Allen's Pensacola

1.24.13 This morning we woke up, excited to get to shore for the first time in 4 days. We thought we would have the whole day to dinghy around and explore the island. But a quick check of the wind changed our plans. We needed to head to Spanish Cay today before the wind changed. We opted to dinghy in to shore anyway and spend at least a few hours with our feet on dry land. We took Koa (who was even more excited than us to be on land!) and dinghied in to Allens Pensacola. We found lots of sand dollars and lots of already harevested conch shells. Koa played fetch for a little while and then we all loaded back in the dinghy to go to a small neighboring island. We got very close to the next island and the beach looked pristine when suddenly, the outboard hit bottom. Sean offered to get out and pull us in the rest of the way. When we got to shore, we found most of the same on this island as on Allens Pensacola - lots of sand dollars. But we did find a few medium sized conch. We decided to take three of them back to the boat and see if we could figure out how to remove them and cook them. We headed back to the mothership around noon, put the conch in a bucket of water and started sailing to Spanish Cay. It was an easy jib sail, going 4 knots with the wind on our stern. We trolled, but came up empty handed. We anchored around 3 pm and started working on the conch. Sean took the first crack at it, using a flathead screwdriver and a hammer to bang a hole in the shell and then a knife to cut the muscle attaching it to the shell. It was harder than the book made it seem, but finally we got all three out. The next step was even harder as we then had to peel the skin on the animal to get to the meat. Only problem - the skin didn't want to peel. After about an hour and a very frustrated Sean, we finally had our conch meat. Since the conch weren't really large, we decided to make some fritters. We fried them up and had them as an appetizer to our meal. They were delicious! Better than most in restaurants for sure! Although we had big plans to finish off the snapper for dinner, we all fell asleep by 6:30. I guess the sun really takes it out of you! We will head in to the Spanish Cay marina tomorrow for a night and also to check in to customs.