Aboard the Sailing Vessel
SHIBUMI

February 12, 2005

Festival At Little Farmers Cay
Last week-end we went to the First Friday in February Festival in Little Farmers Cay... it is called the 5F's and has been sponsered every year, for the past nineteen years by the Ocean Cabin Restaurant.

The 5F's was a non-stop party from Thursday night until Superbowl Sunday. Little Farmers Cay only has 55 residents, but they put on a festival that people from all over the Bahamas, the United States, Canada, France and the United Kingdom came to enjoy.

Ocean Cabin held several activities for adults and kids. Everything from dinghy races to chicken runs, wet tee-shirt contests, best buns contest, flea markets, treasure hunts, and a host of events I have never heard of before were on the agenda. Some nice prizes went to the winners. Neither Jill or I won anything. We did however, sell a spare flashlight at the flea market. We gave the proceeds to the small school on Little Farmers Cay

During the festival there was also a regatta, that included a race upon cruising boats. Jill crewed aboard a friend's boat, Touch`e, whle David took pictures from the shore. Shibumi was not entered in the race.

Ali's Bar was playing loud music until the wee hours of the morning. He kept the party-goers primed with $1 shots of "your favorite drink". His wife made conch fritters and served fish and grits and sweet bread for breakfast.

Roosevelt Nixon invited Elon Moxey, a well known singer from Nassau. Darryl Miller,"The Cutter", is a talk show host also from Nassau. He came to the festival and tended bar at Roosevelt's yacht club.

The island is only a mile and a half long and three quarters of a mile wide. So it is an easy dinghy ride and/or easy walk to all areas.

5F's was the only activity we had on our calendar for this cruise. So now we have no real agenda. We do know that we will sail to Georgetown some time during the voyage. That is where we will pick up our mail. It is also a good place to re-provision the boat, take cruising seminars and hang-out with other cruisers.

Back to Blackpoint
We were in a place called Blackpoint before the weather turned foul. We liked Blackpoint but it provided no shelter from west winds. So we went to Little Farmers early to hide from heavy weather.

Following the festival we returned to Blackpoint. It is picture perfect, with aqua blue water boarded by rock cliffs and caves.

The people are great. They really look out after the cruising boats that visit here. Some of the men walk down to the shore at night and make sure the boats are not dragging on their anchors, which is a cruiser's nightmare. They provide water for free, which is a big deal in the Bahamas. Lorraine's Cafe has good food. Scorpio's bar across the street from Lorraine's is the hang-out for the Brother's. I go in there from time to time to catch up on the latest island news.

Riding Out the Cold Front
For the lastest cold front, two nights ago, we are anchored in Little Bay near Blackpoint.

The front brought some unfriendly wind and waves. The wind blew out of the west for too long. I was up all night, insuring that Shibumi stayed in place against a wall of water coming from the very deep Tongue of the Ocean that lies west of us. They make movies out of that kind of thing... but things calmed down after about twelve hours of rocking and rolling. Then it got a little cold (55-60 degrees, Hey this is the Bahamas, mon). We didn't get off the boat all of the following day...I slept and Jill read.

Strange thing though, Don on Dark and Stormy was anchored near us. He said he slept through the entire thing. I bet he sleeps through alot of good action movies.

Use your browser's back button to select another date