Harbour Island, The Bahamas

Caribbean, here we come!

We left GRK Valley with the help of cousin Royce, who came in ostensibly to rescue his friend Zack’s snowmobile, but ended up rescuing us.  The snow by this time was 8 feet high, but because of the rain, under-snow springs and creeks had eroded patches to bare ground, creating a treacherous snowmobile path.

Treacherous terrain

We packed up and closed down the cabin and packed the three cats together in one small cat carrier.  Sasha hopped on one snowmobile with Royce, the cats balanced precariously in front of her on her lap, while Todd, Tia, and I followed in a second snowmobile with a sled. 

RRRRRRRrrrrrrrr!  Royce’s snowmobile shot ahead as they passed a particularly mucky sinkhole not 10 feet into our ride out.  Royce, Sasha, and the box of cats all fell off, the cats tumbling through the mud.  The corner of the cat carrier had caught the throttle, sending the machine hurtling forward and bucking off all passengers.  Luckily no human or cat was hurt, just a little muddy.  What a way to start a Caribbean vacation! 

Angelfish, here we come!

Connecting through Chicago, we spent two nights with Uncle David and Aunt Jen, sampling the deep-dish pizza, visiting the Chicago Art Institute along with Todd’s cousin Chris and his kids Isabel and Evan, and playing with dogs Rory and Monte.   Then it was off to our first stop:  Harbour Islands, The Bahamas.

We loved these dogs!!!!

Hanging at the Chicaco Art Institute with cousin Isabel

In May of 1992 I was in full teacher burnout at Options School in Washington, D.C., a dropout prevention school where the nearly-unmanageable kids were kicking my butt.  To revive myself, I asked for a week off and booked Todd and me a vacation in the Bahamas.  I had read a travel article about Harbour Island, with pink sand beaches and turquoise waters, and wanted nothing more than to escape.

Impossibly beautiful

Harbour Island is a sleepy northern strip off the main island of Eleuthera, a long, skinny, flat stretch of raised coral reef covered with tropical pines, mangrove, and scrub brush, with the occasional palm tree.   Dunmore Town was at one point the capital of the Bahamas during English rule, and its quaint clapboard houses harken back to an older time.

Heading in on the airplane

Todd introduced me to SCUBA diving here in 1992, persuading me to tell the dive master that I was already certified, and whispering directions on how to SCUBA while we rode out to the first dive site.  When we all hopped into the water, the strange sensation of mouth-breathing through a regulator convinced me that Todd had forgotten to turn on my air properly, and I panicked back up to the surface.  The dive master assured me that all was well, and we descended 90 feet to immense coral canyons.  I was hooked.

A pufferfish, one of my favorites

Underwater wonderland

Since then, I had wanted to return to Harbour Island.  When I sweetened the plan to live in GRK Valley and do homeschooling by adding a month in the Caribbean during the depth of winter, I suggested the pink sand beaches I so fondly remembered. 

Yes, it really looks like this

Tia and Sasha knuckled down to complete online PADI learning courses, and we arrived in Dunmore Town on January 22nd.  A furious but short-lived storm interrupted the pool session the next day and gave us a taste of what the Caribbean must be like during a hurricane.  But by the following day all was calm, and we dove on reefs that Todd and I could remember from 25 years ago.

Barracuda abound in these waters

Tia learns to dive!

Todd searches for sharks

Fresh lobster dinner

We stayed in a lovely little house on a hill surrounded by five acres of tropical garden, with a secret path down to the glorious pink sand beach. I swam every day in this most beautiful of settings, the lightly coral-pink sands contrasting with the turquoise waves and the darker curves of reef.  I dragged the girls out to swim with me once, to their dismay, but I just had to make sure they could appreciate such beauty!

Our home for a week

Simple and sunny

The diving was fun:  we swam through Sea Gardens (the girls saw a turtle and a nurse shark, while we gaped at huge rays) and the reefs off of Pink House.  Our second day was spent at those well-remembered coral canyons, now called Plateau, and a site near Eleuthera’s Glass Bridge and cliffs, where you could watch the surge crash onto rocks from under the water. 

Trying to nap with all these pesky divers swimming about

The delicacy and importance of corals was a big part of the curriculum

Yummy conchs!

The girls’ curriculum consisted of reef ecology, Caribbean history and writing about their experiences.  We learned that back in the 1980s someone released several of their pet lionfish into the Floridian subtropical waters.  The lionfish (from the tropical Pacific) found the Atlantic quite to their liking, as it is free of the parasites and egg predators that keep their population in check in the Pacific, and by 2016 they had colonized most of the Caribbean, gorging on native fry.  Tia and Sasha’s goal now is to become Lionfish Zookeepers, which involves spearingfishing the burgeoning lionfish populations and selling them to local restaurants.

Illegal aliens

Click here for the girls' favorite video on spearing lionfish!

We rode bikes around the island one day and dreamed of buying a house here.  Sasha and I found this one particularly romantic and compelling:

Sweet and breezy

Our last day was spent diving a reef called Split Head, where we encountered a Caribbean reef shark determined to take a nap no matter how close we got.  We saw a number of the bad lionfish, as well as garden eels, huge angelfish, and two enormous tuna, along with the ubiquitous schools of colorful reef fish.

Sunlit waters

We ended our diving on the wreck of the Amiporra, a ship carrying fertilizer that had run aground after a fire broke out on board in 1972.  Just the tip shows now, and it is fascinating how the ocean life has nearly obscured every square inch of the ship’s surface with corals, algaes, and sand.  A school of barracuda kept watch at the stern, and giant lobster hid underneath huge coral-plated metal shelves.  It was eerie to swim through the crusty housings and pass by the huge engines and machinery, softened now by the colorful corals and enlivened by the darting fish. 

Wreck diving is wild!

Harbour Island was just as beautiful as I remembered it.  Tia and Sasha pored through the local real-estate magazine, imagining the places we could buy once we won the lottery.  

Now this is the life...

We stopped through Nassau on our way to Cuba.  Not wanting to fork out the $40 for a taxi when there was a bus, I harangued my family into pulling their suitcases down to the bus stop.  When the fifth taxi stopped to ask if we needed help, I asked the very friendly driver how much.  His charm, friendly demeanor, and winning smile (as well as the grumbling of my kids) convinced us to hop in. Bahama John, as he calls himself, was a wealth of information and completely entertaining.  We had such a good time talking with him that we booked him back to the airport the next day!  If you are in Nassau, look him up: johnrbraynen@gmail.com

Pretty much all we saw of Nassau

We loved the Bahamas.  One thing’s likely:  we will return!

Christmas in the Sierras

Christmas is coming!

Snowy little house in the big woods

California has been suffering one of its longest droughts ever.  But just in time for our move-in to this little cabin tucked away in the forest, El Niño roared into the Golden State and hasn’t stopped.  We were buried under more than two feet of snow just before Thanksgiving, and our prayers for a white Christmas were answered in depth, to the tune of more than two feet!

Winter wonderland

Our cousins' trusty quad--thank you, cousins!!

But first, Tia and Sasha were given an early Christmas present by Aunt Simone:  a week in Hawaii at the beginning of December.  Poor babies, they have such a hard life.  It was definitely a welcome respite from the Sierra cold.

Glad to be out of the cold for a little while--thank you Aunt Simone!

The first Christmas-y stop after picking them back up from the airport was Oma Heide’s house, where we made our traditional German Christmas cookies for two whole days.  They were delicious. 

Heidesand, Klosterkipfel, Zimtsterne, and Butter-S:  All delicious!

Just look at those perfect Ss!!!

Next, we needed a tree.  Lucky for us, my cousins had been planting Christmas trees for the past 40 years in hopes of starting a never-materialized tree farm.  We had our pick, and chose a beauty!

The most beautiful tree we've had, ever.

Then the weather started calling for snow again, so Suzi and Ethan got Dana to book us a couple rooms at their timeshare at Heavenly Valley Ski Resort.  My stepdad Rich joined us, and we had four great days of skiing before heading back to GRK.

Thank you Aunt Suzi, for arrnging this fun trip!

The boys are happy,  too.

Next-generation Shush-boomers

Overlooking Nevada's beautiful Carson Valley

We decided to stay at GRK for Christmas, despite my cousin Dana’s tempting offer of celebrating in her gorgeous riverfront estate along with all our Kingsbury cousins.  We’d never celebrated Christmas at the cabin, even after nearly 50 years of building it, and so it seemed about time.  We drove in just in time for the big snowfall to start.

A snowy walk to the Granite Dome

Puppy love:  Blue loves GRK, too!

The jeep gets a snow mustache

And it snowed…and snowed…and snowed.   Big fat flakes that made you want to pull on your snowsuit and toboggan careening down the hill, or make a snow angel, or smack your sister with a powdery snowball.   The cabin was warm and cozy, the fire crackled, and Christmas was in the air along with the smell of gingerbread.

Our beautiful Chirstmas tree, all lit up

Flipper the snow cat explores the deck

Oh the weather outside was FRIGHTFUL!

Click here to see our snug cabin!

To accommodate us all, Todd, Tia, and Sasha worked together to build a long-desired loft.  This is all part of the official school curriculum of Rico Education.  The girls learned a lot!

Click here to see Tia build the loft!

Suzi, Ethan, Todd, Tia, Griffin, Sasha, Ado, and I all spent four winter wonderland days together, comfortably crowded together in the living room (the only room in the cabin we can heat!) and playing in the snow cross-country skiing, sledding, snowball fighting, and taking in the frosty beauty.  All too soon, Suz and Ethan and company had to return to civilization.

Sasha post-snowball fight

Tia cross-sountry skis to Dead Lake

Christmas princess

A wholesome Christmas morning family activity:  Playing Texas Hold 'Em Poker

Then came the rains, along with all our 45 cousins and friends, for New Year’s.  The rain packed down the snow and scotched cross-country skiing, created slush lakes, and made a mess of good snowmobiling.  Dana’s son Trenton drove his snowmobile across Dead Lake, hit a soft spot, and promptly sunk his machine, creating a big make-work rescue project. Luckily it had stopped raining by then, and we had those 45 people in the valley to help!  Our friends Blaise and Emily joined us for New Year’s; we hadn’t seen them in four years, so it was a happy long-awaited reunion. 

Love my friend Emily!!

Pulling the snowmobile from Dead Lake

Cousin Royce brought humungous fireworks from Reno, which we split between the Granite Dome and the meadow.  At 9:30 pm on New Year’s Even, everyone headed up to Granite Dome to light the big fire we’d assembled.  The sparks swirling into the star-studded heavens complemented the boom and splash of the firework show, creating an impossibly beautiful multi-sensory spectacle: heat and frost, silence and shockwave, dark night and bright light, icy air and smoky wood. 

The building of the New Year's bonfire

Click here to see the bonfire and fireworks!

Then we all headed down to the Kingsbury cabin at 11, dancing until midnight, when Royce and friends put on a second fireworks show to ring in the new year.  Despite 45 people in the cabin, there was room to dance and talk and laugh and sing.  What a way to welcome 2017!

Welcome 2017!!

Frontier family

New Year’s Day brought more snow, to the delight of the snowmobiling crowd.  Most of us parked our cars at the top of GRK’s dirt road, but inexplicably, not Blaise.  That engendered another round of make-work project helping his Ford Explorer slip and slide up the icy, snowy road to the paved (and, thankfully, plowed) road.  Moving at approximately 2 miles per hour on the hidden black ice, they drove off with one intact chain, the other having broken off next to the cabin.  It took them two hours to get 20 miles!  But we loved having them and their boys Drake and Roan; we’re positive they’ll return next time supplied with chains.

Hanging out at Granite Dome before the next big snow

More and more and more snow

And then the snow REALLY started.  Two feet…four feet….six feet….seven feet and counting!  El Niño has really shown us something, and the Pineapple Express pattern of rain/snow/rain/snow leaves wild and wacky crevasses on the otherwise gentle road between our cabin and cousin Grethers’ cabin (wherein lies our only internet access!).  All too soon we leave for our planned escape from the snow to head to the Caribbean as promised to the girls.  The only problem: I’m not ready to leave this snow-laden wonderland!

Bundling up for the cold

Our only way in and out of the cabin

Deeper and deeper

Packing out