Conception Island, Bahamas

May 13 – 15

The passage to Conception Island was an overnight, which gave Jack and Maddy a chance to get their bearings during an overnight passage.

With no wind, no waves, and no traffic, it was a relaxed introduction.  They undertook many lessons from Frank from ship’s operations to man overboard procedures to ropes.

Unexpectedly, there were several boats at our anchorage upon arrival, given Conception Island is uninhabited national park both on land and in the water, and reportedly not often visited.  We took up the only mooring ball but later decided to move closer to shore, I refer you back to the misbehaving dinghy.

We snorkeled the nearby reef, enjoyed a rum tasting and relaxed on the bow of the boat.

The shoreline is one of the prettiest I’ve seen, rum notwithstanding.

We traversed the northern end on the island after swimming to shore. Sounds impressive, however, it was about hundred feet across.

We wandered down the beach making tracks in the virgin sand (until the next high tide), and then snorkeled the coral back to the boat.

With Frank in the lead,

we later snorkeled to a small beach, crossed over to the Atlantic side, which took about a minute, more snorkeling.

We were rewarded with first a sand tiger shark, then a large black tip shark, who seemed a bit too interested in us, so I made my way back to the leeward side of Frank,

and finally a large eagle ray.

Not too shabby.  Definitely no internet service here.