The cruise part two...

CocoCay, Bahamas

Monday 26th September was a beautiful day and we arrived in the Bahamas at CocoCay, an island owned by Royal Caribbean.  It was so warm, the sea a beautiful blue, soft sand and palm trees everywhere - paradise.  I had booked myself on an ecoboat tour, but had a bit of time to kill beforehand so wandered around the colourful market.

CocoCay Coconuts!

Perry, the tour guide was extremely knowledgeable and entertaining.  CocoCay is also known as Little Stirrup Cay and is part of the Berry chain of islands, and is about 50 miles from Nassau.

Freedom of the Sea at CocoCay

 It was so refreshing to feel the seaspray and cool breeze while on the tour, and every so often we'd stop and Perry would stand in the bow of the boat with a big fishing net then pull things out of the sea.

Conch

 First we got to hold a large conch, beautiful colours and Perry told us that this one was around 5 years old and was going to be his dinner that evening :)

 Next came a large starfish, they become hard to the touch when out of water to protect themselves, and would soften again when returned to the sea and no longer felt under threat.

Stingray

After the boat tour, I wandered around the island for a while, and had a paddle in the sea.

I spotted a little hermit crab trying to climb it's way up the steps to the bar - maybe it wanted a Crabbies Gingerbeer(teehee).

We had a barbecue lunch on the island, and I found a great spot on a picnic bench in the shade of some trees.  A few people were making their way to another table then all of a sudden I saw them tearing off in the opposite direction - I wondered what was happening then I spotted the cause of the uproar, two iguanas decided that they wanted some lunch too!  There were chickens wandering about too, and they didn't seem bothered about the iguanas, so I couldn't resist trying to get close for some photos.  I was trying to get him head on, but he decided that his profile was much more photogenic

iguana

ready for my closeup

 

 Back on board we had our first workshop that evening. I was in group B, our class was at 8:00 that evening.  We decorated an insert for a cup, great first project and the cup proved to be very useful to take to class without worrying about spilling drink on your projects.  It didn't take very much materials to complete the project but as always with Tim we had more then enough supplies to make a different insert for every month if you were so inclined.

Cup of creativity