… do not forget to stop by this place. Say Hi to Richard, Shirley and Shelly. Don’t forget their cute dog Gino!!

Great food, great drinks, great location – but most importantly, great conversations with them.

This place is on the south end of James Cistern (you cannot miss it).

… lazily staring into the deep waters as the waves come by endlessly!

After seeing a lot of beaches and sort of beaten down by the heat, we picked a random place by the beach to sit down and cool down over a gin and tonic. We could not have picked a better place. Made friends with the owner Richard and Shirley who were serving us. Both of them are from Nassau.

Richard opened this place just a few weeks back. Lovely spot. He has a fascinating life history which has taken him to England, US, Dominican republic and Haiti. He talked a lot about Haiti. He had gone there on a missionary trip. On his way back, all he had was the clothes he was wearing. Gave away everything else. The description of how poor some parts of that country is beggars description. Had the best time chatting with him.

Shirley – a very smart and a very polite person (every answer had a Sir or Madam) in it – is bubbling with energy. Her goal in life is to be a veterinarian. Because she loves animals.

Again, great time spent..

Aimlessly driving around, we chanced upon this side road. The first thing that struck me was – Well, if it is a Hidden Beach, why advertise it? Sooner or later, it will not live up to its name, right?

Anyways, we got in to see where it led.

“So, Trish, what are the non-touristy beaches?”, I asked Trisha (who goes by Trish) who was serving us breakfast.
“What are you looking for?”
“When you, your husband and your seventeen month old baby go – which beach do you go to?”
“We go to Cocodimama beach”
“Why?”
“It is quiet, not many people at all and you have sand bars going way into the water”.
“Okay. Which side road do I need to take?”

Following Trish’s instructions we reached Cocodimama beach. It was as beautiful as you can imagine. Pristine clear water and the sandbars ran hundreds of yards in. Even when the water was barely six inches deep, you could see the slight bluish color. Lots of fishes and lot of conch shells on the beach!

One the advice we got from the locals was to explore the island by taking all the small roads branching off from the main and only arterial road. This being a very long and thin island, all the small roads invariably ended in a beach or water.

While checking out some of those small roads, landed up at a place that looked like a dock from the yesteryears. Either a storm or the effect of water over many years has completely blown it apart.

The water was blue as blue it could be!

To bring a break to an otherwise riot of blue color everywhere!

It not only let me come pretty close to it (I did not get too close – if you remember, I was still wearing flip flops – and one of them chasing me with a heavy DSLR hanging around my neck would not make for a picturesque scene), it even seemed to do a local dance for me!!