Category Archives: Self-Guided Tourist Activities

Father Jerome’s Hermitage, New Bight, Cat Island, Bahamas

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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.

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Rafting Down The Rio Grande in Portland, Jamaica

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Thursday, March 6 — Our friends on the Kadey Krogan had recommended that we do a river rafting tour down the Rio Grande, and had recommended a guide. We’d called him a few days ago and had made arrangements for him to pick us up today at 0900. Unfortunately, he wasn’t a good communicator. He said the price was $95 for a two-person raft. We were unclear on whether we were renting one raft or two rafts, and if only one raft, if there was a charge for a third person. We were also unclear on whether the cost included transportation to the river. 

At 0900, we were greeted at the marina gate by two men; Michael was our driver and Louis our rafting guide. We left town via the same road that follows East Harbor that we’d taken yesterday, but instead of following the shoreline, he turned inland and took us up the mountain. The road was narrow and full of potholes, but it was scenic. Here is a view of the blue mountains.

As expected, the farther away from town we got, the less dense the homes along the road. While there were some dilapidated homes, the majority appeared to be well built and well cared for.  There were quite a few large homes, as well.

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Keith’s Perspective on Site Seeing in Panama/Le point de vue de Keith sur les visites touristiques au Panama

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This week it feels like not a lot of stuff happened, even though a lot of stuff happened. On Saturday, a bird pooped on mom’s arm. After that we got on the bus and went to a really good pizza place. We had gelato for desert. On Sunday, I did D&D, but one of my friends was DMing. He made his own version of D&D (which isn’t really D&D because it made no sense). On Monday, I convinced my friend to have dad DM. In the evening we did Civ VI. 

Gelato in the suburbs of Colon

On ne dirait que rien ne s’est passé cette semaine mais beaucoup de choses se sont passées. Samedi un oiseau a fait caca sur le bras de maman. Après ça on a pris le bus et on a mangé à une très bonne pizzeria. On a mangé une glace pour le dessert. Dimanche, j’ai joué à Donjons Et Dragons, mais un de mes ami était le Maitre Du Donjon. Il a fait sa propre édition de Donjons Et Dragons, mais c’était pas vraiment du Donjons Et Dragons parce que ça ne faisait pas de sens. Lundi, J’ai convaincu mon ami de laisser Papa être le maitre du donjon. Le soir, papa, nos amis et moi avons joué à Civ VI. 

Coffee and smoothies in Panama City
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Portobelo, Colon Province, Panama

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Thanks to cloud cover, the sun itself was not visible on Wednesday, February 19, but it was still a colorful sunrise.

We decided to keep the car for another day to go to the town of Portobelo, which was about 80 km (50 miles) away from the marina. Portobelo was a small town with a nice bay and protected anchorage that was popular with the cruisers. It was a pivotal part of Spain’s colonial rule, so it was historically significant. Since we wouldn’t be going to Portobelo by boat, we thought it would be fun to go by car. 

On our way out of Ft. Sherman, we decided to make a quick stop at the public beach. Since we’d driven by it so many times, we felt like we should at least stop and see it up close. It was a man-made beach, south of the Coast Guard base, along the road to the bridge. It was usually packed on the weekends. The US military had put in, and it was lined with more of the same housing structures that we’d seen at the loop… except these were in much worse shape. 

We parked in the small parking lot and ventured in. Maybe it was the gloomy weather, but the beach felt sad. There were dilapidated buildings, sunken ships and a lot of trash strewn around. Someone had put up a series of palapas, but most of them had fallen apart into hunks of debris that added to the trash.

Taken from the south end of the beach, looking north. The buildings at the tip of the peninsula are the coast guard base
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Keith’s Perspective on Sites Around Ft. Sherman/Le point de vue de Keith sur les sites autour de Fort Sherman

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This week has been interesting. Saturday we went to an old Spanish fort. It was destroyed and rebuilt three times! It was really hot that day, and I wanted to go back pretty soon. 

Tree with a giant branch at the fort

Cette semaine était intéressante. Samedi on a vu un ancien chateau fort espagnol. Il a été cassé et re-construit trois fois! Il faisait très chaud ce jour là, et je voulais rentrer très vite.

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