It's All North From Here

George Town  

The goal for our final day in George Town was to see as much of Stocking Island as possible. We left Crossroads shortly after 9:00 as Paradigm Shift was leaving the anchorage on their way north. Barry and I went south to one of our favorite trails. It was a beautiful morning and the water was crystal clear and glistening in the sunshine. The tide was high and we knew the water level would fall while we were away, so the dinghy was anchored in the water as opposed to being beached onshore. It only appears to be hovering in the air. As soon as we hit the trail, we saw a shell in the middle of the path. Upon closer inspection, a crab introduced himself to us. After our eye-to-eye encounter, I placed him back in the sand and crossed the island on a well worn path to the Atlantic. High tide covered a great deal of the sandy beach. The walking, however, was easy.   

Some areas were large tidal pools in the shelter of rocks. Other sections were wide open and the waves broke close to the shore. The shallow and warm tide pools were our favorite spot to walk.

With each breaking wave, a small surge of water crossed the rocks and rippled into the shallow water. Larger waves crashed into the rock and shot skyward. We had the area to ourselves and walked a good distance north before retracing our steps back to the trail. 

We then moved further south to the Art Trail. This crossover path to the ocean is lined with pieces of cruiser-sourced artwork. Items crafted from coconuts, rocks, shells and other discarded materials hung on both sides of the trail.

Some artwork was simple and others complex. Our favorites were the painted lizard and the native mask. Back in the dinghy we went further south to the Moriah Harbour Cay National Park. It had a nice sign and a "trail" sign leading to a nice pavilion with a few informational signs, but that was it. I'm sure we could have explored a bit more at low tide, but that was not meant to be on this trip. From there, we cut through the anchorage all the way up to Monument Beach in search of Harvest Moon, one of our marina neighbors from back home. We found the distinctive red sailboat, but Neal and his friend Leslie were not onboard.  

Back we went to Chat N Chill with thoughts of getting lunch. We beached the dinghy, walked by the  iconic directional sign, and over to the Conch Bar where we received an education with our meal. We walked to the water's edge where Renaldo selected a shell from the holding pen and then removed the conch. After a little anatomy lesson, he trimmed it for our meal. The "leftovers" were fed to the eagle rays swimming nearby. 

We then watched his amazing knife-handling skills as conch, onion, green pepper, mango, pineapple, and tomato were all diced and mixed. A little lime juice and orange juice topped it off and we had our tropical conch salad. We shared this generous and delicious serving and were all smiles. After a final walk around the rear basin, we were back to the dinghy. The gradient of colors from dark blue to clear will always be my favorite view.

We got back to Crossroads just as a squall line was moving through. Three cells kept us wet over a period of two hours. The sky eventually cleared and the sandbar at Peace N Plenty was calling my name. I had watched as folks walked 100 yards offshore and were still not over knee-deep in the water. Still on a falling tide, we anchored the dingy offshore and waded in. The tide was low enough to enjoy a surf-side swing. We finally met up with Neal and Leslie and enjoyed sharing a few beverages and several stories with them before calling it a night after a great day. We loaded the dinghy back on the upper deck and we are all set to leave Elizabeth Harbour in the morning, starting our slow journey north.