Jumentos and Ragged Islands

We had partied a lot at the Family Island Regatta in Georgetown, then decided to head down to the Jumentos & Ragged Islands for some Tropical Vacationing! Our first stop was Flamingo Cay. That was a quick, overnight stop for us and also where we experienced a huge thunderstorm several years ago where the waves were huge with lots of thunder & lightning and we actually got a couple of things on our boat electrocuted! My Mom imagined it was like the World being created! When we anchored this time it was really hard and took a long time because there wasn’t a lot of sand the anchor could grab on. We walked the beach and found a beautiful Helmet Shell, which is gorgeous and has white stripes and pretty brown splotches and is just amazing! Usually they have residents in them, a crab that uses the shell as it’s home, and in that case you really should not take the shell and kill the animal for no other reason. In this case, we got lucky and found the shell vacant, so we kept it. Raccoon Cay was our next stop. That is a great one and is a lot of fun to swim in the water and walk the beach. We walked ashore on this sand flat and looked for sand dollars. You probably know what they are, but if you don’t they are white circles with star slits in the middle. We found 80 sand dollars! We kept about 30 and then put the rest back like an Easter Egg Hunt. It was really cool! From there we went further south to Double Breasted Cay and hung out there for a little bit. It is beautiful there and we went ashore and played and walked to the other side where it is rocky and there is lots of stuff washed up on the beach. We hung out there for a couple of days and looked for Sea Beans (or Sea Hearts). They are these brown beans that are shaped like a heart. We found like 45 Sea Beans! The island is beautiful and we were pretty much the only boat there! We went around the corner to a place called Johnson Cay, a very pretty tiny island enclosed by rocks with a beautiful long beach in front of you! It is lots of fun and we spent time walking around and looking for Sea Beans … (none of which we found). Here was the spot where we harvested our first conch, learned how to get the conch out of the shell and clean them, then we made very tasty conch fritters … that seemed to take all day long. We took a trip to a place called Duncan Town, population around 60 residents and the only Settlement in the 100-mile long Ragged Island chain. At this point we were 60 miles from Cuba and we could hear people from there on the radio. It is definitely an interesting place and to get to town you have to dinghy through a mangrove swamp and bush channel. We walked all around and went to the grocery store, which consists of a few bags of chips, drinks, canned foods and some cookies. Then we walked up to the school, which is a yellow rectangular building and has playground equipment. I met this boy whose name is Renn and he followed me around while we did Internet on our computers. After exploring the town, we went back to our boat and guess what we saw … people on a Mega Yacht! We were thrilled to finally see people! They were really nice, we invited them to a beach bonfire and roasted marshmallows & hot dogs and had fun talking to the Captain Peter and his Mate Monty. The place where we had the bonfire is really cool and we thought of it like a Cruiser’s hang out. We actually got invited by the owners Vicki & Alan on the Mega Yacht Victory. It is 80 feet long and is an extremely pretty boat! The inside is huge and amazing, very well done and taken care of. It was a lot of fun and we got to have tea and scones with Alan & Vicky. We moved down to Hog Cay, which is beautiful and really pretty! We snorkeled & spear fished and that sort of turned into an all day event and by 7:00 pm, what do you know, a shark showed up looking for dinner in a fast a sharp movement search! We kept telling my Dad it was time to get out of the water and leave and the shark should have his own space … and finally… we persuaded him and left! Woooo hooo! After being able to explore the beautiful island we decided to do a long overnight trip to Staniel Cay and I entertained myself by playing, reading a little, schoolwork, and watching a movie. We had a safe trip to Staniel Cay and I am now here and playing with my friends on Side By Side.

I will be posting another Blog and I hope you enjoyed this one! Take care and have a good life! Keep in touch with me! Who knows what the next decision will be or where the wind will blow?!