Finally getting around to sharing our family trip to the Bahamas from the beginning of the summer! My father's longtime best friend owns a beautiful home in Great Harbour Cay, a small island in the Berry Islands, Bahamas. These friends are more like family and we are so thankful to have them in our lives. We had the most relaxing time on this trip and it was extra special because this is the first family vacation my brother and sister-in-law have been on with us since my brother was in high school. It was amazing to get to spend so much time with family in friends in beautiful place!
To begin, Great Harbour Cay is pretty small and not commercialized at all. This is what makes the island so amazing, it's untouched. Our family visited once before about 5 years ago when I was still in high school, so I was really excited to get back! To get there, you can come by boat, charter your own plane, or schedule to fly on a small airline but flights are limited and still pretty expensive. We chartered our own plane because we had such a large group and needed to take food for the entire week. That's another thing, the island has about two or three restaurants and two "grocery stores" but selection is pretty small so when we go we bring food for the whole week and eat lots of fish if we catch any. We flew out of Fort Lauderdale on a Friday and were in the Bahamas in about an hour! Our friends picked us up at the little airport and we headed to their gorgeous house!
We spent our first day at the house, enjoying our time on the beach drinking Kalik (THE beer in the Bahamas) and swimming in the prettiest blue water. No complaints here!
{glasses: sunski, bathing suit: VS Pink}
We even saw a little shark off the beach *cue us sprinting out of the water*
The next morning we kicked off our first full day with coffee and family breakfast! Most activities in Great Harbour are water related (duh) and pretty weather dependent. This day the weather was great so we took full advantage and set off on an all day adventure on the boat! We road the boat around the island and across beautiful sea grass flats. My mom was clearly very excited to find this gorgeous starfish!
Next stop on our adventure was the Blue Hole at Hoffman's Cay! Blue holes (deep craters full of water) are all over the Bahamas and this one is right in the middle Hoffman's Cay, close to Great Harbour. Last time we visited, I wasn't feeling well and didn't jump but this time my parents pestered me so much about how it was really because I was scared that I HAD to jump. I cannot for the life of me find any of our pictures from here, probably because they were all taken on a go-pro somewhere but anyways, for curious minds this is what the Blue Hole looks like. Upon googling, I learned the cliff we jumped from is 20 feet above water. Lord knows how deep haha!
After the Blue Hole, we stopped by Flo's Conch Shack in Little Harbour. This is the cutest little pink tiki bar nestled on the top of a hill in a gorgeous blue lagoon. We enjoyed the most delicious conch fritters and best Bahamian Rum Punch of life!
{bathing suit: VS (old)}
To finish up our day on the water, we road around close to the nearby islands and did some diving for conch. You'd think it'd be easy to pick up a giant shell with a snail inside, but think again. You have to search for them in the sea grass and they're almost always covered in algae and sand. Lot's of fun though, and soooo delicious. That afternoon, I think we may have found one or two big enough to eat and a few that were the wrong species. The conch I'm holding is a king helmet conch which are beautiful, but not the harvestable kind. You want the queen conchs! The next day, the boys found a good spot closer to Great Harbour and picked up buckets-full that we turned into yummy conch salad and cracked conch. No restaurant needed lol!
After our long day, we showered off and enjoyed another family dinner.
Sunday, we headed out on the boat again and went snorkeling. Great Harbour Cay is right next to Coco Cay and a few of the other private islands in the Bahamas that the cruise ships own and take thousands of tourists to daily. Some of the best reefs are right off the rocky coast of Coco Cay and we snorkeled those reefs last time we were in Great Harbour as well. Beautiful coral and lots of pretty fish! Last time, I saw a lionfish but this time I wasn't as lucky. Well, I guess I was lucky because lionfish are extremely invasive in the Caribbean. Lol I'm so funny... just kidding, I'm just a nerd.
{hat: roxy (old, linked similar), romper: local boutique (linked similar), bathing suit: old navy}
Monday was Memorial Day and another beautiful beach day! Now don't be worried, being in the Bahamas did not get in the way of me showing some American pride in red white and blue apparel ;)
For the sake of keeping your eyes safe from sensory overload of my vacay pictures, that's all for this post! Lots more Bahamas adventures to follow in the next post :)
xoxo, Olivia
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