It's Been A Long Time...

Hello Everybody! Sorry it's been so long. On January 31st, I spilled a glass of water on my beloved Macbook. I am using Brian's now. I have been preoccupied with unsuccessful computer repairs, building my web business, house stuff, crazy weather, and entertaining company here on Long Island. But now, I have found some breathing room and time to share our continuing adventure of island life.

Guess what this is? Lots of sand, silver thatch palms, limestone, and sea air... AND... the driveway to what will be our first land based home!

You can't tell much from these photos and I promise to post more soon, but this is our property here on Long Island (Bahamas). The driveway is sandy and the rest is a lot of limestone rock and dirt. There are lots of great trees, bromiliads, and wild orchids. We've planted coconut palms, sapodilly trees, papaya, avacado, and all kinds of other stuff. Brian has built some great rock walls and we've got all of our beach combing treasures scattered all over the place: driftwood, sea fans, floats, sponges, and shells.
The building supplies should arrive around 3/16. Brian has been working like mad getting the site ready for construction. We're building a small one bedroom island-y sort of cottage, and we're building it ourselves! It will be really cute and cozy with a wrap around porch for lots of outdoor living. Our dog and cat are super-excited to have a home that doesn't bob up and down. More on the house and property soon...
In February, our friends Atil and April and their son, Troy visited the island. They had a couple days of unbelievably beautiful weather. The photo above shows April and Troy frolicking in the amazing Bahamian waters. I know the weather has been rough everywhere this year, and Long Island is no exception. Today, as I write this, I am wearing jeans and a long sleeve shirt. I know, I know... but, usually the anchorages on this island are protected by the prevailing winds and the weather is much, much warmer. This year, we've been getting our butts kicked in the anchorage on a regular basis. The fronts are bringing more frequent and stronger West winds than ever before. I'm not complaining though, it is excellent weather for getting work done and that's the theme of our stay on Long Island this year. When we leave the island to head back to the States, we plan to be in the money with my website and have the house dried in completely. Dried in means the exterior structure will be finished.
Dean's Blue Hole is beautiful as always. That white platform is what world record holder William Trubridge uses for his freedive training and competitions. Brian has trained there with him and has a personal best of 160 on a single breath of air. It's a beautiful and fascinating sport.

Atil is also a freediving enthusiast. Brian met him through the Mid-Atlantic Longfins Club out of Virginia Beach. They are a freediving club that goes out off of Hatteras in the Outer Banks in the summertime. Brian was actually diving with them when he speared his world-record Spade fish.

Our friend Joyce made us Bahamian style fish foil packs for the grill at a Dean's Blue Hole picnic. They had hog fish, snapper, cassava, boniato, pepper, tomato, onion, pinapple, and fresh sea salt raked from the ponds here by Joyce herself. They were soooooo good!

The water was incredibly clear that day, perfect for swimming and diving!

William prepares to dive.

The platform is an awesome place to get a tan, too!

William goes down, down, down... he can dive to 288 feet without the use of fins, rope, weight or any other form of assistance, REALLY.

Some pretty bougainvillea at the Constantakis Car Rental.

Those are sponges drying out at the Greek community.

More pretty sponges. They are shipped all over the world and retail at a pretty high cost. These are some of the highest quality sponges in the world.

Puff at anchor in Thompson Bay, on a good day! The end of February was spent spending time with Brian's family. They came to visit for 10 days... and they saw pretty much everything there is to see here on Long Island! I think we all had a really good time. More to come on that when I download the photos... Take Care!