After 3 days at Norman's we headed to the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park (from here on called ECLSP!). The park is a designated replenishment area for all of the Bahamas, a no-take zone! What a concept! It encompasses 176 square miles and averages 8 miles wide - 4 miles out on the Sound side and 4 miles out on the Banks side. There are 15 major Cays in the park and the only inhabited islands are privately owned. The park headquarters is located on Warderick Wells with 22 moorings (thank goodness, as the current RACES through there - as it does everywhere in the Exumas), a park office and numerous hiking trails. We enjoyed hiking the trails last year but weren't allowed this year - Dakota Kate is allowed on the beaches but not on the trails - for a variety of reasons but the most important being the tropic birds are nesting there this time of year. You will see pictures of tropic birds later. There are also moorings throughout ECLSP plus uncountable beautiful beaches, caves to explore, reefs to dive on........Our first stop in the Park was Shroud Cay. It is actually a group of cays with a long mangrove-lined salina passing through to the Sound side. You know Jack and I have travelled the world and the Sound-side beach on Shroud is the 2nd most beautiful beach we have ever seen! (The first is in Saipan). You will see pictures of the dinghy ride through the salina and then the beach - look for the tropic birds in the one picture. Just lucky I caught them in flight! Often we are the only boat in the anchorages. Here we were joined by Aspen Alternative, a huge mega-yacht chartered out of Ft. Lauderdale. They had an Italian family on board. A seaplane, C6-WET from Nassau, landed and plucked them up to take them back to Nassau! Quite fun to watch him land next to us and drop his anchor! Who knew you dropped and anchor off a plane? Later in the trip we also saw him land in the Park. Great little business! I like the idea alot! Next year I want somebody else to do the crossing (Jack?) and I will let C6-WET drop me off on Freyja at the first nice beach Jack anchors at!!! From here we continued South and anchored off Hawksbill, baked bread, walked the beaches, read.....then to Warderick Wells and the park headquarters and a mooring for a few days. We reconnected with old friends there - we got to know the people who work there (some volunteer full-time) when we volunteered last year. We helped put out moorings, cleaned beaches, bush-whacked trails and pulled weeds! It is always good to give back. The diving here is spectacular. There is that clear water again.....but here - the fish and lobster are HUGE! Protected, you know! There is always a Saturday night cocktail party on the beach sponsored by the Park. This year we lucked into a barbecue sponsored by the Park to celebrate their 50th anniversary. Burgers and beer! They introduced us to the newest Bahama beer, Sands. Delish! Most of you probably know Kalik - try a Sands if you see it! We decided from here to skip the rest of the Park and hit it on the way back. Now we are off to Great Guana Cay and the settlement of Black Point - our favorite settlement in all of the Exumas!