Bahamian Getaway

One of the great things about living on a Caribbean island (other than the weather, the ocean, the people and the taxes) is its proximity to other great places. Coming from Australia, the country where you can drive for 8 hours and still be in the same state, this is something of a novelty, as I’m sure my London-based friends will agree. So it’s hard to stare down the barrel of a long weekend without jumping online to check out where you can pop to for a few nights after a one or two hour flight.   

And so it was that I ended up moseying over to the Bahamas for the long weekend just gone (4 July is Constitution Day in the Caymans - and no to every American we met along the way, the rest of the world does not celebrate your independence day). My friend Aleisha and I literally looked up the places we could reach on a direct flight in 3 hours or less and since we couldn’t get the accommodation we wanted in Honduras (save that for another long weekend!), we picked Nassau instead.

The Bahamas is a collection of 700 islands spread out over 100,000 square miles of ocean just north of the Cayman Islands (a delightfully short 1 hour and 10 minutes by plane). They are basically exactly what you have seen on postcards. Crystal clear turquoise water, white sand and beautiful tropical palm trees. So why, you may be thinking, would I leave my own island with crystal clear turquoise water, white sand and beautiful tropical palm trees? Because water slides.

The Atlantis resort on Paradise Island (next to Nassau) is a 105 hectare water park with 5 hotels, 10 swimming pools and many many cocktail bars. Like its Dubai counterpart, the Atlantis Aquaventure park features two slides that go through a tank filled with sharks plus countless other water slides. 

Thanks to a flight and hotel deal from British Airways, Aleisha and I stayed at the Cove Hotel, one of the more deluxe of the hotels, which was ah-may-zing (and just to be clear - way out of our price range normally!). Most importantly, it was within convenient walking distance of the water slides, meaning we could kick off the first day with minimal delay and get in front of all of those pesky children. 

Our favourite ride, based purely on number of goes, was the river rapids. It incorporated 2 different water slides you could take if you took a little detour, plus a wave section and a number of rapids and best of all, didn’t require you to move from your rubber ring if you didn’t want to. Outside of the river rapids, we also both loved one of the tunnel slides that took off from the top of the Mayan temple, was pitch black, involved two horizontal drops and then landed you in an underground cave next to the fish tank. I was obviously really brave and kept waterslide squealing to a minimum (if Aleisha suggests otherwise, she’s lying).

When we weren’t water sliding, we parked ourselves at the Cain, the adults only pool for guests of the Cove, on luxurious sunbeds with pina coladas in hand. 

While this sounds glamorous (and it was to an extent), I couldn’t help but feel like I had accidentally walked into a shoot from the OC / the Hills / Entourage / some other show featuring rich and entitled Americans and didn’t quite fit in. For a start, the Cain’s sunbed reservation policy leaves a lot to be desired and seems to be based on an unspoken scale ranging from “tiny waisted, skimpy bikini wearing blonde with artificial enhancements” to “middle-aged overweight white man with cigar, younger wife and weirdly ostentatious jewellery”. I’m not quite sure where Aleisha and I fitted on that scale and I think the staff struggled to place us in order of priority too. There was one pool boy in particular who advised us (3 hours after we’d selected sunbeds, on which we’d left our belongings when we briefly went away to show that they were ours) that they were reserved for other people and we’d have to move. He confirmed he had seen us set up a few hours before, knew we were sitting in reserved spots, but didn’t deign to tell us until all other seats were taken several hours later. The same guy had assured us the day before that he would let us know when a bed became available and we never saw him again. We obviously communicated our confusion to management (who seemed equally confused) who eventually set us up with 2 different sun beds. Unfortunately these ones seemed to be in a blind spot for the wait staff (notwithstanding that they were central and poolside) who didn’t offer us a drink until maybe 5 hours after we’d arrived. I can only assume we weren’t flashing enough cash around or weren’t correctly barking orders at them across rows of sun beds. 

The days by the pool were, however, a delightful insight into the lives of the rich and entitled and an entertaining (if infuriating) few hours of people watching. The clientele of the Cain were, in short, horrific. But us commoners stuck it out nonetheless because the bartenders made a mean pina colada. We're selfless like that. 

Unlike many tourists, we made sure that we stepped outside of the Americanised bubble of the Atlantis resort to check out Nassau itself. We were lucky enough for our trip to coincide with the Junkanoo summer festival, which involves weekly festivities throughout July in downtown Nassau. There is some debate about how the Junkanoo festival started (some believing it was established by John Canoe, a legendary West African Prince, who outwitted the English and became a local hero, some say it comes from the French ‘gens inconnus,’ which translates as 'unknown' or 'masked people', while others say it developed from the days of slavery when the slaves celebrated their 3 days off at Christmas by singing and dancing in colourful masks, travelling from house to house, often on stilts.) but it’s now supposed to be one of the best street parties in the world. The main event happens around Christmas but there is now also an offshoot over summer.

When we headed into town on Saturday night it was the official opening of the Ministry for Tourism’s Summer Junkanoo Festival, which kicked off with a limbo performance by Obeah man (did you know the limbo was originally a slave dance, performed by slaves to buy their freedom? Puts a bit of a damper on the traditional kids party game!) and a Junkanoo jet ski show. It was then time for the main event -  a parade of competing dance troupes (they take it seriously enough that there is an A and B division) who danced and played music down the street in colourful costumes made from coloured crepe paper and cardboard, each following an extravagant float (one of them had three enormous moving peacocks, seriously). The crowd favourite was the Bahmi-Boys who were AMAZING and certainly my favourite. Mainly because I’ve never seen so many attractive, masculine men dancing and playing instruments! I fear I will no longer be contented with a man unless he can play tunes with a cowbell and/or play drums on a repurposed goatskin-covered oil drum, while walking down the street in in bright colours.

Behind the parade there were 30 or 40 stalls with local food and crafts. The fried chicken was predictably amazing, as was the local beer, Kalik (according to Aleisha anyway). After the parade we hit up the fish fry, which is an area in town, beyond the end of the parade, lined with traditional fish fry restaurants. This was clearly the place to hang out on a Saturday night and was pumping with people both inside and spilling out onto the street. I had snapper with ‘rice n peas’ (traditional rice and beans) and salad. The snapper in their secret herbs and spices was possibly the most delicious fish I’ve ever had in my life.

Dinner on night 2 was at the Bahamian branch of Nobu which was predictably delicious. The sushi chefs were amazing and I am now obsessed with their spicy tuna sushi, which may lead to my financial undoing if I ever live closer to a Nobu.

The one thing we didn’t get to do while in Nassau was swim with the pigs. There is an area off Exuma, another of the islands in the Bahamas, where you can swim with wild pigs in the water. Unfortunately the only day trip from Nassau was booked out for our weekend so we will just have to go back to the Bahamas some time!