ABACONIANS TOUR

September 1998 Table of Contents - Current Issue of The Abaco Journal - Abaco Bahamas' Home Page

ABACONIANS TOUR DISNEY MAGIC AND CASTAWAY CAY
by Jack Hardy

The flagship of the Disney Cruise Lines Disney Magic docked at the Castaway Cay site on Gorda Cay on 2nd August for its inaugural regular visit. The Disney Magic had made prior visits but these had been preparatory runs. This was the real thing.

A party of central and local government officials - headed by Senior Island Administrator Everette Hart, Senator Michael Bethel and MP Robert Sweeting - had been invited to view the new facilities and take part in the official opening of the Castaway Cay Post Office by Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham. Radio Abaco and members of the local press were on hand to record the event. That's how my wife and I got there.

As I drove down the Abaco Highway towards Sandy Point, a great rainbow spanned south Abaco. Always on the lookout for signs and symbols, I wondered whether this augured well for Disney or Abaco, or both.

We were welcomed aboard the ferry to Gorda Cay by a very personable young lady from Disney Cruise Lines. It was a lovely day with flat waters and blue sky and the eight mile crossing took less than half an hour.

For generations, Gorda Cay had been a farming area for Sandy Point people. Wild hogs would destroy crops sown on the mainland so pumpkins, sweet potatoes and corn were grown on Gorda. Small houses were built there and wells dug. During the summer months Gorda Cay swarmed with thousands of giant white land crabs and the waters around teemed with fish and were rich in conch beds. Somehow the place seemed part of Sandy Point's birthright and nobody bothered taking out title on it.

Gorda Cay was the base for drug operations during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Sandy Point people were kept off the cay by fierce dogs and men wielding large guns. That phase passed and Sandy Point people returned to Gorda Cay. Nobody farmed there any more, but it was a great place for summer family picnics. Then came Disney and further - perhaps final - disinheritance.

Many of the invited guests from Abaco had these thoughts in mind and were particularly interested in what benefits Castaway Cay would bring to the people of Abaco. As we approached the dock, it was perhaps unfortunate that the lady from Disney ended her instructions to us with a hearty: "Welcome to our island!"

"Our island?" someone muttered.

"Sh!" his wife told him.

It was the first time at Castaway Cay for some of the Abaco party. Necks craned as we passed the massive Disney Magic which was already at berth. The visit started with a half mile trolley ride to the beach area during which we were regaled over a speaker system about the history of Castaway Cay by someone who had a voice remarkably similar to 'Mr Ken' Touchton in a jolly mood.

My wife is a Sandy Point native and there are obviously things she has not told me. I thought Gorda Cay had been bought originally by a man called Tucker, but the jolly disembodied voice assured us that it had been inhabited for years by a family from Chicago, the Scuttles, that had been shipwrecked on the cay. They, apparently, had thrived there and built Castaway Cay into what it is now. Heavens, you live and learn.

When we disembarked from the trolley, the women took in the shops and restaurants while the men took in the bikinis on the beach. An Abaco band played island music while thousands of guests of every conceivable size and shape desperately enjoyed themselves. We were allowed ten minutes, then it was back to the dock with the jolly voice telling us to drink plenty of water and use sun block, while hoping we had enjoyed ourselves. Most of us were engrossed in the conversation of a dashingly handsome man who was under the impression that Nettica Symonette of Different of Abaco was the postmistress and was trying to bribe her for a first day cover without queuing. Nettica, of course, refused the bribe.

It was then time for the opening of the Castaway Cay Post Office. Being a Bahamian government event, it was the only activity of the day to run late. The Prime Minister (who was on time) greeted some of his Abaco people. My wife and I are his constituents and voted for him, but he didn't say hello to us. Maybe we looked like tourists. Sorry, guests.

The sun was getting high, and you know how hot it gets in Abaco during August. That's how hot it was. Disney personnel asked the Abaco contingent standing in the shade to please move into the sun. They all moved and ended back in the shade.

Rev Napoleon Roberts of Zion Baptist Church, Sandy Point, gave the blessing on the new post office and if I hadn't known better I'd have thought he was an Anglican priest. Little did the Americans watching the ceremony suspect what a volcano of a sermon lay beneath the brief prayer and benediction.

The Prime Minister said all the right things he was supposed to say and it appears he also did not know the true history of Castaway Cay. He, like me, had thought Gorda Cay had been a drug running centre. I hope he took a trolley ride so Jolly Voice could give him the real facts. I believe, however, he went off bonefishing with Paul Pinder, a bonefish guide from Sandy Point. Sensible man.

There was no chance of getting a first day cover of the new stamps as the queue outside the post office was long - and in the sun. And Nettica wasn't the postmistress. The first couple in line were Ken and Diane Baus from Boyertown, PA, and they politely refused an offer from me to take their place for $10. Bahamian.

Next was a tour of the Disney Magic. We Abaconians were led through as a group. Being a dedicated reporter, I was scribbling in my notebook and looking for camera angles. The lady in charge of us was intent on setting a new tour record so I was always ten seconds or so behind her agenda. I haven't been told to stay with the group so many times since kindergarten.

The boat was impressive. The atrium/lobby was vast and looked good enough for the Titanic until you observed that the statue at the base of the sweeping staircase was of Capt Michael Mouse complete with a boat steering wheel. Elevators powered by air smoothly whooshed people between decks. We, however, climbed the stairs.

Disney has divided the boat very cleverly into kids and real people. One area, Beat Street, contained several drinking establishments with somewhat different ambience so you could stagger from one to the other as your mood took you. When you look at the boat from outside, you see two funnels. Only one of them is a real funnel. The other is ESPN Sky Box, a place where dads can go to watch football games. I hope the crew don't let on to the kids that it's a fake funnel. The kids get play areas with computer games, their own movie house, their own restaurant that goes from black and white to colour somewhat more extravagantly than The Lost Kingdom ever did, their own pool, cafeteria serving hamburgers, hot dogs and pizza all day long, and the sexiest supervisors. The impressive part of the tour for me was the Walt Disney Theatre that was, believably, the greatest room volume in any cruise boat. I'd love to book it for next year's Abaco Central Secondary School graduation.

The whole family trip is something like a game: Let's see how long grown-ups and kids can stay apart. Even on land there was a Kid Dumping Area called Scuttle's Cove.

Lunch would be served back at the complex, so we endured Jolly Voice and his revisionist history once again. You could eat all you wanted for nothing though, technically, everybody else had already paid when they booked their trip. The food was served cafeteria style and a pleasant Brazilian girl made up our trays (with cloth napkins) and then presented them to us in reverse. The plate was to the left and the napkin to the right, but on the napkin the knives and forks pointed south. "They couldn't get a Bahamian to do this?" one of the Abaco party asked. There were large shady cabanas with table/bench units to sit at.

Entertainment was provided during lunch by those who had decided to go barefoot. It was afternoon and the sun had heated the cement pathways to egg frying temperatures. The tippy-toe from shade spot to shade spot was enormously amusing and we who were from Abaco and somewhat overdressed for the occasion got our satisfaction. We also speculated on what degree of burns some of the more scantily-clad would be suffering later that evening.

After lunch my wife and I spent several minutes regarding the plants that had been brought in from Florida rather than bought locally. The Scavellas didn't look too happy. I'm glad Silbert Sawyer wasn't there to see them because last I looked, his were healthy and glossy. We visited the Cultural Illusions shop, the only Abaco concern on the Castaway Cay, and chatted for a while.

We then decided to take another trolley ride to the other side of the cay to the adult beach. The very name suggested something European and topless, which I thought would be worth a brief look. As we approached the trolley it took off, but then came to a halt for us. "Welcome on board, Mr and Mrs Jack Hardy!" came a voice over the speaker system from the driver. Everybody turned to look at us, wondering who the hell we were to be famously recognised and treated so well. At least one Abaconian had a job there!

Jolly Voice was on board to greet us, but with a new repertoire. Some American had crash landed on Castaway Cay and fell in love with it and stayed for ever. I think there was something about him falling in love with one of the Scuttle girls and developing inter-island commerce long before mail boats and Bahamasair. I really wasn't listening. He told us not to wander off the beaten paths because of poisonous plants and wild life. "Don't feed the bloody monkeys!" an Englishman in good humour called out from the carriage in front. Most of the journey to the beach was along the old airstrip.

The adult beach was just old codgers without a skinny-dipper in sight, so we took the same trolley back and received advice from Jolly Voice to drink plenty of water and apply lots of sun block.

Right about then, had I been a bona fide tourist, I would have gone for a beer. Unfortunately, it was impossible to buy anything unless you had an electronic card to record your purchases. We made our way to the end of the beach and sat with our backs to the man-made beach and each smoked a quiet cigarette while we watched some kids play soccer. Halfway through, a cheerful young Disney lady approached us. "If she asks me to put my cigarette out," I murmured, having been nico-celibate for five hours, "I'm going to use her belly button as an ash tray." Fraggled nerves and Jolly Voices do that to you.

"Are you enjoying yourselves?" the girl enquired, bright as the sun.

"Quite lovely," we responded.

"Good, good!" she chirruped and went off to bug the next couple down the line of lounge chairs.

Time to return to our ferry. On the way back I peeked in at the Brazilian girl serving trays. Her knives and forks were still upside down. At the trolley stop my wife hesitated. "I think I'll walk," she said.

"You must be strong," I encouraged her. She rode back with her hands over her ears, keeping out Jolly Voice's admonitions to drink plenty of water and use sun block. It was only then I realised I hadn't put on any sun block and my face was growing tight-skinned and hot.

"I'm going to the post office," I said determinedly. "If I can't buy a Bahamian stamp with good Bahamian dollars in The Bahamas, I'm going to let my MP know about it. When he gets back from fishing." The queue, however, was just as long as it had been hours earlier so I gave up on my socio-political experiment.

There was much more talk on the ferry back than on the outward journey, but it would be unkind to report what any particular person said. By and large, there was discomfort over the few - very few - Bahamians employed at Castaway Cay. The Prime Minister has assured us that The Bahamas would be raking in plenty of money from the venture. There was speculation on how much of it would return to Abaco. Not much yet, apparently.

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