BASRA rescue....Jonas and Ingrid from Sweden visit...

Anthony reading in the reading perch. It's still a great place to read when it's raining outside.

Jonas and Ingrid's boat, "Ouhm", it is a 27 foot Brise. Jonas made it himself in Sweden and he and Ingrid sailed it from Sweden to Ocean Reef and now are in the States loving the intracoastal waters. It's a very unique boat.

Ingrid and Me.

Ingrid sitting on their boat. It took them 39 days to sail across the ocean from the Canary Islands to Guadeloupe then up to St. Martin and then San Salvador and then Ocean Reef to us.

Jonas wearing his safety vest to clip him to the boat. They are getting ready to go.

Ingrid...we had so much fun visiting with them again after 9 months and in a very different part of the world.

Here they go...they have a 2 horsepower motor.

Ingrid has her safety vest on too.

A square sail.

Bye, Ingrid and Jonas. We hope to see you again sometime.

Me on the BASRA rescue boat 1.

I joined BASRA as a volunteer and one day Tom called me to go around the canals with him to look for a boat, "Robin III" whose EPIRB had gone off and BASRA, Bahamas Air and Sea Rescue had to respond so he took me. I was thrilled. We went down to Port Lucaya and got in the Rescue boat and toured around the canals to look for the boat. This was a big fishing ship we went by. The fishermen in the Bahamas are not allowed to use nets for fishing so this boat never worked out as a business.

This was the boat, "Ghost" used in the movies "Pirates of the Caribbean 2 and 3".

This is another view of the boat.

Getting closer.

Going under a low bridge.

Look at those beautiful canal walls....made in the 1960's.

This outlet goes out to the ocean.

Some homes and resorts along the canal. Note they have dockage right in their front lawn if they live on the canal.

Buildings for the Dolphin Experience. You can sign up to scuba dive with the dolphins. They follow the lead boat out to the ocean and then the scuba divers dive with them. I really want to do it but it costs $200.

Some of the homes are absolutely beautiful.

This is one of the Dolphin tanks...where they keep the dolphins. Robert, Ning Ning's husband works here training the dolphins.

The Beach as we're heading out on the ocean.

They do have cormorants down here but they are not as plentiful as they are in Lake Ontario. You only see one or two at a time.

A Gazebo.

More huge beautiful homes with their boats in the front.

This is Tom, the BASRA guy. It turned out that the EPIRB going off was a dysfunctional EPIRB and all was well.

Ann's Place

This is Stella, one of Ann and Chippie's dogs. I met Ann through Marion and we have been visiting every week. She picks me up and I go out to her place in Fortuna Place a subdivision east and north of Port Lucaya. It's a lovely home right on the Canal....the Port Lucaya Canal System. She raises Cockatiel's, Love Birds, and has 4 dogs. She sells a selection of lovely Bahamian Coin Cards at different shops on The Grand Bahama Island.

This is one pair of her Cockatiels who are laying eggs right now.

This is Henrietta, she was getting picked on by the other birds so Ann brought her in the house and gave her, her own cage in the kitchen. She loves it when you talk to her and she sings a lot when we put Michael Buble on. You know that Canadian singer that sounds like Frank Sinatra. How do you spell his last name? I don't have a French keyboard to make that e, ague????

This is GEE GEE, she's the youngest dog and loves to ride in the jeep with Ann and me.

Beacon School

On Monday's we take our guitars and egg shakers to Beacon School at the other side of the island. It's a school for Handicapped Kids. We have borrowed a guitar from the school and one from Miss Hamilton and Anthony plays his and I let the kids play mine while I do crowd control and help the kids position their guitar and remember which end is up and sing the songs with the kids and Anthony. This little guy is Blind and he loves the time with the guitar and he's a great little singer too.

We meet in the Resource Room and usually have 3 to 4 kids at at time. They now know us and why we are there so we get lots of great smiles welcoming us when ever we arrive. Miss Hamilton picks us up and takes us back home. We have become close friends with Miss Hamilton and her family...she's the Art Teacher there.

The children wear uniforms and are very, very mannerly, "Good afternoon, Mr. Anthony and Miss Judy".

Their favourite songs are This Little Light, This Is The Day, Jesus Loves Me, He's got the Whole World in His Hands and we put the kids names in the song....He's got Xavier and Kashana in his hands.....they really enjoy hearing their names in the song.

It's a lot of fun for Anthony and I and the children sure smile a lot and are very excited when we are there. The principal gave us a list of children she wanted us to see and then a Teaching Assistant, Dexter, helps me find the kids and bring them to the Resource Room.

Sometimes we don't have enough guitars to go around so we give the kids egg shakers that John Lodge brought me earlier in the year. There isn't a music store on the island so I got friends to bring down guitar strings and shakers and spoons, picks, etc. that we needed for our singalongs.

This is Dexter, he is very helpful with gathering the children. Thanks Dexter for your help and great smile.

Anthony and some of the kids.

Me and some of the kids.

These two little cuties enjoy the music too. The school goes from grade one to grade 7, I think. I'll have to ask more questions when Miss Hamilton picks us up tomorrow. I'll take some pictures of the school buildings too so you'll have an idea what the school looks like.

Boaters Potluck

Tom, the Sea Rescue guy, and Anth. Note the bottle of wine on the table with the old looking paper on it. It's from Moldova when I went through the huge winery. I drank the original wine a long time ago but I kept the bottle....it was the kind of wine that Queen Elizabeth had said she like when she was visiting there, once.

Diane with her most delicious dessert. She's a great cook and is very kind....remembers all of our birthdays and collects us together to celebrate.

Ingrid...from Sweden. The story goes like this. When we sailed across the Atlantic last June/July when we were in Ireland we met Ingrid and Jonas in Crosshaven. They were on their way to the Canary Islands and we were on our way to Rhu, Scotland, then England by train, then home by plane and then the Bahamas on our own boat. So...we said, "See you in the Bahamas". Well time went by and we continued to email each other and we continued to sail our different routes. They went to the Canary Islands on their 27 foot boat called, "Oumh". It took them 39 days to cross the ocean to Guadaloupe and then up to St. Martin...on to San Salvador in the Bahamas. By that time we had taken 2 months to come down the Erie Canal, Hudson River, Intracoastal and across to Bimini Islands in the Bahamas and then up to Ocean Reef on The Grand Bahama Island. Then they were interested in finding us so I sent them our coordinates and they sailed to us. And here is Ingrid at our potluck, can you imagine that. More pictures of Ingrid, Jonas and "Oumh" to come.

Fishing With Leslie

Uuuuu what a gorey mess. Anthony was climbing down one of the dock ladders to get in the kayak and the last rung on the ladder broke off and Anth caught his arm on the rung above. Thank heavens he landed in the kayak....if he had gone into the water he would have gone a lot further down and probably would have done more damage. This is all healed now and wasn't as sore as it looked. Poor guy.

That's where the rung broke off...right there at the bottom of the ladder. When the tide comes up they are under water so the wood rots.

Here comes a Big Blow and rain....it's getting darker and darker. This is looking off the stern of the boat.

Look at those trees bending.....the winds are fast.

And here comes the rain. This looking towards the bow of the boat by the docks.

We went fishing with Les...the guy a couple boats down that we buy fish off and he takes people out fishing too. Anthony caught a fish almost every time he put his hook down. This is an Ocean Trigger fish. It was bigggggg. Way to go Anth.

These guys are in the bucket...they are Trigger Fish too but not Ocean ones....aren't they pretty? They sure tasted good too. Anthony caught a Margaret Fish too which Les said he hadn't caught yet this year.

Here we are at the front of the boat. Les had all sorts of fishing rods. The shoreline is Xanadu Beach.

Les and Anthony.

Me. I caught 2 fish. I think I need to practice jerking the rod to get them on the hook more. I caught a baby Squirrel fish and we threw it back in. It had great big eyes and was pretty funny looking. It was a great day.