The Surf Shack, family visits and All That Jazz

This week is a compendium of family visits, a trip to the Surf Shack and All That Jazz – phew – quite a week……  I had heard that Chef Bill Stack and his wife Jennifer had opened a small cafe in Gregory Town and I found the perfect excuse to visit there last Saturday on the way back from a lightening trip to Harbour Island. My good friend Amanda and I took a ride up to Harbour Island – I needed to visit the beauty salon there for a little routine maintenance – don’t ask !

While I was in the salon – Dermalogica – a great place by the way , lovely staff and great service – Amanda had a mooch around the shops at Valentine’s Marina and found these great pool noodles – they have a fabric covering so they should last pretty well. As we had Bob’s youngest son Cassius and our 3 grandchildren visiting this week I rushed in myself and bought some for them to have fun with. Then a short browse around India Hicks’ shop – the Sugar Mill – always lots of beautiful things to buy there and back on the water taxi. Then on to  Gregory Town and lunch at the Surf Shack.

Now this really is pretty much a shack – but Chef Bill’s food is extremely good. Although it is a small menu everything is very tasty. I have eaten his shrimp grit cakes before and had I spotted them on the breakfast menu I would have ordered those – but I didn’t until later ! So we shared 3 salads between the 2 of us. I loved the Crab Cake Caesar Salad and Amanda enjoyed her Spicy Shrimp Caesar as well – and the Melon, Feta Cheese and Pine Nut Salad was finished with a beautiful balsamic dressing. Delicious. The setting is right smack bang in the middle of Gregory Town – just a short way past the Island Made gift shop. ( Can’t pass that by without stopping to buy a few goodies and to add to my collection of Pam’s hand painted Bahamian Ladies) Anyway – back to the Surf Shack. It is situated right there in the heart of Gregory Town – next door to the tyre place – I LOVE the down home feel of the place – and will pay many more visits there to sample the food in the name of research for you dear readers  – yeh right !

Saturday night and Sunday lunch time we were at the Jazz Festival – the concert at the Levy Preserve was very good and both the food and the music at the Sunday Lunch were extremely good. And a nice mix of people – meeting old friends as well as finding new ones…… Bob’s elder son Joel was here for the week leading up to and including the jazz festival – he left at the beginning of the week as Cassius and the children arrived the next day.

So lovely to have our grandchildren around – it is 2 years since they were last here and they have grown up so much……. But not too much for lots of hugs and kisses and cuddles !

One of the people we saw at the Jazz Festival was Doug Douglas from Cotton Bay – in the south. He invited us down for a meal and took Bob to see an amazing project that he has just completed – a basketball court complete with floodlights and fencing all around as well as a climbing wall at Wemyss Bight. It is an act of huge generosity and we are hopefully going to the official opening of it next week – more news of that soon.

I spend a day with a great helper rootling through the attic here at Colman Towers as well as various other spots to find lots of goodies (!!!???) to put in the flea market sale. Usually I only post pictures of myself that I think are OK – but I was so hot and sweaty and grubby that I thought I would show you how very glamorous my life can be here ……. Don’t forget if you are on the island do come along to the flea market – Saturday 8th April – 8am – 1pm – Cigatoo car park…….

And finally – Rudge getting into the mood of a Sunday morning lie-in !