snorkel off the kayak so that if we got rattled we could always get out of the water. We see lots of rays and the occasional nurse shark but we know that they won`t bother a swimmer; however I saw my first pelagic shark, a bull shark about 20 feet away that I learned from other crusiers in the bay was close to 8 feet long. Unlike a nurse shark they are unpredictable and can be a problem with divers. Needless to say I was grateful of my kayak and have little recollection of getting out of the water and up on my kayak. Evidently the folks I spoke to had speared a couple of lobsters and nothing brings sharks faster than blood. I also didn`t know that Raphael had been cleaning conch and lobster in the bay or I would have stayed out of the water. It was something amazing to see; however that will do me for a life time.
Today, sunday January 23rd we are sailing south to meet up with First Edition. It will be wonderful to see them both. Later in the week we will be in town to pick up our mailboat grocery order from Maxine and do some blog entries.
Christine at the helm on a warm day in the Jumentos.
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