Green Turtle Cay

LEAVING HARBOR ISLAND AND HEADING TO THE ABACOS

We were up at the crack of dawn and still couldn’t beat that gardener. He scared me again as he moseyed by the bedroom window just before daylight. What the heck is he doing now? Probably spying on us, I thought suspiciously. I’d felt like we were under surveillance since the day we arrived. There was not a moment’s privacy or peace between the gardener at dawn, the maid at 10:00 and the cook scheduled for 6:00. (That’s another story still to come about our stay in Harbor Island – to be posted soon) I whisper to Larry, motioning and pointing outside to the gardener in the yard.

He watches him threw the filthy venetian blinds being careful not to touch them too much or your hands will get sticky dirty.

“Looks like he came by to pick up a couple of the card board boxes filled with the weeds they pulled yesterday.” Larry whispers back.

“Why the heck couldn’t he have picked them up yesterday when they were finished at a decent hour rather than coming by so early?” I asked. “I’m sick of him sneaking around before daylight each morning waking me up!” I snarled back.

I was even more annoyed since he hadn’t done any yard work the entire three week stay and the grass had grown in parts of the yard up to a foot high but the last day of our stay he decided to clean the place up getting it pretty for the next renters I supposed. I don’t know what he did each day sneaking around predawn except for occasionally turning the sprinklers on and draining our water tank so we couldn’t flush the toilets for a several hours. Yesterday he brought a helper and gave this kid instructions on everything that needed to be done and then left still not lifting a finger to do anything. The whole day the kid, edged, weeded, raked, trimmed and turned the dirt in the planters. I couldn’t let Zig out the whole day. He was getting the yard ready so it would look maintained for the next renters is all I could think and doing it on our last day here. Maybe it was the owners who were coming next was another thought. This place just gets to me as you can tell.

GET THERE EARLY

Well, after today, there will be no more of this and that’s good. We were up at the crack of dawn to today to get to the airport by 8:00 for our flight with Bahama Air at 9:30. I heard Larry confirming the flight and our reservations day before yesterday on the phone. I could hear him arguing or rather irritatingly questioning why we had to be there so early for a flight within the Bahamas that doesn’t leave for an hour an a half. The airport was nothing more than a small one room building with a counter and it was a simple no brainer flight, just 20 minutes, and in a small prop plane. It made no sense but not everything made reasonable sense here or so we were beginning to think.

TOO MUCH STUFF

I worked most of yesterday sorting through the amazing amount of crap we packed and thought we needed with us on this trip. I spent hours deciding what we could throw out just trying to eliminate at least one bag. I threw out our big clod hopper tennis shoes because they were so big and heavy. They were our walking shoes and I will probably live to regret that decision. Most likely I’ll wish I have them at the Miami Boat Show in two weeks where we’ll be doing a lot of walking. I threw out old towels we brought for the Ziggy clean up factor and will probably regret that too as he always seems to get into something unpredictably dirty in the most unlikely places where we have no facilities to clean him up. Anyway, I did my best but still had to keep the big bulky winter clothes to get home for the drive back across the country and to keep Larry from freezing while he flies up the East Coast to Maine when we get back to the mainland. They sure seemed ridiculous in the suitcase here in the Bahamas with this climate. I did manage to eliminate one bag though, the duffle bag, and I didn’t have to throw it out either but managed to stuff it into the big bag on rollers but I must say the bags were about ready to pop.

When I got it all done and was feeling pretty proud of my accomplishment, I called Larry in to show him. He said I “did a wonderful job of packing.” I could tell there was a “but” coming with such an overly complimentary statement. I guess he thought my bagging job lost any common sense when I told him that I was going to carry my camera bag, and the 400 mm lens bag separately along with my purse, as a carry on. “You are not going to be able to carry all that and manage Ziggy! It’s just a small little plane!” So without much protest on my part, back into the luggage bag went the camera and lenses and out came the duffle to be refilled again. So much for all that work and throwing out perfectly good stuff and not at least eliminating a bag.

RIVER OF DOUBT

So, back to this morning, here we are up at the crack of dawn with a truck load of crap to get down the harbor, then on to the water taxi and then on to a road taxi, on the Eleuthera side, and finally to the airport check in. I felt like the “River of Doubt” if you’ve ever read it, about Teddy Roosevelt leaving on an expedition to an unknown river in an unexplored area of the Brazilian jungle with a ridiculous amount of baggage and things that none of it was suitable for the mission, and after much difficulty they found themselves shedding stuff right and left throughout their journey as things became more and more difficult, or maybe I could equate it to the Donner Party, leaving things at each leg of the journey throwing them off the wagons as the trip become more impossible and desperate. Well, I have no idea what the maid will do with all that junk I left there but hopefully she’ll find someone that can use some of it.

So before we headed out, Larry said, “I’ll take care of all the luggage and you take care of Ziggy! If you and Ziggy walk down to the dock I’ll have enough room on the golf cart to take all the luggage. I’ll meet you there.” That’s a great deal for me. So Zig and I moseyed down the road. Not a soul was out at this time of the dark morning except for one or two black people on their way to work, probably to some hotel or the like. It seemed so silly to be going to the airport so early when it was just probably 6 miles away as a crow flies. It was just all the maneuvering and changing types of transportation to get there that become cumbersome and timely.

WATER TAXI

Larry passes me on the road in the golf cart loaded like the Beverly Hillbillies truck, bags piled on top of each other, teetering all the way down the road. Ziggy wasn’t anxious to take this walk this morning without Larry as he likes us all the stay together so he was dragging behind and refusing to go forward, but once he saw Larry going by, he suddenly wanted to go with Larry and pulled me all the way to the dock. There’s nothing Ziggy likes to do better than ride on an open air golf cart specially with a bit of chaos thrown in for the heck of it. By the time we got to the ferry, the black water taxi guy was loading our huge heavy bags into the boat which was already listing severely to port. How much can you load on these things I wondered? Oh well, the water is warm and shallow here if something happens. We surely won’t drown if the boat sinks. On the bright side maybe we could finally eliminate some baggage.

There were three or four other black passengers inside sitting on the little padded cushions waiting for us. They all looked like they had some business in Eleuthera. One was “Chef Thomas” wearing his black and white striped chef pants and he had his knife bag on his lap. He was in the seafood store one day when I went in to get some fish which is the only reason I knew who he was. The other was a black lady, hair straightened and shiny, slick to her head, and nails at least an inch long air brushed with some multi-colored microscopic design and another guy who was kind of sheepish and quiet and didn’t seem to have any big purpose that I could determine and kept punching things into his cell phone.

The seats and floor were wet and dirty from the morning dew and the street. I stepped down the concrete steps from the dock and over the railing with Ziggy under my arm and perched on the ledge of my hip. We sat down on an open seat and I thought so much for those white pants I put on this morning as this was where I got my first dirty patch of many during today’s travels.

Larry after emptying the bags off the golf cart back was heading back down the dock to leave it with the key hidden in front of the Landing Restaurant. That was about the only thing so far on this island that any body ever did that showed a bit of trust, didn’t cost us an arm and a leg and provided a means to make something easier on us. I was sure the grouchy guy at the golf cart rental was going to require us to return the jerky temperamental cart to his shop which would mean us either lugging by hand the bags to the dock or going in the complete dark before dawn to get the cart back before we had to leave.

Back on the water taxi, as we all waited and watched as Larry walked back the length of the dock, his shirt I could see by now was starting to spot in several places from perspiration for all the work in this humid climate that we had today. Suddenly today the weather got hot and sticky and there was not even a slight breeze to relieve any of it.

Off we sped as the 300 horse power engine took off, the boat seemingly overloaded and incredibly low to the water, leaning to port, but making incredible distance in a short spurt of time. No one seemed to think anything of it.

Within a few short minutes we were on the other side and a slew of black people were there waiting, many to board other water taxis to take them to Harbor Island for their daily jobs. They’ve really got a system here. Several black guys were there handy to unload our baggage and pile it right into a waiting taxi van. In moments we again sped off, this time down the rugged road and Ziggy never having time to touch his paws to the ground. We were soon at the Eleuthera Airport building no more than a mile and a half up the little deserted road.

Lickety split and that was the whole process. We were there and not surprisingly, not another foolish traveler was to be seen. There were a few black guys hanging out front under the awning of the small airport building sitting on the plastic seating ganged together by a metal rod. One of the black guys quickly got our bags off the van. Larry paid the taxi guy, and our bags were quickly put inside and left by the empty ticket counter. As I entered the building carrying Ziggy, I was immediately and abruptly, told “No dog allowed!” and they pointed to the direction of the door I just came through. I felt like the scum of the earth to consider taking a dog into the airport building which certainly wasn’t the cleanest place in town. So out the door I went and where Zig stayed for the duration.

NOT A SOUL THERE

Larry was pissed to say the least that no one was there but not surprised. “Just what I thought there’s no one here! We’re here way too early!” he said.

We made better time that we thought too and were there at 7:45 for our 9:30 flight in this God for saken little airport with nothing to do in this humid heat. Larry comes back out and is fit to be tied.

I replied, “Well, you have to do what they say here. What choice does anyone have? We didn’t know the routine but had had our suspicions. So there we were and it was getting darn hot out. I had picked out this shirt for Larry to wear today and for some reason it wasn’t “breathing”. He was overly hot and perspiring. I told him to go inside in where they had air conditioning and cool off.

As I sat there with the black porters and Ziggy you couldn’t help but listen to their loud rambling and crazy talk about politics and news events. It never fails as they seem to get in a big tether about it and soon it becomes a yelling match. At some point as the volume increases that maybe a fight will start but really, it’s just their way of talking. We’ve come to think this now after spending three weeks listening to them do the same thing on the fisherman’s dock in front of our rental house on Harbor Island.

BUGS!

Suddenly, something felt like it bit my leg. I looked down and I could see it was just this itty bitty little pin head of a dot. Oh no, it those blasted “no see ums” are here!!!!

Soon, they were biting my legs all over. It was horrible. I got up right away and walked across the dirt road and stood in the sun with Ziggy hoping they weren’t over there. I started doing jog in place hoping to keep the bugs off. I thought that maybe they wouldn’t land on dancing legs. I have no idea what those black porters thought of me as I stood in the heated sun doing a silly jig, when I could be sitting by them in the shade. I didn’t care what anybody thought though I was desperate. I guess Larry noticed me from inside looking out the window and came out to see what I was doing.

When I explained he told me to go inside were the AC is away from the bugs and he would sit with Ziggy. He said he had long pants on and he would be fine. You see, during our stay, the water taxi guy told us “da bugs here in da Bahamas dunt like air conditinin’. If ya wunt em to ga away turn the air on”. So in I went to the air conditioned room feeling very guilty that Larry was sweating and probably being eaten alive by those dam bugs. How do these people stand this I wondered? Are they immune to them? Do they not like that taste of the natives islanders? Looking back I can honestly say I’ve always been a bug magnet. I think it has something to do with living all my life in California where there are no bugs to speak of. I remember when we first moved to Boston I couldn’t believe how the New Englanders could sit outside on a summer’s evening while the mosquitoes swarmed them and I would run inside and peek out at them behind the protection of plate glass and watched in amazement, as they were so relaxed having cocktails on our outdoor patio not bothered a bit by those things landing on them.

So, there were and no ticket agent for about an hour. It was pure hell and stupidity. I’d take turns with Larry and he’d go inside a bit. But he certainly took the brunt of the time outside and the bugs. At one point I asked a ticket agent that did finally arrive but for the other charter line if I couldn’t bring Ziggy inside and keep him in the crate? “No!” was all she said. What’s the big deal here? Ziggy went everywhere in Harbor Island but suddenly they think this run down piece of crap of an airport building has this holier than tho attitude about dogs.

Finally the Bahamian Airline ticket agent arrived. She was dropped off out front by her husband or boyfriend and she strolled in at a snails pace with her nose in the air and feeling not one bit of guilt about having us here so early. She could care less. So, Larry checked the bags and then went back outside again with Ziggy and waited. I peer out the window at him and see he’s now doing the jig with his arms, constantly wiping them with his hands hoping to deter any little no see um not giving them time to deposit that painful toxic itch potion under his epidermal layer.

DOG PARANOIA

FINALLY, the friggin’ plane arrived, late as usual, and then it was the sudden rush to get Ziggy on the plane. The little porter rushed out and said to “Pick the dog up and carry him to the ticket counter. It time to go! You must put him in the crate there. You must carry!” Geezh, these friggin people! Why can’t he walk in there I thought? This is so stupid!

It was quick though, once in the crate, we were rushed to the plane and in Zig went with the bags into the cargo hold. It was hotter than hell out and we were so worried about him in that cargo area that’s got to be like a baking oven. Never again! There was nothing we could do about this horrible situation. We could hear him barking all the way to Nassau.

WHERE ARE WE? NASSAU?

Yes that was another surprise. We landed in Nassau but were told we’d be landing in Governor’s Harbor first and then Nassau. I very relieved when I looked out the window and recognized Nassau and knew that would be the first stop. I was worried that if we stopped to pick up or let off people in Governor’s Harbor the heat in the cargo would get too hot while they dilly dallied with the bags for people getting on and off and it would make it too hot for Zig in the crate. We were both a wreck worrying about it.

HUMAN SARDINES

We were also so uncomfortable as it was a small prop plane that held about 50 people but should have been more like twenty to be humanly comfortable. What kind of designer would design such an uncomfortable claustrophobic carrier? This is nothing but an instrument of torture I thought to myself. I barely had space for my purse below the seat ahead of me and then to top it off the woman in front of me who had some extra space because she was sitting in the exit seat with plenty of leg room put her seat in reclining position in this little stinking plane! I’m not a small or short person and I was so crammed in that I thought I could punch her. Meanwhile she’s up there she’s lounging, and stretching and snoozing for a 20 minute flight.

Once you were squeezed in to these seats you are never again able to move a body part until landing and de-boarding. As I looked around I noticed the plane is a filthy run down mess. I tried to look out the window and could barely see through it’s scratched surface but could clearly make out the nearby wing and prop which were filthy with black oil and soot and the nails or whatever that hold the metal plates to the frame looked loose. Geez, why are we here and doing this? Do they take care of the engine with the same filthy careless run down attitude that is viewable on everything else? What about the pilots? Who are they? Oh my gosh, never again I thought. I’ve had it with this kind of airplane travel. I didn’t realize how nice it was traveling all these places with our boat. We could’ve arrived to our destination in the same amount of time and had none of these hassles. Geez is all I can say. We didn’t know how good we had it.

Larry is equally uncomfortable and frustrated but continually reminds me that the reason we are dealing with this is because of Ziggy. “We’re traveling with a dog,” he says bluntly. He’s right I guess but it doesn’t make it right. I think to myself that it could have been a bit better without Ziggy but not much!

ALONE ON THE TARMAC

We finally touched ground in Nassau and everyone gets off the plane and heads into the airport buildings. We stand outside of the plane wondering about Ziggy. Where are no baggage handlers? There is no one to be seen, absolutely no one. We could have walked several yards in either direction and climbed into another plane and no one would have known the difference or we could’ve skipped or did a jig across the international air strip with the same uninterested result. This place is ridiculous.

After standing there a couple minutes, Larry finally climbed back up the stair to the plane and got the pilot out of the cockpit (who I guess was doing some paperwork or sleeping) and told the pilot we needed to get out dog out! He was a nice black guy and came back out with Larry, and calmly, like it was as normal as could be, opened up the cargo door for us and walked away. There was poor Ziggy staring out through the wire mesh in his crate barking like a crazed animal until he saw us. I reached up and opened the door to the crate and got Ziggy onto my shoulders and then down. We are so grateful to the pilot for letting us get him. He was fine and so happy to see us.

Once we got Ziggy’s leash on, the pilot is long gone by now and still there is no one around. We could’ve raided the cargo hold for valuables I guess but weren’t interested. So there we are on the tarmac and wondered where do we go now? We started to walk towards the buildings but what door do we take? Where do we go? We finally decide on one door and go in and no one seems to care or even wonder where we’ve been or what we’ve been doing out there on our own with the planes and a dog on a leash. Maybe they thought we had to take him out for a dump or pee on the tarmac. Who knows in this place? I wonder if they would have noticed if we had both been stark naked? (Probably not.)

We manage to find the baggage claim area finally, but the baggage of course is not there because there is no one getting the baggage. We know that because we left the cargo door to the plane open and no one was there when left. Maybe we should have rummaged through it and got our baggage ourselves. It certainly would have been more efficient. If only we could’ve carried it all ourselves it probably would have been a good idea. Speaking of that, now we had to figure out how to carry the baggage for the next leg of this wonderful adventure.

We now were facing a six hour lay over until our next flight of horror which will hopefully get us to the Abacos and our final destination for this week. I was secretly contemplating suggesting to Larry to get another flight straight to Fort Lauderdale and out of this mess. I don’t understand why we had to go through all of this when it would have been a simple little straight flight of 20 minutes from Eleuthera to the Abacos. It’s all a wonder to me, but no, we have to go to Nassau first. Shit in a can is what this is.

ONE ARMED BAGGAGE HANDLER

Well, Larry still had a hard day ahead. He had to manage all that dam baggage now and get it to the Bahamian ticket counter so we hopefully could check it in and not have to deal with it for six hours. Our answer arrived or so we thought. An old ragged black guy comes up to us with a baggage cart and mumbles something to Larry about helping us with the bags. He’s got an official looking name tag clipped to his shirt so we think he must be okay. Larry kind of looked at him suspiciously but said “Yes, we need help, when the bags eventually come out.” Once that was decided the guy stuck to us closer than glue. As we were standing there waiting, this is when we noticed this rag tag guy was missing one arm. Not only this he was old as the hills and I think I got a few whiffs of alcohol on his breath. He cleverly kept the one armed part hid until we committed to his service. How is this guy ever picked the profession of bag handler with one arm is beyond me but the good thing was he seemed to have a hold of the only cart in the airport that we could see. Larry and I looked at each and the look in our eyes said everything. There was no need of words for this next predicament. Oh well.

As we were waiting, he kept mumbling something to Larry, who has a bit of a tin ear, couldn’t make out what he was saying. Finally Larry had him speak louder and it turned out that he was asking if Larry would part with some money to support his 11 year daughter. Larry said “Your tip will help support you daughter”. What next? You never know what is next around here. This guy surely was too old to have a 10 year old daughter I thought. We got a taste of this scam once before in Eleuthera when we stopped our rental car to ask someone along the roadside some directions and the first thing that comes out is “Would we like to make a donation for their daughters?”

Finally, after I don’t know how long, the bags arrived. I didn’t care of course how long it took because I had Ziggy and he was fine. Of course the conveyor belt wasn’t working so the baggage handler behind the wall would just put one bag down at a time and the passengers had to get them out of the way so he would put the next baggage down. It was just more stupid chaos. Larry of course had to get all the bags and load the cart because the one armed alcoholic octogenarian porter couldn’t pick up anything if his life depended on it. It didn’t matter though, as again, he had the one and only cart.

Okay, so now the cart is loaded to the ceiling and the bags are teetering and I had as Larry was loading the cart the porter was trying to direct Larry on how he should be piling the bags for maximum efficiency. It could have been so funny if the day hadn’t been so terrible. Soon the four of us headed off to the other side of the airport to Bahamian ticket counter. We must have been a funny sight.

CUBANS

Larry got in line and thought he picked the shortest of three lines to get in. We weren’t sure what line meant what because there was a pack of Cubans in all three lines though only one sign saying “Havana”. It was again another Bahamian mess. None of the Cubans spoke a word of English and when they got to the ticket counter it was like a war would break out between the ticket agent and the Cubans. It took for ever to check any of them in and not with out fierce arguments and looks of distrust between all parties and several consultations with the person who happened to be nearby or behind or one of what looked like many relatives. It was like none of them trusted anybody. I guess with Castro in charge it’s only natural for them to be so distrustful.

The last guy in line ahead of us was having some problem with his luggage and we couldn’t quite figure out what was wrong. He kept moving stuff from one bag to the next hoping to satisfy the ticket agent. First he unzipped one bag and grabbed all his underwear out of it and stuffed it into another bag and then nodded to the agent asking if that satisfied him but that didn’t seem to do it for the agent so then he’d move something else to another bag and so it went on and on for about 20 minutes. He finally left without ever getting his bags checked. Larry and I were giving each other the looks. Nothing made sense here.

SIX HOUR LAYOVER

Finally we got to the counter and were able to check our bags for our flight that was six hours from now. I was shocked because I thought that would be impossible considering everything else that had been happening around here. Oh, but there was one glitch. He wouldn’t check the dog carrier. No matter how we reasoned with him there was no way. We had planned to get a taxi and head to the center of Nassau to have lunch at our favorite place called Café Matisse during this six hour lay over. They have a lovely restaurant and outdoor patio area where Ziggy can sit with us undisturbed. Were we going to have to lug that dog carrier with us to the restaurant and back we thought? Larry was determined no matter what obstacles we had to face. If said to me “If we have to take the dam carrier with us that was what we were going to do”. While he continued to argue with the ticket agent about having already paid for Ziggy and that we hadn’t been charged for over weight bags on any of the other flights, and etc., I watched this black lady agent who looked like the supervisor. She was solving problems with other people and with an air of authority. I went up to her and asked if we couldn’t check the carrier and have them hold it for us in the back so we could leave for several hours to have lunch in Nassau. “Oh certainly Madame” was her answer. Go figure. Does anything make sense here? So I waved to Larry and told him what she said and he said “Well have her tell that to this ticket agent then!” He was getting madder than a hatter.

So, we finally got the carrier checked but were told we had to be back at least by 3:00 (the plane supposed to leave at 4:00) to get Zig in the carrier. Okay, we thought, we’ll deal with that ordeal later.

NO DOGS IN TAXI!

Oh we were so happy now as we headed out the door to get a taxi. Or so we thought. “No dogs in the taxi!” the cab drivers said. What? We drove all over Nassau two years ago with Ziggy in the taxis what this business now? What kind of #@$% is this now! One guy finally said “Well, maybe but have to ride in carton!” they said.

“We just checked the “carton”! There no carton!” Larry yelled. One guy let us in his cab, but at the last moment not Ziggy. He said he had to check with the policeman first. I got back out and had had it. “I’m sick of this” I told Larry and resigned myself to having to stay in this awful airport for six hours... So out of frustration we walked up to the other end of the airport and there was no problem there. We got a taxi with the nicest black guy. He drove us to Café Matisse and we made arrangements for him to pick us up after lunch to bring us back. We don’t understand anything that goes on here!

CAFÉ MATISSE

Lunch was fabulous as usual at Café Matisse. I just love the place, the atmosphere, the friendly owner, the food, the service and its civilized something we thought had been misplaced in this strange paradise. It’s a wonderful to go. We both ordered a martini to dampen our frayed nerves. I was secretly hoping to numb myself to get through the next leg of this nightmare but sadly the buzz wore off as we entered the airport again for the final leg of the journey.

SMUGGLING AT THE AIRPORT

We both were secretly scheming about we could maybe not check Ziggy in until the very last second as we by now have these people down. We didn’t want him sitting somewhere in the crate where we couldn’t be sure if he was cool and comfortable or hot and dead and also make sure he got on the plane or even the right plane. Larry decided we were going to just walk through security as natural as can be with a dog on a leash and see how far we get.

We waited in the main area of the airport as long as we felt we should before going through. Then, we gathered Zig up and headed in for battle. I carried Zig and walked behind Larry as a buffer. Larry put his computer in the tray and then I put my purse in the tray as they headed down the conveyor belt for x-ray. It was my turn to walk through the security scanner and the lazy looking guards didn’t seem to think anything was abnormal, in fact the one woman, said I needed to remove Zig’s collar and go through again when the loud buzzer went off. I quickly retraced my steps and then went through without Zig’s collar. No big deal! Amazing!

Okay we were this far and nobody has stopped us. We found two seats over out of the way in the waiting room and settled in to wait this out and figure our next strategy. I’m almost getting myself sick worrying about this and wondering when the guard is going to come and throw us in the Nassau goal (jail house). When they announce the boarding Larry wants us to try to carry Zig all the way to the plane. He thinks maybe we can just carry him aboard without any one noticing. He said the last flight had no stewardess (because there was no space to cram her I thought) and this probably will be the same. Who will know? If not, and they discover what we are doing, they can just get the crate out of the cargo hold at the plane and we’ll put him in it there and make sure he gets on the plane.

“What if they are holding the crate behind at the ticket counter like they were supposed to do?” I asked.

“Then they’ll have to go get it!” Larry responded, determined.

“What if they can’t find the crate?” I say. “They might not let us on the plane then and what will we do?

He said “We’ll worry about that if and when it comes to that.”

So the minutes ticked by as we sat, as incognito as possible, waiting for the boarding announcement to be made. Finally, it was time. We kind of crowded into the group going through the door and no one noticed. Okay we’re back out on the tarmac area again with Ziggy under my arm. How far can we get? I wondered. That’s where charade ended as I tried to go up the steps and into the plane. This darn plane had a stewardess and she said the dog would have to ride in the cargo area. So she called the baggage guy and he found the crate (which was loaded on the plane) and we put him in and watched as he loaded Ziggy into the hold of the plane. It wasn’t so bad this time as we had him with us up until the very last minute and not in some unknown storage area all this time. And the plane took off shortly so he wasn’t sitting in the heat long.

SAFETY ISSUES

I was still a wreck but not as bad as the last flight. We had more space on this plane and at least some leg room. The plane still was another run down dirty plane and the stewardess put on airs as if she were in charge of the first class section of Singapore Airlines but of course offered no service. I had to laugh when she put on the safety tape and began to demonstrate the safety exits and seat belts, etc. The voice was some snobby sounding English woman that sounded so bored to death that I thought she’d fall asleep before she ended the recording. I watched intently because I wasn’t so sure this heap of a plane would make it and wanted to make sure I knew all my options. But the real clincher was when the stewardess was demonstrating the life jacket and the sample jacket had all sorts of broken parts and was finally missing the whistle that the snobby recording said “If all else fails, blow the orange plastic whistle attached to the top collar area” and the stewardess couldn’t find it.

GOING TO MISS THE WATER TAXI

We soon arrived at our next destination, Treasure Cay, and we by now were cutting it close on time to catch the water taxi to our final island of destination, Green Turtle Cay. We still had to get the bags and get a taxi to the ferry landing hopefully all in a couple minutes. It was impossible but seemed like the smallest hurdle we would have to cross of the day. Larry gets Ziggy and gives him to me and yells at me to get a taxi ready while he gets the bags. I try to get a taxi but they won’t let me get one until all the bags are ready. I say we need to get to the ferry in time and the black guy looks at his watch and says you don’t have much time.

MORE MISSING BAGS

Larry doesn’t come out for the longest time. Meanwhile, everyone on the plane except for another couple have left and gone. He finally comes out and says to me “They lost the God dam bags again!” The other remaining couple is missing their bags too. I remind him about the ferry and ask if they can’t locate the bags and get them to us like they did on the other stop. He rushes back in and gives them the tag numbers and leaves saying we’ll call him.

SENILE CAB DRIVER

By now, all the good the cabs are gone. The head taxi guy whistles for the last taxi guy to come. He drives up to the curb about two miles an hour. I’m wondering, what’s the matter with him? He takes forever to get out of the taxi. I think the guy is senile, no kidding. He looks very old and totally confused. I thought at this pace there was no way on earth we were going to get there in time. He’s moving like a snail and finally I say “We have to hurry, move it, we’ve got to catch the ferry!” He slowly looks at his watch and says “It should be gone by now”. Larry throws the bags in the back while he stands there studying his watch and Larry hops in slams the door and says “Let’s go”. So, at worse than a snails pace, we drive to the ferry landing. Fortunately, some other people that were on the plane are there too. There’s a big wedding on the island and they couldn’t fit everyone going to the wedding on the first ferry so (thank you God) they had to come back to pick these people up and us of course.

NO ONE TO MEET US

So we made it. The ferry guy dropped us off at a small dock at Green Turtle Cay and a lady was there waiting to give us the golf cart. The woman who was supposed to be there to show us the way to the rental house and the particulars of the house didn’t show up but fortunately I remembered where the house was and we found it. It was unlocked and that’s all we cared about.

ALL OVER? HARDLY

All was well I thought at the end of this miserable day until Larry said the last exasperating thing that happened. There hadn’t been time to tell me in the confusion at the airport with the missing bags. Why he was waiting for the bags to come out of the plane he went to the ticket counter and reconfirmed our next flight out in a week, on Continental, and that’s when they informed him that they can’t fly Ziggy out! No dogs! What? When he booked the flight he told them of the dog but no one said a word about no dogs. Now what? What next? How the hell are we going to get home now?

STUCK IN THE ABACOS

We’ll figure it out I’m sure. Another day, another story.

I finally made sense of the last place...(Harbor Island)

Well, I was beginning to think I needed to check myself in. Could this vacation be so bad I thought or is it just us? We should be so grateful I’d think to myself, just to be able to be here and enjoy the weather, water and beach. I think some of it had to do with the bug bites. We were miserable right off the bat with that. They would burn and itch and you could only grit your teeth trying not to itch them and the other half of the problem was that dang house. It was really designed for a crowd of people mostly people with kids. We looked through the whole house during our stay to see what the other rooms were like incase you ever wanted to bring a whole family down. They had rooms crammed with bunk beds and twin beds and we figured that counting the sofa in the living room that could be made out into a bed (sofa bed) you could literally stuff 12 people into the house at one time.

Then suddenly it made sense to have the cook and maid. If you had a group of 12 people and kids you could order up all the supplies at Pigly Wigly, have them delivered and call the maid to put them away. Why not have the cook do it all then? Imagine all the work to cook and clean up for 12 people. Poor Betsy, she then would officially be the slave then. And then Betsy, the maid, would literally need the 6 hours a day just to clean up after 12 people. I guess then I could understand rationing the guests to one set of towels a week and one change of sheets a week, and limit their toilet paper use and water consumption, well sort of. But who would want to rent their house out to 12 people? Eee Gad! I kept thinking of that poor young couple that bought the house next door, the small cute colonial cottage. Imagine the noise and disruption when 12 new renters crammed in next door each week, mostly little kids. That’s it! The light bulb went on! I finally made sense out of the place. That’s why there was so much junk around. It was a kid’s joint! Larry kept saying it to me but it just didn’t click. Even so, I still can’t imagine telling someone that paid good money to stay in my house, that they were limited to one roll of toilet paper a week and one bottle of water to drink, after that "buy your own". Shouldn’t you just provide that at least?

Abacos was night and day from the last place....

Well, this rental place in the Abacos, Green Turtle, to be exact, on the other hand, is totally the opposite. There are no posted rules except a small little note asking if you could please conserve and not waste the water because what they use is all rain water and to please keep the garbage secure because there are a lot of bugs on the island and some cats and roosters otherwise like to make a mess of it. That’s it! Now, that's more like it. Aah, finally, a reasonable person at last.

And guess what? There were rolls of toilet paper too, as much as you needed and bath towels, and a washer and dryer to use with soap provided! Wasn't all that stuff at Harbor Island ridiculous? It was night and day.

I immediately loved this little beach house. It looked like something out of the old days in Key West. You imagined Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall to be lounging around on the porch. It had a walk around porch, the back side of which was screened in and big Adirondack chairs on the deck to just sit and take in the magnificent ocean view right at your door step. We had the whole beach to ourselves literally. The inside was what you would imagine the beach cottage to be with big wooden storm doors to open and let the ocean air in. The furniture though old had character, it was vintage bamboo and fabric. There were lots of great books left to read with interesting titles instead of the last place and tons of great videos for the TV too. Yes, we had TV! It was rustic but perfect.

The Perfect Beach

Our little beach was protected by a natural reef and it was like we had our own private protected swimming beach that had nothing more than small ankle high waves. There was a little island several yards off that you could swim to and at low tide the shore for a ½ mile revealed lots of little tide pools formed in the rock formations and you’d find all sorts of things there, shells, fish, crabs, interesting, no, fascinating things. This finally was my idea of paradise!