January 1, 2011.

Christy was inspired by yesterdays beaning success so right after breakfast we were off again in search of sea beans. We dinghied around to the southern most point of the cay that we could without exposing ourselves to the solid 25 knot breeze blowing outta the east.

We anchored the dinghy just off the beach as the tide was falling and headed into the interior of the cay. After a very short walk we were on the first of three beaches that Christy had planned for us to explore.

After the first beach yielded NOTHING we had to start what would come to be a ridiculous walk of over a mile and a half across iron shore to get to the second beach.

Iron shore can be a HUGE pain in the ass, especially on a long walk. Its razor sharp, and incredibly random terrain. You have to constantly stare down at the placement of each step you take. Then you have to keep one eye out ahead planning and scouting your course so you don’t walk your way into a dead end. Sometimes its tiny sharp points while other times it smallish boulders strewn before you. To add to the excitement factor once in a while one of the large rocks will teeter or rock under your tread. A walking stick is a huge advantage.

Today while negotiating a particularly hazardous stretch I had an epiphany of sorts. It was fifty yards long by seven feet wide. On the right side was a one story fall to the raging rock strewn shoreline, on the other side was an impregnable wall of scrub. The bonus was that the land canted down to the water at a forty five degree angle. I would slowly move step by step heavily relying on my walking stick. It struck me funny that now-a-days you have to wear your seat belt in a car even though you’ve been driving for years. You have to wear a bicycle helmet even though we survived childhood without one but here we are depending on a piece of shit bamboo staff that we found on the beach to keep us from bouncing down the iron shore and off into the water.

We arrived home safely to the boat after 3 miles of tedious hiking. We’re both sore as hell, everything aches and after all that Christy only found one Hamburger Bean.