January 23, 2012 Long Island

Monday, January 23, 2012

I was anxious to start the day because we enjoyed ourselves so much on Saturday when we rented a car to see the Southern end of Long Island, I knew we were in for some big treats having a car today and able to see the Northern end.  We decided to head straight up to the Northern tip and work our way back south.  We saw some school children waiting for a bus and as usual, they have uniforms, plaid jumpers, White or sky blue shirts, black pants or skirts.  I love the idea of the school children all having the same clothes.  No competition on who is wearing the best threads here.  The school bus is exactly the same as we have in the US.  I forgot to check which sided the steering wheel was on.  It was obvious the further North we  drove, the move affluent the areas got, dotted with a shack here and there.  I can’t say the same of the streets though.  There again, is one main highway and anything off of it is a luxury to have pavement to drive on.  It would probably cost a fortune to level the limestone rock enough to pave the side roads.  The people are so friendly.  Everyone waves and smiles so we all learned to wave at anyone we passed.  If one wasn’t in a good mood, they would be by the time they got to their destination!   It’s fun to wave and smile!  Fishing and sponging are the main industries here and I think they are all private.  If you know the fisherman, you get the great prices, if not, you pay up the nose for anything.  The main road hugged the waters edge quite often which gave us some pretty amazing surprise views along the way.  We estimated the water was about a foot below the main road on high tide.  It looked that way anyway.  I can’t say enough about the colors down here.  I keep taking pictures not believing the beauty in front of me.  Even still, the camera doesn’t capture it like I see it.  Each view is better than the last, no matter which direction you go.  We saw a black faced sheep, which are common here and were brought to these islands over 200 years ago.  There are not as many wild goats on the Northern part of the island but there was a snake crossing the road.  It’s pretty hard to miss anything since the speed limit is 20 mph here.  I confess, Jay broke the limit pretty much the entire trip and we were traveling at the blazing speed of 30 mph most of the day, except on the side roads, which truly brought us to a crawl.  I enjoyed every inch of those roads from the paved ones to those full of limestone boulders.  We decided, next time, we were renting a hummer, like they use in the deserts.  We finally reached Cape Santa Maria, named by Columbus after his flagship ran aground in the reefs in the area.  The beaches are spectacular.  We did take a few side roads to see some beaches but today was not really a day for shelling, although we did go to one of the top 10 beaches in the world, Cape Santa Maria Beach.  I had to grab some sand!  We climbed to the Columbus Monument and to the Cape Santa Maria Light.  The beaches are secluded and pristine.  It is very easy to find a private beach to spend the day but we can find them too with Casa Mare’ so we bypassed the blanket and suntan lotion.  Further down the road we came to Stella Maris and decided to have lunch at the Moonshine Bar and Grill here on the island and ran into David & Marsha from s/v “Antigone”.  WOW, it was like a commercial.  The waves splashing over the rocks, blues I had never seen before and pristine beaches, again.  You would think, by now, I was used to these colors and beaches but I don’t take one single step without letting God know how grateful I am to be here.  I loved our waitress!  Her husband has a lobster boat.  She offered us some lobster which was at her home but we were too far South to turn around and go back.  Another stop was to see the ruins of Adderleys Plantation, one of the first on the island and ruins it is.  Just to see how they built structures back in the day is fascinating.  A hurricane back in the late 40’s I believe took the plantation as well as the harbor, filling it in with sand making it impossible to enter by boat.  This brought the cotton export to a halt.  Another research I wish I had done.  It was interesting to see and has quite a story behind it’s history, which I will post on my pictures.  It was a fun, relaxing day with Norma and Jay.  We filled the car up with gas and I asked the lady who filled the tank where a good place was to buy Lobster.  She directed us back a few miles, the first right after the market and the 4th crossroad with 3 palm trees at the foot of the drive.  “Atlantic Seafood”  Sound familiar?  We turned one crossroads too soon and came to the sister of the owner of Atlantic Seafood.  Bless her heart, she lost her house to Hurricane Irene, her husband and son died a few years earlier although her nephew has been helping her.  I hated to leave, she was so happy someone stopped by to see her.  She directed us next door where Atlantic Seafood was still there although they lost their sign.  We picked up 16 lobster tails for $28.00.  This was the finest price of anything we had seen since we left Florida.  They eat lobster here like we eat hamburgers from McDonalds in the US.  Needless to say, we brought them back to the boat, packed them up for the freezer and left 2 out for dinner.  Fred cooked them n the grill.  YUMMIEEEE is the word.  I found I can eat these lobsters here without having any allergic reaction.  Fred loves Stasia and cut a piece of his for her but she turned her nose.  We are both complete wore out.  I have turned the SPOT on again and hope it will send.  I will leave it on all night if I need to.  I don’t know why it is not working unless it has something to do with the solar flares recently my Mom told me about.  If the SPOT post us too many times, I am sorry but we have to get this location on our SPOT map!  Fred’s asleep, Stasia is asleep and in less than 5 minutes, I will be too!  It was a great day!