Spanish Wells
This small fishing village was our first of two stops in Eleuthera. Though it is really two small islands connected by a small bridge and not actually Eleuthera, the proximity made me group it together. The town was pretty sleepy, like most Bahamian villages. There were tons of golf carts everywhere and we decided to explore more than we could on foot so we joined the golf cart madness. It was a pretty pair of islands with amazing beaches and sandbars. Turned out to also be really good for running, which allowed Grete to get in a few miles as well. I keep feeling like the Bahamas is a lot hillier than we anticipated, and Spanish Wells and greater Eleuthera continued on that trend.
Eleuthera
We anchored in Hatchet Bay near Alice Town in central Eleuthera. After a few days of being on a hobby horse ride anchored near Spanish Wells, we were very ready for a calm anchorage, even if prettier options might be available. Even still, this anchorage has had beautiful sunsets and is surrounded by small rolling hills covered in vegetation so it isn’t exactly an eyesore. We rented a car from the house two doors down from the dinghy dock so we could explore the long, skinny (me shaped) island. In addition to all of the sightseeing, we also found two places selling gluten free bread (gas station in Gregory Town and Bacchus Fine Foods in Governor’s Harbour). One other place we found (North Eleuthera Shopping Center) had bulk foods, so we got some gallon cans of corn and beans in addition to a big bag of rice.
Pink Sand Beaches
These are not real. We went to two of them. They should definitely call them “regular sand beaches”. There are small red flecks and if you squint and turn your head, near sunset, and know that you are on a pink sand beach, you might be able to convince yourself. Perhaps it’s a cyclic thing and we happen to be here when it isn’t as pink or something, but we went to one without knowing it was a pink sand beach and we didn’t notice.
It reminds me of touring the Palace of Versailles with these girls I met in Paris and one of the girls asking why we didn’t get to see the hall of mirrors. I told her, “We walked through it for like two or three minutes”. The really old polished metal wasn’t her idea of what mirrors look like, so she didn’t see it. Pink sand beaches weren’t any of our idea of what pink sand should look like.
Blue Hole
There are a couple of blue holes on the island. Unlike pink sand beaches, they actually are blue! We went to one in the north end of the island that was discovered by somebody with a drone a few years ago. The Sapphire Blue Hole. It was so obvious why it was named that and was really breathtaking.
There was a platform you could jump from and a ladder to climb back out, but the kids would not have been able to do it and we still planned to be in the car for several hours so we just watched a couple of other people check it out.
Glass Window and Queens Baths
The Queen’s Baths are a bunch of small tide pools that you can swim/sit in on the Atlantic Ocean side. They were pretty neat and watching the waves crash and spill back out was a pretty awesome treat. Of course my ten-year-old son doesn’t have the sense god gave a goose, so he was hanging out right near a ledge trying to get dragged off a cliff to his early demise. Up in Spanish Wells, he and Fira walked along the sandbar for about a quarter mile heading out into breaking waves in a strong current cut. I chased them down and got them out, but make no mistake, these kids are striving for a Darwin Award.
The Glass Window was my personal favorite for the island, and our entire trip so far. It used to be a natural arch, but collapsed in a hurricane. A bridge was built, which has also collapsed in a hurricane. It’s repaired now though (although looking at the bridge it is pretty sketch). At that point, the island is only about 50 meters wide. On one side is the hundred meter deep Atlantic Ocean, surging and crashing against the rocks. On the other side is rather calm, and a few meters deep over the white sand of the Bahamas. The stark contrast between deep blue and turquoise with just a small spit of land between was quite a sight.
Pictures below. Clicking them opens the pictures up as a gallery and the captions should be visible.
