Sunrise on Friday, April 4

Yesterday, the families agreed to moved to New Bight — the northern part of The Bight Bay — where there were more activities and amenities within easy dinghy/walking distance. Eric had been reluctant to move because we’d heard it was less comfortable in the northern part of the bay, but we couldn’t resist the appeal of more activities/restaurants.

Since we were only moving about 3.5 miles within protected waters, we didn’t do a great job of securing things for sea. We did bring up the dinghy, though. With our dinghy being so lightweight, we didn’t want to take the chance of it flipping it during towing.

We pulled up anchor at about 0830 and by 0915, we were anchored in our new location. As anticipated, up here, the swell and waves came from different directions and it was rolly. We immediately put out the flopper stoppers. With the flopper stoppers out, it was still a tad lurchy, but the motion was fine overall. 

In the early afternoon, the families went for a walk to Father Jerome’s Hermitage. Father Jerome was an Anglican missionary in the Bahamas for over 10 years. He then converted to Catholicism and continued missionary work in Australia. Prior to becoming a missionary, he’d been an architect, and he used his architecture knowledge to build simple, yet beautiful churches. Upon retirement, Father Jerome moved back to the Bahamas and built the Hermitage on the tallest hill in the country, Mt. Alvernia, at 207 feet. He passed away in 1956.

After lunch, we dinghies to shore near the dock. Since the dock was in disrepair, we all beached our dinghies.

There was a road along the shore, and the Office of the Administrator was across the street from where we’d landed.

Here were some of the kids walking on the road that led up the hill. The Hermitage was visible on the left.

There was a mama goat tied up and several baby goats wandering around. Oddly, the babies seemed to be different ages.

At the entrance to the Hermitage, the road turned into a foot path and continued up the hill.

Looking at the beautiful view from the backside of the entrance.

Not far beyond the entrance, the trail split. One way was a steep staircase up, the other a winding, gently sloping trail. We took the staircase.

Along the staircase were a series of carvings called Stations of the Cross. Each carving depicted Jesus’s crucifixion ordeal (If you look at carefully at the photo above, you can see several more).

The front of the Hermitage.

At the top of the staircase was the last Station of the Cross, which depicted that the stone was rolled away from Jesus’s tomb, revealing that the tomb was empty.

The view from the top.

Group photo at the top.

The back of the Hermitage.

The rooms in Hermitage were tiny. It was clearly built for one short, skinny person. This was his bedroom. The photo was taken from the doorjamb — this was the entire room.

This was the chapel. Again, the photo was taken from the doorjamb, so the room was one step deep. To the side of the door was a single chair.

We took the sloping trail back down.

On the road back down, as we were passing the goats, one of the children noticed another goat was trapped in a bush. Like the other mama goat, she’d been tied up, and her leash had gotten tangled around the bushes. Suddenly, it made sense as to why the baby goats were different ages — there were two mamas! The girl convinced her mom, Brenda, to free the goat.

Once we got back to the beach, we all headed back to our respective boats to rest until dinner time… to be continued…