Tuesday dawned bright and sunny and the day began with morning yoga overlooking the Exuma Sound at Kavalli House. Thanks again to our lovely personal yogi, Erin, for taking us through another centering and challenging session in such a spectacular setting.
While the gals zenned out with yoga, the guys took care of a few errands. Steve lent Matt a hand with our water jerry cans in his much faster dinghy, making what would have been an hour plus trip into a quick 30 minutes (We’re counting down the days until our 20GPH watermaker arrives). With Kaleo nearly topped up with water, it was time to get ready for the Regatta Dinghy Parade and Poker Run.
Upon pulling up to Volleyball Beach, we saw dinghies and drivers adorned with the glitz and glimmer of “Pure Gold,” the theme for this year’s regatta. Gold wigs, anchors, flags, shirts and shorts were all in theme as about 50 dinghies made chaotic circles waiting for the start. There were a few dinghies that didn’t follow the theme but were so well decorated that it only added to the spectacle. There were a few crews of pirates, arrgghhhhing as they jousted with each other and Zero to Cruising teamed up with another couple in full army gear with palm fronds camouflaging their dinghies. All the pageantry signaled that regatta week had officially started and everyone was in it to win it.
Just after the parade, we teamed up with Steve of Anchor Management to take on the Dinghy Poker Run, a harbor-crisscrossing-card-collecting-pub-crawl. The goal of the Poker Run is to get the best poker hand by drawing one card from each station, each station being in a different part of the island.
At our first station, Eddie’s Edgewater Grill, we drew a 4 of clubs and so began an afternoon of dinghy dashing, in zigzag fashion, to collect our remaining four cards. After Eddie’s, we buzzed back across the harbor (a 10 minute dinghy ride), with salt spray splashing our game faces to Alvin’s Snack Bar, where we drew another club and our next destination of Denny’s Snack Bar. Back across the harbor. Denny’s, like all other checkpoints, offered a Poker Run drink special and after drawing our third club, we took a break to enjoy a round of Bahama Mama Punch. With three clubs in hand, the hunt for a flush was on.
Our next stop was St. Francis Resort so it was back in the dink and back across the harbor where luck was with us and we drew the fourth club. Our last jaunt across the harbor to Palm Bay Resort was filled with anticipation, as a flush would surely win us the grand prize of $175. We beached the dink, stopped at the free appetizer station (conch fritters and grouper fingers) then sauntered over to the poker station. We each tried to convince the other that it was their turn to pick the last card but settled for a couple rounds of “Rock, Paper, Scissors-style draw” to decide who would blindly finish our hand. It was as if the room hushed when we reached for the card, and with deliberate hesitation, the card was flipped to reveal a king of diamonds. A collective groan from our team and a round of Rum Punch to lament, wrapped up our almost-win of the Dinghy Poker Run. We were even offered a couple rounds of complimentary colorful Jell-O shots to ease the sting.
After a full day of sun, salt and bouncing around in the dink, we skipped the beach-side meet and greet in favor of seafood dinner aboard and an early bedtime. Believe it or not, we’re having to pace ourselves in this jam-packed regatta schedule.
