I have become quite the fan of the mollusk.  Particularly these big guys.  That's the whole critter above once removed from its shell.  Yes, it does look like something from another planet, and cleaning them takes a little getting used to.  The flavor of the meat is sweet; somewhere between shrimp and crab, but is best (in my opinion) eaten raw with lime juice.  Conch are all over the place here.  As a matter of fact, they are so abundant that the locals use their shells to build walls with concrete mortar.  I'm not going to be turning down free food while I'm here, so I plan to take full advantage.

By the way, saw the largest shark I have ever seen in the wild the other evening while looking around for conch near north Man O War cut. Visibility was a little poor, but it was probably a nurse shark. I estimate i'ts length was over 7ft.  I'm not supposed to be scared of those things, but I do know a few things:  It was a shark much bigger than me, it was interested in me for at least a while (or it would not have been there), and it is hard to look intimidating with a stupid mask on your face and a snorkel in your mouth.

This is a picture I took while at Guana Cay.  Kinda shows your daily afternoon thunderstorm madness during the summer months.  These things come out of NOWHERE and go WHEREVER they want.  I recall not getting a drop of rain that day even though I was surrounded by these for a couple of hours.  So I have stopped trying to guess the forecast and just go with it.  What else can ya do?

Don't know what my plan is.  Maybe Marsh Harbor in a few days.

  Nothing quite like winding down in the cozy cabin dry as a bone while the rain comes down outside.  Feels like a little victory.  

   Nice long and relaxing day at the beach, cleaned up the boat a little, short trip to the bank, made some soup.  Not a dollar spent on anything today.  

   

   Why the fuck didn't I start doing this sooner...?

Too much to cover in the last week or so.  Tropical Storm Arthur decided to stick around for a couple of days over the Abacos and gave me about 6 inches of rain.  Continued to rain for a couple more says nonstop so I was in the cabin for most of it.  Boat did just fine, even though I was in an unprotected anchorage at Green Turtle Cay.

Went north to Manjack Cay for a couple of days and fed stingrays, sharks, and turtles.  Very cool.  Also found some conch and tried my hand at cleaning one.  This will take some more practice ;).  Since I had the entire island to myself for most of the time, I did a little exploring and furiously battled the mosquitoes  There is not enough DEET in the world.

Patiently waiting for squid.  One did accidentally bite me (since I put my damn fingers in its mouth), but no biggy they don't have big teeth and I could tell it was sorry.

 
Decent Cero Mackerel caught just off of Whale Cay on the way to Guana Cay.  Tasted pretty good too.

So now I'm anchored in Fisher's Bay, Guana Cay.  Just up the hill is Nippers, the everyday party venue in the Abacos.  I'm bound to head up there pretty soon, just hoping the budget holds out (it wont).

Now that internet is more readily available in this area, I'm going to try to post every day for a while. Maybe.