Tessa and Tristan snorkeled and fished all day. I am amazed at how relaxed we are with our kids. We give them a lot of freedom. It feels very safe here and they are really building up their confidences. Earlier in the day, a 70 foot motor yacht pulled into the slip next to John and Holly’s boat. That night as we were having cocktails on the back of the boat, we met the guys from Philly and their crew, who were two guys from the Philippines. They made a grand entrance earlier in the day, hurling themselves into their slip, ramming the dock pilings. They were nice guys, a couple of blue collar guys who had made it good, but their crew was the talk of the evening.

The owner of the boat brings workers in from the Philippines to use as “boat crew”. It was pretty obvious to everyone that these two, I will call them Hal and Phil Ipino knew nothing about boats. But they were friendly, spoke some English and worked hard. They came to the US on a visa that allows them to work as a crew on yachts. With the 70’ boat he could bring 6 workers to the US. The other 4 he had put up in an apartment in Philadelphia and they were doing odd jobs for him, like painting his house and driving his daughter to school.

He paid the Philippine government $1000.00 per month, per worker, and after the Philippine government got their share and other expenses were deducted, the crew got about $350.00. Of course they also had free room and board. The other stipulation, to make sure they were working as crew on a boat (and NOT painting someone’s house or being someone’s gopher) every six months they needed to leave the US, on a boat, and have their passport stamped. So every 6 months he came to the Bahamas. It’s all perfectly legal he said. In fact he said that several times.

It seems to me if in a 20 minute conversation you have to say “It’s all perfectly legal” more once, it may not be so perfectly legal.

No Audley today, but it turned into a really great day. Tessa and Tristan joined the boys in fishing. We had lunch with Susan and Holly. Afterwards we all rode bikes into the settlement at West End. The settlement was small and there were still several homes that still hadn’t been repaired since the last hurricane. We found an ice cream shop and the kids got ice cream before we headed back to the marina.

Later John and Chris came back from deep sea fishing. It was getting near sunset and the kids were anxious to try for the shark again. John and Chris had fish to clean so they gave Dan some bait and a pole. Now I am sure none of us, including Dan, thought anything would come from it. The boys, Tessa and I stayed with him while he was fishing. I wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing and fell on some rocks at the edge of the lagoon, cutting my leg. I told Dan I needed to go back to the boat and get some band aids. I wasn’t on the boat very long before Tessa comes running to the boat, screaming “Mom! Mom! Dad caught a shark! He caught a shark!”

My first reaction? Oh my God, what are we going to do with a shark!

I head over to the lagoon about 50 yards away as a crowd is starting to gather. Sure enough, Dan has a shark on the line. Dan, who hasn’t fished since he was probably 11, and who has never fished in anything besides a river, has now caught a shark. I need the camera. It’s in Dan’s pocket. I struggle to get the camera from his pocket while he is trying to reel in the shark. I pull out the camera along with several ten dollar bills, which are now scattered on the ground and threatening to blow away. What to do now? Take the shark picture or go for the cash? I chose the cash losing valuable photographic opportunities. Finally I get the money stuffed back into Dan’s pants and try to take a picture of the shark. John has come up to help. The marina guy gets a gaff which the site of gives me the willies. I look at Dan. “We are going to let it go right?”

“Yes.”

Ok. I can’t get a good picture of the shark in the water but I don’t want it gaffed. John goes up and cuts the line to let the shark go. “A lemon shark” he says appreciatively. Dan and I look at each other and say “Lemon shark” and nod as if we know what that means.

A lady standing next to Dan exclaims, “You caught a shark! Wow! What were you fishing for?”

Dan looks at her, a bit confused “Um … A shark,” he replies. There’ll be no living with him now.

Another week in an expensive marina. Audley stopped by to let us know the customs paperwork was not correct and he needed to get new paperwork faxed to customs before they would release the part. We go through stages of being upset and then realizing we are in the Bahamas where we want to be and the kids are having a great time, so we need to enjoy ourselves.

Tristan and Tessa met three boys from a fishing boat that pulled into the marina late in the afternoon. They watched them fish in the lagoon next to the marina. It was starting to get dark when Tessa came running up to our boat yelling “Shark!!” In the lagoon where the kids were fishing they saw a shark. Dan and I went out to see for ourselves. I never saw it but Dan and the kids saw a nurse shark. We did get to meet the parents. We talked for a few minutes and as we left to go back to our boat we agreed to meet the next night for a shark hunt