Enjoying sightseeing around New Plymouth

Day 17: Thursday March 12, 2015       

It is always great sleeping in a boat tied to a dock.  I have a deep trust in the holding power of my anchor, however, I am always a bit on guard during the night.

We decided to treat ourselves to a breakfast cooked by a professional. So we fired up the dinghy and headed for the village of New Plymouth.  As we were leaving Black Sound (the site of our marina) I noted that the waves in the open water had not yet built so I decided to make the 3 or 4 mile trip to Green Turtle Cay Marina and Resort to fill two of our three gas tanks.  This is a really upscale marina that obviously caters to the bigger boats of well healed owners.  It seems that the fuel tanker had not been in the area for a while and most of the smaller marinas had run out of fuel.

With our tanks full, we headed back to continue our journey to New Plymouth.  We tied up at the public dock and began walking through this lovely little village.  Pictures best describe this quaint little village.  The street are really narrow. Many are no more than 1 vehicle wide.  The majority of traffic are golf carts that are used as trucks and personal cars.  These vehicles can be rented for about $50.00 per day and it is amazing to see how many have what are obviously tourists sporting them around.

Typical street and neighborhood in New Plymouth

Most all of the houses are nicely painted in pastel pinks, blues and yellows and are highly maintained with pride.  The lawns and landscape appears to be almost professionally done.  It is an amazing contrast to what we saw in West End on Grand Bahama.

We had been advised that a restaurant called McIntosh would be the best bet for breakfast and we were definitely not disappointed. Janine enjoyed a ham and cheese omelet and I had a blueberry waffle with sausage links.  We had a nice conversation with the lady who waited on us.  She lives on another Cay and rides to New Plymouth every day on a ferry.

MIntosh Restaurant

Back out on the street, we ran into another couple who had spent the night in the neat anchorage near Crab Cay.  They also passed us as we were motoring between Crab Cay and Green Turtle Cay. 

New Plymouth Cemetary

Across the street from the restaurant is the cemetery for the village. It is also very well maintained and surrounded by pink fence and concrete walls that may house some sort of a vault burial system.  The island is coral and basically solid rock so the interred cannot be buried very deep. area

On down the street we came past a museum,a memorial garden honoring many importaint forebearers of this area, numerous shops and eating establishments.  We went into a well-stocked hardware store where I bought a 1 ½ foot piece of 1 inch PVC pipe to use as a replacement tiller on the Honda outboard.  The wooden stick I have been using is not working well.

Memorial Garden

Finally we stopped at a grocery where we picked up some supplies.  The prices were really high.  We bought a box of Ritz Crackers at a fee of $8.65.  Too much but we needed our crackers.

We walked back to the dinghy and motored back to the boat.  We spent the rest of the morning doing various chores around the boat.  I rebuilt the tiller while Janine blanched the eggs that we had purchased in preparation for our warm storage system.

We prepared our usual lunch.  I got out the tortillas that we had made several days earlier and found them to be moldy.  We have been carrying store bought tortillas as a replacement for bread because they last a long time without molding, however, the ones we made were moist and needed to be tossed.  On our next attempt, we will make them thinner and fry them longer.

We spent the afternoon wandering about taking pictures and interacting with restaurant turned out to be a great choice.  I had cracked lobster with a salad and our neighbors.  One neighbor is on a 32 foot sailboat.  He and his wife sold their restaurant business in Canada and bought this boat here on Green Turtle Cay having never sailed in their lives.  The boat is older and has some problems but they are living their dream. They have taken the boat out several times but are not very good at sailing, however, they are learning and have a positive attitude.

We gathered suggestions for our evening dining event and decided to take the dinghy across Black Sound to a public dock and walk the remaining way into New Plymouth.  As we entered the village, the first restaurant appeared to be nice with

Memorial Park

 
two small groups enjoying beverages on a screened in porch.  The “Wrecking Tree” a Guinness while Janine had fried fish and ice tea with lots of ice. 

Second Wind moored at high tide

The first two groups left and another group of 6 folks from Franklin PA arrived. We struck up a conversation with these folks who had come down and rented a house in a really lovely subdivision.   We laughed and talked for a while before departing.

Back out on the streets, Janine and I walked around the outer perimeter of New Plymouth.  We passed several more eating establishment and bars before heading back toward the dinghy.  Our path back took us again by the Wrecking Tree where our new PA friends were finishing up their meal.  We stopped and continued our conversation.  They offered to give us a ride on their golf cart and show us areas of the island that we had yet to visit.  These folks had sent the day cruising all of the back streets and gravel paths that travel through all various parts of the island.  Our driver and chauffer were Jim and Jack. They had picked up a brochure that laid out all of the interesting sites on the island and had visited them all so they were a wealth of information about the place.  We rode and laughed around the Cay for probably close to an hour before they took us back to the dinghy.  We said our goodbyes and headed back to Second Wind in almost total darkness. 

Back at the boat, we buttoned things up and were in bed by around 9:00.  Another wonderful day in the Bahamas.  I could get usedS+ to this!