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| So Close, Yet so Far - Cruise ships at the Nassau pier, as seen from the Sandy Toes excursion dock - our Ship, Carnival Sensation, is 2nd from Left |
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| Relaxing time on the Sandy Toes beach excursion, near Nassau |
Sandy Toes delivered us, as promised, back to their dock at exactly 3:45. We had, as anticipated when we booked the tour, a 45 minute cushion, so to speak, to get back to our Ship; and the taxi ride over in the morning had taken maybe 5 minutes at most. NO PROBLEM. We flagged down one
of our tour guides, reminding him we needed a taxi to the cruise ships. He turned us over to a long-haired old dude
(must have been at least 60!) who, I guess, was kind of the “taxi captain” for
this dock area. This guy pointed to a nearby
taxicab... note, no driver was behind the wheel, and we guessed later that Long-Haired Dude was likely both taxi captain and driver... Anyhow, he indicated we’d be heading off soon, but first we had to wait for
another party from the excursion boat that also needed a taxi to the ships. I verified the price, $8 for the two of us,
same as we paid coming over that morning.
NO PROBLEM!
We waited maybe 10
minutes while the stragglers unloaded from our excursion boat. There was nobody else looking for a taxi from
what we could see. Meanwhile, our 45 minute cushion was shrinking! I mentioned to Long-Haired
Dude that we needed to get back to our ship… couldn’t we just go now? This is where it became kind of a Catch-22;
ironic since I’d been reading that classic book of the same name for the past few weeks. One phrase from the book immediately came to mind in the next moment: “There is
only one catch… Catch-22… and it’s a good one!” Anyhow, Long Haired Dude said we could go without the other (absent or non-existent) party, but then it would be a
$12 fare. I argued that he’d already
told us $8, but then said I'd pay $10 if we left now. He
said we had to wait still for that elusive other party. By now, nobody was left on or anywhere near the
excursion boat except the boat crew, nor were there any folks looking for a taxi (note, since this
was not a Cruise sponsored tour, most of the folks on the excursion were from
Island hotels and taking hotel shuttles)…. Tellingly, those shuttle buses were
already gone, and we were still there.. WAITING, for a non-existent party who
would make our now long delayed taxi trip cheaper… and WAITING STILL!
About 5 minutes later we’d both had it with Long-Haired Dude
and headed off for the nearby "Water Taxi" pier.
Some other tourist on the excursion had mentioned these earlier in the
day, said “Water Taxis” were plentiful and that the trip over to the Cruise
Ship piers was quick. Turns out the
promised water taxis were actually WATER FERRIES, which left for Nassau across
the water every 30 minutes. It was now
a little after 4 PM, but we were assured, as we bought our Ferry tickets.. $8
for the two of us.. that the next boat
would leave in about 10 minutes. NO PROBLEM!... AM I RIGHT?.. TELL ME PLEASE!!
10 minutes came and went, and 5 minutes more after that,
before some guy, the Ferry Captain it appeared (and possibly related to “long-haired”
dude, I might guess, thinking about it now), walked SLOWLY to the boat at the end of
the short pier, climbed in and went to the controls up front. But then he turned around, climbed out of the
boat and strode just as SLOWLY back up the pier. It was
nervous time now, about 4:20,
and we were at the complete mercy of the boat ferry crew, and also hoping the Cruise ship crew
would be merciful and wait long enough for late stragglers, LIKE US!
Finally the captain strode back to the boat, a young
deckhand going with him, and we were told to board the ferry AT LAST! Lanie and I parked ourselves close to the
back of the Ferry where we could depart quickly once we got to the other side. But then the captain left the boat again and
walked back up the pier, waving his arms and yelling something at a young
family of five wandering down the pier. Apparently they needed to board before we
could go.
FINALLY this last family was on
board and the ferry was ready to push off; but it was already 4:30! I asked the deckhand how long the short trip
across to the Cruise ship pier would take.
He said 7 or 8 minutes; It was more like 15, and seemed longer than that, even, in my heightened state of anxiety as we chugged this way and that, the deckhand on the "mike" pointing out local landmarks, such as the four cruise ships, our Carnival Sensation still thankfully among them, that we slid by at length on our way to docking at the Nassau pier.
We were finally there, or rather almost there, as we climbed off the ferry and hurried down the LONG pier; but we still had to go through a security line for
returning cruise passengers before being cleared to rush ever more frantically
down the rest of the LONG pier toward our ship.
We turned the corner at the mooring spot for the Carnival Sensation,
still over 100 yards away from the re-boarding ramp. There were no other passengers around the
boarding area and it looked like the ship crew was getting ready to close up
shop. I waved my arms in the air as we
hurried toward them; thankfully they saw us and waited!
We were on board at about 4:50, out of breath; the “short
taxi” ride back to the Cruise ship had taken OVER AN HOUR! We went immediately to our stateroom and
popped open a bottle of red wine. The
ship fired up and set sail soon thereafter.
We were, indeed, on board, AND, MOST IMPORTANTLY, not wandering around the docks in
a foreign country without our passports (we’d been advised to leave them on
board in a safe place in our stateroom) and wondering how we’d get back to Port
Canaveral without them, not to mention without our cruise ship as well.
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| Ah, some Vinho Tinto to soothe frayed nerves! |
Soon enough we could laugh about the whole
thing; but it wasn’t too funny when it (the routine short taxi ride) was
unraveling an hour before. To paraphrase
that book passage again; “There was only one Catch, Catch-22, and it was a good
one!”.. “Eight bucks if the folks that
aren’t here go with you, twelve bucks if they don’t; but in any event you must WAIT for
them to NOT show up!”.... Arrgh!
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| Saying Goodbye to Nassau (and the Long-Haired Dude and Ferry Captain) |
