Day Two: Freeport-The Grand Bahamas

I booked an excursion for this stop…shopping, and a beach with a chair/drink etc.

I grabbed a chair on the (then) deserted beach of Lucaya, and enjoyed the view, applied some sun screen to everything but the tops of my feet. I think it’s important to get one really terrible sun burn on some weird part of your body. As you watch it peel three weeks later, you can better remember your time in the sun…or not. Anyway, mission accomplished…or not.
I’ve had the fortune of viewing quite a few of the Carribean Islands, and other beaches on the ‘mainland’ and some more exotic places like Hawaii, and it’s amazing how different an ocean’s color can be despite their interconnected qualities. I know there are experts on these subject, but here is my expertise. It’ll get you nowhere in life, but I don’t think it’ll bring you any harm either. The Bahaman Islands offer up aqua colors I’ve never seen before on any of the other beaches I’ve visited. Mexico’s beaches remind me of clear swimming pools, the Hawaiian Islands have more of a green tint to their water (with a few black sand exceptions). California, Florida etc have a deep blue, and then there are the brown waters of the Gulf of Mexico. In the Gulf’s defense, it’s a very warm place to swim with a little gentler waves. Just ask all sharks, stingy things, and other sea life that flock there by the boat load. ;o) All I’m sayin’ is…aqua is a really ‘in’ color right now, so you should check out these beaches in the Bahamas, man…or should I say “mon?” Whatever, they were pretty.
After a few hours at the beach, I headed over to shop at the Straw Market.
They’ll make “Pretty Ladies” and “Sexy Mamas” a very good deal (you can get much of this sitting in your chair on the beach via the ladies and gentlemen who walk by with their wares as you laze in the sun). Much like many of the ports throughout the Carribean's markets, the people are very eager to show you their selections, BUT they invite you in with a smile, and I can appreciate someone that will smile even if you walk on past their stall. For the most part, I walked on because I’ve just about beached out my collection at home, though you never know when you are going to find something you didn’t know they had, and you didn’t know you ‘needed’ until you see it, so I look, just in case. It was a colorful market.

In fact, it was a colorful town filled with pinks, aquas, yellows, blues, lavenders, and peaches, with a red and white stripped light house off in the distance. I loved the colors best. Fine, I loved the beach best, but the colors were a nice backdrop for such a stunning ocean scene.


There was a lot of mood music being played around town by live bands, and there was, rum, rum, and there was quite a lot of rum to be had on the beachside, and roadside bars.
Freeport seemed like a pretty laid back place. I did a lot of sitting and starring at the water, and people watching, shopping, and then…I sat on the beach some more and starred at the water.