Hiking on Manjack Cay

Day 25:  Friday March 20, 2015

During the night, the winds came up a bit from the southeast and blew into our beautiful anchorage causing the boat to rock and bounce.  It did not make for a very comfortable night’s sleep.

I was up at my usual hour typing the blog while Janine picked up an additional hour of sleep.  We made pancakes and used the last of our bacon.  We bought Tyson’s ready bacon which comes in a good resealable package and we were pleased that it remained good for about 1 ½ weeks after we opened it.  I had read of another cruising family that had no refrigeration and they had a rule that they would never put anything, spoon, knife, fingers, into a sterile package or container after it was opened.  This prevented the introduction of bacteria and therefore reduces the chance of spoilage.  It has worked well for us.  Besides the bacon, we have opened canned jars of salsa and poured small amounts out daily and they lasted upwards near 2 weeks without spoilage or molding. 

We hung around the boat reading and doing various chores until about 10:00 when we fired up the dink and headed to shore.  The gentleman, Frank, who had set up and invited us to the bonfire last evening had told us of trails that led across Manjack Cay and offered that we should hike over to the large beautiful

Franks Lovely Cottage on Manjack Cay

ocean side beach.  And we did. 

The first part of the walk as along a wide (for here) road that eventually ended up at his little cabin.  He had built this cute little yellow home that overlooked the northern lagoon and its white sand beach.  It was obviously quite new and fresh.  He had a short board walk to a separate deck where one could sit and enjoy the ocean view.  He also had built a matching shed/barn in which he keeps his Kubota loader tractor.

Road back to Frank's Cabin

From his cabin, we took another trail that had a sign that directed us to the ocean beach. This trial had not been maintained and we walked about ¾ mile through small shrubs and sticker vines that continually tried to trip you.  At the edge of the ocean, we came across an octagon shaped house that someone had started and had about ¾ of the way completed before they appeared to have abandoned it.  I had a lot of potential but also needed quite a bit of work to complete.

Incomplete apparently abandoned home overlooking the Atlantic

We continued on down the path for another 1/10 mile paralleling the beach before we left the trail, cut through the woods and walked out onto the beautiful white beach.  I had considered going for a swim, however, the surf was rolling in fairly heavily and I decided against it.

We headed back to the other side of the Cay where our dink awaited to carry us back to Second Wind.

Janine overlooking the Atlantic on the beautiful beach

Back on the boat we prepared our typical lunch and settled into a great peaceful although a bit rocky afternoon of reading.  For our evening meal, we decided to open a jar of our turkey soup and found our first canned jar that had gone bad.  For this trip, we probably canned 60 to 70 jars of all types of food and this is the first one that didn’t keep.  We got out another and proceeded to enjoy a nice light evening meal.  We preceded the dinner with a sardine appetizer and quenched our thirst with a warm beer.  We discussed the fact that after a while, one can actually enjoy warm beer.  It ain’t bad!

Dink parked at Frank's Dock

We spent the remaining hours before “cruisers midnight,” 9:00 reading.  This was another good day.