November 4, 2009: Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos
	During the Cruise: Aboard the Oosterdam
	Return to the Index for Our Panama Canal Cruise

Getting to Half Moon Cay

We sailed from Fort Lauderdale about six-thirty on Monday evening. The ship sailed through the night following a course east and then south through the Bahamas.

Had we known ahead of time that there would be so many islands to look at as we came down through the Bahamas, we might have gotten up earlier, but as it was we were anchored off Little San Salvador Island before 8AM.

The original inhabitants of the Caribbean Islands were the Arawak Indians, who lived a peaceful existence of farmers until the Carib Indians came along in the early 15th century. The Caribs were known cannibals who hailed from South America. Just prior to the age of discovery, the Caribs swept up through the Caribbean chain island by island in their dugout canoes. They had no problem with navigation, because their next destination was always clearly on the horizon or at least just over it. They introduced two new words to the white man's language which we still use today- Caribbean and Buccaneer. The first one is obvious, but the second needs some explaining. The Caribs sliced and smoked their meat over open fires with grills called 'boucans'. When the freebooters and privateers saw this, they copied the idea and so became known as Buccaneers. Just as the Caribs had established their new home, they had the Discoverers to contend with and soon after that the Settlers had arrived.

I thought that the image below, taken from Google Maps, was extremely interesting. (Aerial maps aren't the same resolution all over the world; in sparsely populated areas, there is not nearly as much detail as there is in, say, Chicago. That's why the actual picture is fairly fuzzy when you zoom in this far.) As you can see, the satellite camera snapped its picture while two Holland America cruise ships were anchored off the small island.

Little San Salvador Island, Bahamas (also known as Half Moon Cay), is one of about 700 islands that make up the archipelago of the Bahamas. It is located roughly between Eleuthera and Cat Island. It is a private island, owned wholly by Holland America Line, a subsidiary of Carnival Corporation & PLC. It is usually a one-day stop (port of call) on most Holland America Caribbean cruises, and requires a tender ride from the ship to land, and vice versa.

Half Moon Cay is about a hundred miles southeast of Nassau. Holland America purchased the island in 1997, and has developed only 45 acres (180,000 m2) of the 2,400-acre (9.7 km2) island, with the goal of maintaining as much habitat as possible for wildlife. The island is also a significant nesting area for waterfowl.

This particular cruise itinerary uses Half Moon Cay as a way to get passengers acclimatized to the tendering process and also to give them an opportunity to partake of those typical Caribbean island activities before heading to the Panama Canal. After this stopping point and the next one at Grand Turk, there won't be much opportunity for beach-type activities. So Holland America has stocked the island with all the typical activities- swimming, sunning, scuba diving, jet-skiing, cycling, snorkeling, deep-sea fishing, parasailing, glass-bottom boat rides, and nature walks. There is lots of equipment for rent, including Hobie catamarans, Sunfish sailboats, windsurfing sailboards and kayaks. There are also volleyball and basketball courts, horseshoes and shuffleboard, a fitness trail with exercise stations, horseback riding, and nature trails for hiking.

Our general plan for today was to take a tender in to the island's small harbor after breakfast and then just explore. We knew that lunch would be provided, so we would do that as well. As it turned out, the beach was so inviting that right after lunch we took a tender back to the ship, changed to swimming trunks and flip-flops, and then went back to the island to get into the water.

Taking the Ship's Tender to Half Moon Cay

Click on the Image Above to View the Slideshow

Here at Half Moon Cay, the tenders that the ship used were boats that come over from a larger island for the day. There were three of them, I think, and beginning right about 8AM they ran a continuous shuttle service back and forth. We left the ship about 9AM; by that time, the tenders were much less crowded. I've put the pictures from our transit to the island in a slideshow so you can move through them quickly. If you are interested, the widescreen pictures in this album are almost always Fred's, while the 4:3 pictures are usually mine.

To view the slideshow, just click on the image at left and I will open the slideshow in a new window. In the slideshow, you can use the little arrows in the lower corners of each image to move from one to the next, and the index numbers in the upper left of each image will tell you where you are in the series. When you are finished looking at the pictures, just close the popup window.

Visitor Center and Beach Walk

When we got off the tender, we were met by a couple of the crew handing out cold bottles of water (it was very warm today- 88, according to the ship's log) right next to the typical "You Are Here" sign. We'd already gotten an island map on board, so we knew where we were headed. We walked through the small plaza (where there are a few little shops and an ice cream parlor) and past a really neat shell fountain, and over to the obligatory sign pointing to various locations near and far. I took a picture of it and Fred, and you can take a look at that picture here.

From the plaza, we walked over to the beach and then walked along it to the north, generally towards the place that was serving lunch. The water was very blue and quite clear, and all in all it was a very nice beach. If you click on the thumbnail images below, you can see some of the best beach pictures that we took:

After walking a ways on the beach, we came to the paths inland that took us to the Island Barbecue. Lunch was being served, so we stopped and ate. The BBQ, hamburgers, hot dogs and fish were served in a large open but roofed building buffet style. You carried your stuff away in any direction to a series of patios with family-style picnic tables. The food was pretty good, and the cold drinks were welcome.

Done with lunch, we set off again walking along the trails. We were going to walk to the other side of the island where some of the shore excursions were headed, but it was a long way, it was extremely warm, and we didn't think it would look much different there than on this side. So we just walked along the pathway above the beach. After a while, we spotted Paul walking along the beach, so we headed down to meet up with him and Greg. We all hung out for a while and then went back to the tender dock to get the next tender back to the ship. Click on the thumbnails below and you can see some of the pictures Fred took during this part of our visit to Half Moon Cay:

Returning to the Oosterdam

There was a bit of a line when we returned to the tender harbor, but it wasn't long before one pulled in. We boarded, and sailed down the narrow channel towards the open sea. Coming out of the channel, passing the breakwater, we could look back at the beach. We continued on towards the ship, which Fred photographed from the back of the tender- an interesting picture that shows both the tender and the ship. You can have a look at that picture here. As we got closer, I got a good view of the Oosterdam at anchor, and after the tender had docked, I hung back until Greg and Fred crossed the gangway.

As we were coming by the bow of the ship, I made my first movie from a returning tender (but it probably won't be the last). I don't know now which of them will have turned out the best.

NOTE:
As I mentioned earlier, once Fred and I had relaxed for just a while on the ship, we decided to go back to the island for a swim, which we did from about 2PM to the last tender at 3:30. The water was clear and warm, and I swam all the way around the perimeter of the area blocked off for that purpose. I enjoyed it immensely.

Evening Activities

We got back to the ship about 4:30, and we headed off to the gym for our normal hour or so there. Tonight was one of the formal nights in the dining room, and Bud had made reservations for 8, so around 7:30 we got our jackets and ties on and headed off to the Vista Dining Room. All six of us were there, but Fred only got a picture of Paul, Bud and Greg. We had a very pleasant meal with good food- except that Chet's beef was overdone.

That night in the Vista Lounge, the permanent onboard singing and dancing troupe (oddly enough called the "Oosterdam Singers and Dancers") performed in a show called "Stage and Screen"- a medly of songs and production numbers from, you guessed it- Broadway and Hollywood. You can see one picture that Fred took at left.

Here is what the Daily Program had to say about tonight's entertainment:

"Stage and Screen II is a movie musical concert featuring the incomparable costumes of Hollywood's legendary designer, Bob Mackie. It features the Oosterdam Singers and Dancers."

The show lived up to its billing. The song selections were all familiar tunes from movies and musicals, and the costumes were, for the most part, over the top. As with much of the entertainment throughout the cruise, it was entertaining and worth our time to attend. Some might complain that the productions were amateurish or the performers second-rate, but what these people don't consider is that not only was the entertainment free but it is probably impossible to book first-rate performers for a venue this small and an engagement that might only last one or two nights. Personally, I've been to concerts that cost $100+ and which were held in venues holding tens of thousands of people and which featured stars of the calibre of Liza Minelli that I did not enjoy as much as some of the shows on board the Oosterdam. So there.

Tonight, as he did on most nights, Fred used his zoom to take some really good pictures. If you will click on the thumbnail images below, you can see some of them:

You can use the links below to continue to the album page for different day.

	November 4, 2009: Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos
	During the Cruise: Aboard the Oosterdam
	Return to the Index for Our Panama Canal Cruise