Origins: The Bahamas - #124

Every place in the world has a series of things that give that spot a special character... and make it different from every other place.  When you look at the ORIGINS of these things, you often end up with a better appreciation of the territory -- and that makes it a lot more interesting to visit.  And sometimes, these ORIGINS help us understand why we live the way we do.

The early maps of the New World show the islands of the Bahamas as a chain that runs in an arc from the east coast of Florida to the top of Hispaniola.  Hispaniola is the island which is now divided between Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

When the first Europeans arrived here with Columbus in 1492, they found a group of people called the Lucayans.  The Lucayans were members of an Arawak tribe from South America and had been living in the Bahamas for about 500 years.  They’d learned to make large canoes and used them to cover the distances between the seven hundred islands that make up the Bahamas.  Most of their food came from the sea.  Fish and shellfish.  Turtles.  And lots of conch which is a local shellfish.  They made a primitive form of bread from the roots of plants and tried to practice a little farming.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  People have been practicing a little farming in the Bahamas for over a thousand years, but unfortunately this is one of those situations where practice does not make perfect.  The Bahamas are made out of limestone with a very light dusting of soil on top.  Not the ideal place to start an economy based on agriculture.  As a result, there were no huge plantations and no huge slave populations to work on those plantations.  And that affected the history and the gastronomy of the Bahamas.  When you look at the history of the Caribbean islands that had those plantations and the large slave populations, you see the development of foods that were chosen purely because they were the cheapest and the easiest for feeding those slaves.  And that was never really the case here in the Bahamas.

The main source of protein in the Bahamian diet has always been seafood.  There’s usually just enough vegetation to support chickens, sheep and a few pigs, along with a vegetable garden and a limited selection of tropical fruits.  But that’s only the local stuff.  Being a British colony for well over two hundred and fifty years meant that British ships would be importing the traditional ingredients of the English kitchen whenever possible.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  While I was researching the history of the Bahamas I came across a book by Shelley Malone and Richard Roberts.  It contains picture postcards that were produced during the early 1900’s.  Picture postcards just came into fashion at that point, and most of them were made by local photographers who really had a great understanding of the area.  Today, a book like this will give you great insight into what was actually happening.

This book is called Nostalgic Nassau.  It has cards that illustrate the important buildings of the time... most of which still look they way they did in these pictures.

There are beach scenes... the local inhabitants... the churches... the grand hotels... and the ship you came in on.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  But in amongst these traditional views are a couple of postcards that will show you how people were eating and drinking and how they were cooking.

This card shows a vendor who is offering oranges on a stick, all you can eat for what would be about a dollar at today’s rate of exchange.  The oranges appear to have been peeled and are ready to eat.  This was obviously unusual enough to warrant a photographic card.

The fruit stands in this photo are on Market Street, which is still an important shopping area in Nassau.  Bananas.  Watermelons.  And oranges.

The next photo shows seagrapes at threepence a heap.

Some stands had a large variety but a limited stock of each in a rather informal display.

Others put a considerable amount of effort into their presentation.

Produce came in on one side of the market by donkey cart.

Fresh fish arrived at the back on small boats.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  When the United States government outlawed the manufacture and consumption of alcoholic beverages many people in the Bahamas made great fortunes as bootleggers.

The text at the bottom of this card reads... “Evil Spirits - A consignment of booze - Nassau, Bahamas.”  Under close inspection the two fellows at the dock appear to be men of the cloth, undoubtedly there to advocate moderation.

This card shows an outdoor oven.  And it’s the same type of oven that’s been in use throughout the world for thousands of years.

Wood is burned in the center of the oven until the interior is hot.  Then the coals are pushed to the side and the bread to be baked is set in.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  It was an effective and safe system.  It made efficient use of the fuel, and it was far enough away from the house so that it wasn’t a fire hazard.  And to tell you the truth, the last thing you want in your kitchen in a climate like this is a hot oven.  It was used for baking bread, but it was also used for making casseroles.  The ultimate one-pot dish in the Bahamas is peas and rice.  It’s made over a series of days, with new ingredients going in each day.  Eventually, a cake-like crust forms in the bottom of the pot, and it’s fed to the neighborhood dogs.  Even today, a Bahamian dog without pedigree is known as a “potcake.”

It is amazing that in spite of the fact that the Bahamas were a colony of the English for over two and a half centuries, they’ve managed to maintain a love of good food.  In many other parts of the world, colonization by the English meant certain death for good dining.  But not here.  Bahamians are good cooks and good eaters.

This is Arawake Cay -- a collection of food stalls and restaurants that have turned themselves into an ongoing party for both the locals and the tourists.

Arawake Cay is a strip for eaters, but the place for ingredients is Potters Cay on Nassau’s West Bay Street.  It’s a row of wooden stalls that sell fruits and vegetables and locally caught seafood.

BURT WOLF:  Tell me about the fish...

WENDELL HEASTIE:  These ones are called jacks...

BURT WOLF:  Jacks?

WENDELL HEASTIE:  Uh-huh...They’re nice and early fish... you know they’re nice and fresh.... we tell the people -- like the fresh ones, the inside in here is red...mostly still has the blood circulating inside of it...

BURT WOLF:  Check for the red... shiny eyes...

WENDELL HEASTIE:  Uh-huh... this type of fish is more like a softer fish...

BURT WOLF:  How do you cook it?

WENDELL HEASTIE:  It’s a snapper... you could fry it, steam it, stew it, boil it, you know, it’s your choice of taste.

BURT WOLF:  But the most famous thing here is the conch.

WENDELL HEASTIE:  Oh yeah, they’re nice.  I’ll give you a demonstration of one of them.  Okay, you’ll see like how they live inside.  We’re going to break the shell, right?

BURT WOLF:  Right...

WENDELL HEASTIE:  With a chippin’ hammer... that’s because the shell is hard... use a pointed knife... see?  And you do this like a flick of the wrist, see the flick?

BURT WOLF:  Right...

WENDELL HEASTIE:  And you pull him right out.  He comes right out.  See, now you get two eyes.  Here’s the eye, right on the end there...

BURT WOLF:  Wow!

WENDELL HEASTIE:  Two eyes and this is his mouth.  The middle one is his mouth.  See, that’s his chest.  See like this here he use, that’s his foot.  Because he live on the ground like that, and he stretch out, and pull himself like that wherever he want to go.

BURT WOLF:  With that one big foot...

WENDELL HEASTIE:  One big foot, yeah.

BURT WOLF:  How do you cook him?

WENDELL HEASTIE:  Well to cook it, you have to beat it, see because all of this is muscle, it’s very tough.  See, like putting a line right in that’s so you could spread it out... you pound it with a hammer or with a bruiser and it’s come out... when you boil it or cook it it’ll be tender.  If you do it like that it’ll be tough, it’ll only draw up from the heat.  If you gonna eat it raw, you don’t have to cook it.

BURT WOLF:  You just chew it...

WENDELL HEASTIE:  You just cut it up in pieces and you could put some like lemon, pepper, onion, tomato, make it into a vegetable salad with conch in it.  And we call it conch salad.

BURT WOLF:  I always saw movies when I was a kid where somebody would play them like a horn.

WENDELL HEASTIE:  Oh yeah.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Conch has a big reputation for being an aphrodisiac, but I can’t actually confirm that first-hand.  Here you go, thanks a lot.  These are the strong ones, right?  Okay... Some of us live in hope.

One of the few agricultural products produced in the Bahamas on a commercial scale is the banana.  Spanish colonists brought them to the New World in the early 1500s.  And though we think of them as a fruit, they are actually classified by botanists as the world’s largest herb.  They’re also one of our most nutritious foods.  They’re high in vitamins A, B, C, and contain significant amounts of iron, phosphorus, calcium and potassium.  And we’re still getting information suggesting that potassium helps control high blood pressure.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  There are a number of different types of bananas, but the two most important in terms of eating are the yellow- or red-skinned variety which is sweet and ready to eat, and the plantain which is much more like a vegetable, and is always cooked before it’s eaten.  Bananas appear to have gotten started in Southeast Asia and there is actually an ancient Hindu legend that targets the banana as the fruit in the Garden of Eden.  That particular kind of banana is known as the banana of paradise.

And speaking of paradise, it appears that everyone has their very own version of the place.  Which seems to be a theory that is being tested, rather successfully, on a small strip of land that is just at the edge of Nassau in the Bahamas, and known as Paradise Island.  In 1994, a South African named Sol Kerzner purchased 650 acres of paradise from a company controlled by Merv Griffin, the television star.  Kerzner spent 125 million dollars rejuvenating the place.  As a result, Paradise is now available in two formats -- Atlantis and The Ocean Club.

Atlantis is a hotel complex attached to a fourteen-acre waterscape with a giant aquarium and recreational areas.  A lazy river whose man-made current gently rafts you along for a quarter of a mile.  Five pools, some saltwater, some fresh.  Lagoons.  Waterfalls.  Grottos.  A suspension bridge over a predator pool.  Coral reefs.  An endangered species project that gives sea turtles a safe place to hatch their eggs before they return to the ocean.  And the truly amazing 3.2 million gallon aquarium that lets you walk through its center inside a Plexiglas tunnel.

STEVE KAISER:  Well, we try to really present our exhibits so that we’re really not trying to be an aquarium.  We’re really trying to have that experience of being underwater without getting wet.  And we do this by trying to really balance all our tanks from an ecological standpoint so we have enough fish that eat other fish and so we don’t get overpopulated and we have enough fish that eat algae and ones that stir up the bottom.  And so what we’re trying to really reproduce is what you see out in the wild while you’re diving.

This is a Paradise where children find bliss and families really get a blessed break.

Included in the heavenly aspects of this paradise are the meals produced under the direction of the Executive Chef Michael Cloutier.  Today he’s making a Bahamian Lamb Curry.

He starts by pouring an ounce of oil into a sauté pan and letting it warm up.  While that’s happening, four cups worth of lamb, which have been cut into 1-inch pieces and trimmed of fat, are emptied into a bowl.  A little salt and pepper goes on, followed by three ounces of curry powder and three ounces of flour.  All that’s mixed together until the lamb is evenly coated.  Then the lamb goes into the hot oil and is browned on all sides.

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  The French islands use lamb, okay, just because that’s what’s more plentiful there.  The, uh, a lot of the other Caribbean islands use goat.  And I kind of think goat’s probably a little bit better, a little more authentic actually.  It’s a little more tender and it’s not quite as strong as lamb, believe it or not.

BURT WOLF:  I never see it in my market.

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  Well...

BURT WOLF:  And I bet you if they had it, it would never be on special...

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  It probably wouldn’t sell too well...

Three cloves of chopped garlic are mixed in, and one tablespoon of tomato paste.  Two ounces of chopped celery and two ounces of chopped onion are added.  A little more stirring and cooking.  Then three cups of chicken stock go in.  Two cups of peeled carrots and two cups of peeled potatoes cut into small pieces are added.  And now it’s time for a little thyme and a bay leaf.

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  You want to cover that, turn the heat down, just a hair, okay, and you let that cook for about 45 minutes to an hour.

BURT WOLF:  Just simmering.

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  Correct.  Until the lamb is fork tender.

At that point, the Bahamian Lamb Curry is served on a bed of rice.  Paradise enhanced.

Michael’s second recipe is for a traditional French Red Onion Soup -- Bahamian-style.

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  Okay, first you add about four ounces of clarified butter...

BURT WOLF:  Would you like to clarify that?

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  Clarified butter is butter that has been melted where all the fat solids and the waste settle to the bottom, and you just want the stuff off the top.  Okay?  If you were to cook with the fat and everything in there, it would burn.

BURT WOLF:  So you melt the butter, and you just take the butter off the top with the solids settled to the bottom.

CHEF MICHAEL CLOUTIER:  With the solids settled to the bottom.  Correct.  Then we add about three cloves of sliced garlic, and the reason for that is we don’t want a real strong garlicky taste.  The more you cut garlic, and the more you mince it, chop it, it gets hotter and more bitter.  Okay?  So we want a nice mild garlic flavor, so you want to slice it real thin on an angle.  Okay.  Add that to the butter.  And you want to let that cook -- do not let it get any darker than a real light tan brown.  Okay?  If you go past that point, it’s going to burn and it’s... you might as well just start all over again.

The garlic gets cooked for a few minutes at which point two pounds of sliced red onions are added.  A little stirring.  A little cooking.  Cover goes on and the onions sweat it out for fifteen minutes.  Then two ounces of white wine are added.  And two ounces of Balsamic vinegar.  A little more of the melted butter and two ounces of flour are stirred in.  That cooks together for two minutes, and the stock is added, which consists of three and half cups of beef stock and three and a half cups of chicken stock.  A few sprigs of thyme and a bay leaf.  Then the cover is put on and everything simmers for 25 minutes.  When the cover comes off, Michael adds a half cup of cream, but we both agree it is an optional ingredient.  The soup is ladled out into single serving terrines.  A round of toast goes on top and a few slices of cheese.  The cheese is melted under a broiler and the soup is ready to serve.

The second form of Paradise lies about a half mile down the beach  -- an elegant hotel called the Ocean Club.  Huntington Hartford was the heir to the A&P Supermarket fortune and this was his private estate.  It still has much of the original feeling.  A garden based on the classical design used by Louis XIV at Versailles.  A 14th century cloister brought from a monastery in France to Florida by William Randolph Hearst.  Hearst seems to have forgotten about this little purchase, and he left the stones in a series of crates until Huntington heard about them.  Huntington bought the stones and had the cloister reconstructed stone by stone.  It took over a year to do the work because someone had lost the instructions for reassembly.   Alongside the cloister... tennis courts... and a golf course.  A version of heavenly paradise, with individual areas for rapture... and delight.

Between the Ocean Club and the Atlantis Hotel, there’s plenty of good cooking on Paradise Island.  Today Chef Alfred Williams is going to souse a chicken.  A souse dish is a recipe where the main ingredient is submerged in a cooking liquid -- like “boiling” or “poaching.”  My old Aunt Harriet was a soused dish too, but her liquid was gin.

ALFRED WILLIAMS:  We souse a lot of other stuff, you know, we souse the pig feet, the pig ears... we have the mutton souse, we have sheep tongue souse, it’s every, everything, we souse basically everything here in the Bahamas.  We even souse the scrap from the conch also.

BURT WOLF:  Everything can be soused.

ALFRED WILLIAMS:  Everything can be soused in the Bahamas, yes.

BURT WOLF:  I’ll remember that.

A quart of chicken stock is heated in a sauté pan.  A chicken that’s been cut into parts is salted and added to the stock.  Two ounces of whole allspice is added.  All that simmers together uncovered for 10 minutes.  Then a cup of chopped celery is added and a cup of chopped onions.  A little hot dried pepper goes in.  Finally, two cups of peeled potatoes cut into small pieces.  Twenty minutes more over the heat, and it’s ready to serve.

ALFRED WILLIAMS:  We use a lot of hot pepper here in the Bahamas, we like a lot of spice so if you want to you can have a lot.  It’s up to you, you know?  It’s like the Cajun-type cooking...

BURT WOLF:  You take as much as you can...

ALFRED WILLIAMS:  Yes.

Finally, Alfred is going to prepare a Bahamian favorite -- peas and rice.

A little vegetable oil goes into a sauté pan.  A half cup of bits of bacon are added.  A little stirring.  A little cooking.  And then a quarter cup of tomato paste.  A cup of chopped green peppers are added.  A cup of chopped onions, and then a cup of chopped celery.  Everything brightens up when a cup of chopped tomatoes arrive.  A little more sautéing.  Then it’s time for the thyme.  Then two cups of pre-cooked pigeon peas or black-eyed peas are added.  A little stirring.  Then two quarts of chicken stock go in followed by four cups of rice.  Cover goes on and everything cooks for 15 minutes.  At that point the cover comes off, the rice and peas are stirred, and it’s into a bowl for serving.

And now that we’ve eaten -- let’s do junkanoo!

BURT WOLF:  Tell me about junkanoo -- what is it?

STAN BURNSIDE:  Well -- Junkanoo is... Junkanoo!

STAN BURNSIDE:  Junkanoo is the festival, the major festival of the Bahamas.  It combines sculpture, fine art, dance, performance, theater, all in one.  There are two parades.  One parade starts the morning after Christmas.  Remember that these parades go from midnight until six in the morning.  The other parade is the morning of New Year’s Day.  Junkanoo, we believe, is a festival that was brought here by the Africans who were brought here as slaves.

The Africans of course had certain restrictions on their culture, and when they had the opportunity to gather together they really celebrated their culture and Junkanoo is the one part of their culture that they kept very intact.  And over the years, in the New World, it’s developed and it’s evolved right here in the Bahamas so that you have the link with Africa but now it’s shaped into something entirely different.  Because each time a Junkanoo group goes to Bay Street and it develops a theme, all of the art systems of that theme.  For example,  if they have a theme on Great Britain, for example, the Junkanoo artists go and do the research on Great Britain and in the process they get all of the art systems and the design systems of Great Britain and they put that as a part of their presentation on Bay Street. 

And each time a presentation is made on Bay Street all of those art systems become a part of the whole body or visual vocabulary of Junkanoo.  So that at this stage you can say that while Junkanoo at the root is a very very African experience, it’s an amalgamation of all of the different cultures of the world.  When you really think about it, Junkanoo is very modern.  You know when you talk about modern art, nowadays you talk about the hip-hop culture, the whole idea of sampling, and that’s what Junkanoo is.  Junkanoo samples a little bit of everything and it pulls it together and stirs it in a pot and makes a stew, called Junkanoo stew.

Normally the groups start in the neighborhoods.  You know they’re very provincial kinds of gatherings.  You know, I’m from this neighborhood, so naturally I’m associated with this group.

WOMAN 1:  I happen to like the Congos.  They’re not entering this year, and so I guess I’m pulling for the Valleys.

WOMAN 2:  The Saxons.  Yeah.

WOMAN 1:  I think it’s going to be a tough competition between the two.

STAN BURNSIDE:  And the process of that competition of group against group, you have neighborhood against neighborhood, community against community.  So it really starts as a very local thing in each neighborhood where the young kids, as soon as they can get permission from their parents to join a Junkanoo shack, they look forward to being able to go and participate and represent their neighborhood.  Many consider, when you look at some of the pieces, you’ll notice how large they are.  And when you consider that originally these pieces were just masks and each year one group would try to outdo the other and the masks just got larger and larger until we have masks that weigh three hundred pounds.  And that is exactly what happened as a result of the competition.  Everyone wants to be bigger and better and more extravagant and it’s really enhanced and helped the artform to develop very rapidly.  It’s an incredible opportunity for the entire Bahamian community to come together during the Christmas season around this festival.  So you have family reunions and communities getting together around this parade.  So you could say that Junkanoo really is the festival of the Bahamas.

Well, that’s a brief look at the folklore and the food of the Bahamas; I hope you will join us next time as we travel around the world.  I’m Burt Wolf.

Origins: Nassau - #113

Every place in the world has a series of things that give that spot a special character... and make it different from every other place.  When you look at the ORIGINS of these things, you often end up with a better appreciation of the territory -- and that makes it a lot more interesting to visit.  And sometimes, these ORIGINS help us understand why we live the way we do.

The most northerly of the islands of the Bahamas lies about a hundred and fifty miles off the east coast of Florida, at about the same latitude as Palm Beach.  There are over seven hundred islands in the Bahama chain, and they swing down to the southeast until they come to an end just above the Dominican Republic.

When Christopher Columbus finally hit land in the New World it was one of the tiny islands of the Bahamas that he banged into.  Spanish explorers following Columbus called the area Baja Mar which means the “shallow sea.”  Eventually the islands came to be known as... the Bahamas.

Today it is one of the most popular resorts in the western hemisphere.  It has some of the finest beaches... places for scuba diving... boating... deep-sea fishing... duty-free shopping... gaming... and spots to just hang out. 

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  The first people to live in the area  were known as the Lucayans which means “people of the islands.”  By all accounts they were a friendly group.  They had started out about two thousand years ago in South America and moved north through the Caribbean.  One of the reasons they kept moving was to avoid another tribe known as the Caribs. The Caribs, like so many modern nutritionists, believed that the more different foods you included in your diet the healthier you would be. The Caribs included the Lucayans in their diet.  And that’s one of the reasons that the word “cannibal” is found in the languages of Europe.  Unfortunately when the Spanish showed up, things did not get better.  The Lucayans got out of the food chain only to find themselves in the chains of slavery.  Within twenty-five years they had all died and the islands were deserted.

Back in England, the king had become head of the Anglican Church and he thought that everyone should follow him.  The Puritan congregations, however, preferred to follow God without the king as a middle man.  The king made life difficult for the Puritans, and many of them decided to look for a new place to live.  Some of the Puritans that left England ended up on Plymouth Rock and founded Massachusetts.  The Puritans who were in Bermuda were also being persecuted by the English government, and they escaped to the Bahamas.  In 1647 they formed this nation’s first permanent settlement of Europeans. 

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  The next meaningful migration took place during the last decades of the 1700’s.  It was made up of American colonists who had decided to stay loyal to the King of England and wanted to have nothing to do with the newly formed United States of America.  The Loyalists who arrived here came with their slaves and enhanced the racial mixture of the islands.  Then in 1843 the British Empire decided to abolish slavery, and much to the credit of all of the Bahamians there was an easy transition to a British colony made up of free citizens. 

In 1973, after more than 250 years under British rule, the Bahamas became an independent nation.  Today it has a democratically elected government, a stable society, and a prospering economy.  But figuring out how to make a living in the Bahamas was not always a simple task.

Most of the islands in this part of the world have a volcanic base which gives them a soil that is ideal for agriculture.  The Bahamas, however, are formed from limestone with very little topsoil.  This is not an easy place for farming.  And that has influenced the history of the Bahamas in some ways that are positive and in some that are not so positive. 

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Without the ability to grow sugar cane which was the major cash crop for the early European colonies in the Caribbean, the Bahamians turned to other businesses.  For hundreds of years the major local occupation was the salvaging of wrecked ships.  These were dangerous waters, and thousands of boats went down on the reefs surrounding these islands.  The locals made a living by salvaging what they could. 

They also realized that they could improve their business by shifting the shore lights so instead of directing a ship to a safe passage, the light would send the vessel into a rock that was conveniently located for the salvage team.  Efficiency has always been important to a well-run business. 

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Now, some of the salvagers felt that waiting for a ship to get into trouble, even if they helped it along, was just inefficient.  They wanted  to salvage the ship and everything on it before it wrecked.  Now if you did that for a ship that was from your own country, it was called piracy.  But if you did it for a ship from an enemy country it was called privateering and that was a totally legitimate business.  As a matter of fact, many of the great heroes of the British navy were actually privateers and the Bahamas became a major center for the business.  The Spanish would come along and steal the gold from the native American tribes.  They’d put it on their galleons and sail it back to Spain.  As they passed the Bahamas, the English privateers would come out and try and get the gold from the Spanish.  When they got it, the pirates showed up and tried to steal it from the English.  What a business.

The next significant commercial development for the Bahamas came during the War Between The States.  The navy of the north tried to block the major ports of the south.  Bahamian ship owners made great fortunes by running the blockade, bringing in food and military supplies and taking out cotton.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  The end of The War Between The States put an end to the blockade running business.  But, you know, blockade running is a lot like bicycle riding, you can not practice for years and years, then you get back on and your skill level is right there.  When the U.S. federal government passed the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, outlawing the manufacture and consumption of alcoholic beverages, many people along the east coast of the United States who did not agree with that law, and many people who owned boats in the Bahamas began to sing the same song.  “Seems like old times...”

BURT AND OTHERS SINGING: 

“...Having you to walk with...

Seems like old times,

Having you to talk with,

That is still a thrill,

Just to have my arms around you,

Seems like old times with you...”

BURT WOLF:  The Beatles have nothing to worry about.

GUITARIST:  You hear what he said.

The encouragement of free enterprise has always been part of Bahamian history.  Fortunately, today the Bahamian love of business is manifest in three very acceptable forms: international banking, tourism, and duty-free shopping.

They are a retailer’s seventh heaven and a shopper’s delight.  Ninety percent of the stock is famous brand merchandise.  Cartier.  Fendi.  Christian Lacroix.  Rolex.  Chanel.  Gucci.  Baccarat.  Everything is pre-packed and ready for sale, and ninety percent of the shoppers know just what they want and are ready to make their purchase.  These magical midpoints of marketing are known as duty-free shops.  They are found throughout the world and represent billions of dollars in annual sales.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  The idea of duty-free shopping goes back for thousands of years.  One of the easiest ways for a king to pick up a few extra dollars was to place a tax on luxury goods coming into his country.  That tax was added to the retail price of the product and everybody paid for it.  What we now call an import duty.  One of the easiest ways to avoid the import duty was to do your shopping on the high seas, ship to ship, or maybe on a little island that didn’t have a tax agent.  Eventually the kings decided to let sailors buy luxury goods like tobacco and alcohol, without paying the duty. The theory was that they were going to use those products in an area that was not part of the  king’s territory.   So let’s give ‘em a break. 

The modern duty-free business got started just after World War II, when a duty-free shop was opened at Ireland’s Shannon Airport.  The Irish government did not charge an import duty on the goods that were being sold to the passengers.  And the duty-free shop passed on those savings to the purchaser.  In 1948, airlines began selling duty-free liquor and tobacco onboard their flights.  And today, duty-free shops are found at virtually every international airport, border crossing, cruise ship, international flight, and in port towns where the nation has come to understand how profitable this business can be.

The duty free shops in Nassau are a perfect example of what I mean.  The government has posted a long list of luxury items on which it does not charge a duty.  That savings is passed on to the customer by the duty free shop.  And unlike many countries in which there is so much paperwork that it just doesn’t pay to make a duty free purchase, there is no paper work in Nassau.  Everything happens in the shop.  No madness at the airport.  In general there’s a 25 to 35 percent savings over the prices in North America and Europe.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  But remember, your own country will place a limit on the amount of the duty free stuff you can bring back in.  Governments and duty-free shopping have the same relationship as just about everything else that involves the government.  If they don’t get you coming, they get you going.  Which is better than when they get you coming and going.

The idea of taking a vacation in a warm and sunny spot by the sea goes back for thousands of years.  Ancient documents show that over two thousand years ago, the well-to-do of Rome were heading to the seashore near Naples when they needed a break.  The first person to try and put the Bahamas on the vacation map was a man named Henry Flagler. 

During the 1800s, Flagler had put together the railroads of Florida and the tourist industry that went along with them.  He felt that he could do the same in the Bahamas by setting up the Miami-Nassau steamship line and building a new hotel in Nassau to receive his passengers.  Nice try, but too early.  Neither made enough money to stay in business -- but the idea of making Nassau into a vacation paradise hung on.

During the Roaring Twenties the magnificent private yachts of the great industrialists cruised into Nassau.  The Whitneys, the Vanderbilts, the Astors...   if it floated, and you wanted to flaunt it, Nassau was the place.

And then, in 1940, the ultimate seal of approval for the rich: a royal resident.  The Duke of Windsor, the ex-king of England, became governor of the Bahamas.  He was fashionable.  He was elegant.  He had given up the job of king to marry Wallis Simpson, an American.  He was media perfect.  And the Bahamas became the jewel in the crown of vacation spots.

The island of New Providence may not be at the geographic center of the Bahamas but its capital city of Nassau is clearly the political, economic and tourist hub of the nation.  Much of the architecture is from the 1800s, including the public buildings which were the original structures housing the Court, the Legislature, the Assembly, other government officials and the Post Office.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  One of the things I noticed as I was walking around town is that everybody picks up their mail at the post office.  There is no home delivery which I thought was rather unusual for a totally modern city.  The reason turned out to be very simple.  No one has ever gotten around to numbering the homes and no one wanted to try and deliver mail to unnumbered buildings.  Personally, I don’t get it, but everyone in Nassau gets their mail and that’s what’s important.

The Nassau Public Library was built in 1798 as a prison.  Today it holds a collection of books and photographs that deal with the Bahamas.

That’s Government House; it was built in 1901 as the official residence of the Queen’s representative in the Bahamas.  In front is a statue of Christopher Columbus trying to figure out the right direction for the rest of his trip.

As I mentioned earlier, the first permanent colony of Europeans in the Bahamas came in search of religious freedom, and that is certainly one of the hallmarks of this nation.

This is St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church.  It was built in 1810.

The St. Francis Roman Catholic Church was the first Catholic church built in the Bahamas.  It was constructed in 1885.

The Greek Orthodox Church is rather new.  It was built by the Greek community in the 1930s.  A substantial number of Greeks had come to the Bahamas to set up a natural sponge industry, which unfortunately came to an end as the result of a sponge blight.  The sponges were gone, but the Greeks stayed on to soak up the sun.

The largest church in the Bahamas from the point of view of membership is the Baptist.  And to visit any of their gatherings on a Sunday morning is to see one of the great ritualistic expressions of the love of God.

PIANIST:  And I just want you to worship him this morning, in spirit and in truth.  When we begin to praise him, things begin to happen.  Healing comes to us, deliverance comes to us.  We’re going to praise him this morning. 

CHOIR:  (Singing)

The gospel music that fills Nassau’s Zion Baptist church has its beginnings in the 17th century religions of West Africa.  The tribes believed that there was one High God, a group of less important gods, the spirits of the recently deceased, and the ordinary spirits who had been reincarnated in the newborn.  All of these spirits acted as messengers between this world and the world of the gods.  The best way to get in touch with a messenger was to join in a “ring shout.”  A “ring shout” was a combination of song and dance -- part religious, part secular -- it allowed the group to enter into an altered state of consciousness -- to contact the spirits -- to make confessions and offerings, to ask for help, and to talk to ancestors.

The rhythms, the hand clapping, the calls and responses, the physical closeness of the group during the singing and moving­­, are all part of the tradition of the “ring shout.”

Because these ceremonies were viewed with suspicion by the slave holders of the new world, much of this musical energy was channeled into the church where slaves were able to express themselves more freely.  The Christian God was substituted for the African High God and the African ring dance moved inside the church to became an essential part of black Christian worship.

There’s a good deal of good music in Nassau.  And on a note that is less spiritual than the Zion Baptist Church but just as inspiring, there is something called “rake and scrape.”

EDMUND MOXEY:  The name “rake & scrape” was introduced in the late 60s.  As I boy I knew the music that we now play that we call rake & scrape was called “Goombay.”  Goombay music is a marriage of Africa and Europe.  Goombay from the African word jimbi, which means “big drum.”

The original African inhabitants of the Bahamas arrived without their traditional instruments.  And the trees and the roots that had been used to create the drums were not part of the Bahamian landscape.  So they improvised with the materials that were available.  They took old cans and old barrels and stretched goatskins over an open end.  They weren’t the big drums of Africa, but they were better than nothing. 

The European influence showed up in the instruments used to present the melodies -- the guitar, and the bass, and sometimes an accordion.  The old dances were adapted from European quadrilles and polkas.

The other essential element of rake & scrape is the distinctive percussion.

EDMUND MOXEY:  In Africa they had an instrument called the satchika, which was made out of the bamboo beads.  And we had no bamboo beads.  And as a result, they adapted the common carpenter saw, which we use in place of the bamboo bead instrument.  So you had a combination of the European guitar, the carpenter saw, and the African drum.

As you might expect, while I was in Nassau, I came across a few restaurants I enjoyed.  The first was next to the Nassau Yacht Haven Marina.  It’s called The Poop Deck, and it’s a hangout for local lovers of the sea.  A relaxed, informal spot with a great view of the boats.  They’re famous for their chowder with homemade hot pepper vinegar... Mama Mary’s Steamed Fish, which is actually not steamed, but sautéed and then covered with a sauce made from tomatoes, onions, celery and green peppers.  The side dish is peas and rice.

Down the road a piece is a spot called Sugar Reef.  It describes itself as a “harbourside bar and grill,” which is a perfect description.  The Sugar Reef tables are set out on a pier that juts into the harbor.  And the colorful seascape that surrounds it is matched by the interior decor.  It’s party time! 

Great crab cakes served on a bed of spicy black bean salsa along with avocado and papaya sauces... a grilled jerk pork sandwich with a sweet onion jam... and a side of raisin coleslaw.  And for dessert, an apple tart with cinnamon ice cream.

Next is a kitchen that really cooks for the locals -- it’s a neighborhood spot called Mama Lyddy’s Place.  There’s no name on the outside of the building, but on the inside there’s some very traditional Bahamian home cooking.  That’s Mama Lyddy, and that’s her with the rest of her family.  The building was the family’s original homestead.  It’s at the corner of Cockburn and Market Streets, in an area called Grantstown.  They specialize in cracked conch, which is breaded and deep-fried... grits and peas... and a knockout coconut meringue pie.

Finally, there’s Compass Point -- it’s quite a place.  It has eighteen cottages on the beach... a pool... and one of the most enjoyable restaurants in the Caribbean.  It’s decorated in the style of Junkanoo, which is the annual folk parade of Nassau.

Compass Point was put together by Chris Blackwell, the record producer who introduced Bob Marley, U2, and the Cranberries.

The chef is Richard Haja, and the meal he made for me was pasta and shrimp... grilled lamb chops with guava sauce... and his “accidental goat cheese cake.”

RICHARD HAJA:  We were in the kitchen one day and I was making cheesecake and I had all the ingredients inside the mixing bowl.  We had Philadelphia Cream Cheese as well as the goat cheese and I said to my assistant to put the cheese in.  I figured he knew that I was using the Philadelphia cheese, but it was the goat cheese he put in and as it turned out, we were committed to it because it was the eggs and the vanilla and what have you.  So we just mixed the goat cheese up and went with it and it turned out to be quite a pleasant surprise.  Quite a nice accident.

Sigmund Freud said that there were no accidents, but on the other hand, Freud didn’t know much about cheesecake.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Well, that’s a brief visit to the Bahamas.  I hope you will join us next time as we travel around looking at the history, culture and folklore of some of the world’s great places.  I’m Burt Wolf.

Origins: The Abaco Islands - #110

Every place in the world has a series of things that give that spot a special character... and make it different from every other place.  When you look at the ORIGINS of these things, you often end up with a better appreciation of the territory -- and that makes it a lot more interesting to visit.  And sometimes, these ORIGINS help us understand why we live the way we do.

When some of the British colonies in North America decided to declare their independence from the king of England and form the United States of America, not everybody in the colonies agreed with that decision. Many people remained loyal to His Majesty, and when the American Revolutionary War was over they left the colonies. Some went back to England, some went to the island of Jamaica, thousands went to Canada, and six hundred came here to the island of Abaco in the Bahamas.

The Abaco Loyalists came from New York, showed up in 1783, and settled in a spot called Treasure Cay. Their dream was to set up a self-sufficient township for the families that had remained loyal to the king of England.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  They were soon joined by a group of settlers that came in from Harbour Island, which is just to the south of here.  The Harbour Islanders were descendants of groups of people that had come about 150 years before from England.  At first, I thought the Harbour Islanders had arrived to support their follow royalists, to share their belief in the rights of kings, to stand shoulder to shoulder in their vision of Great Britain.  But on further investigation, I found out that the Harbour Islanders showed up because they thought the Loyalist girls were real cute.

The Abacos are a group of islands in the Atlantic Ocean about two hundred miles northeast of Miami, Florida.  Treasure Cay is still here and the inhabitants are still loyal.  However, their present loyalty is directed toward vacationing tourists.

There is no central township for The Abacos. Each island in the group has its own focus and the residents are connected by a series of ferries. Flights into Abaco usually land at Marsh Harbour, from which you can take a ferry to Hope Town.

Hope Town is a picturesque little village inhabited by three hundred and fifty descendants of the original loyalists.

SCHOOLCHILDREN:  “Loyalists, where did you come from?  On your way to Abaco in the sun.  Yea, this was their destiny, all that came, came to be free.  Looking for a nice place to be, in Abaco Islands, especially Hope Town.  When they landed, they found a yard, to settle down was not that hard.  Yea, this was their destiny, all that came, came to be free.  Looking for a nice place to be, in Abaco Islands, especially Hope Town.”

Most families have a place where they store the stuff from their past.  Photographs of deceased relatives... presents that you don’t want but you had better have out at family gatherings... things that have been around so long you don’t even know what they are any more... The residents of Hope Town have actually taken a house and turned it into a collective attic for the community.  It’s called the Wayannie Malone Historical Museum. It’s a great idea. You can get the old stuff out of your house and instead of feeling guilty, you feel a sense of generosity for having made a donation to a historic museum. I love this place.

PEGGY THOMPSON:  One of my favorite things in the museum is a beautiful little vase, and back in the olden days you were a wrecker just like you were a doctor or a lawyer and you would salvage ships that wrecked on the many reefs around Hope Town.  And you had to turn it all over to the government legally, but this one lady who really liked this pretty vase -- as much as I like it -- hid it in her baby’s cradle, so when the inspector came, he couldn’t find it and she got to keep it in her house in Hope Town.

I also like the archaeological dig that they did here in 1991.  We don’t have any source of fresh water here, so we have to dig cisterns to store rainwater, and when somebody was digging a cistern they found a skeleton.  Turns out it was of a Lucayan Indian, and all of the schoolchildren got to come down and did a proper archaeological dig.  And all of the remains and other things that went with it, some tools and stuff are in the museum.  And that’s another one I like.

Down the road is the Hope Town lighthouse. It was built in the 1830s and was a highly controversial project.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  In the old days the reefs around the Abacos were quite dangerous and boats were always banging into them and sinking.  When a boat would hit a reef and start to go down, the local residents would come out to save the cargo.  Actually, seize the cargo would be a better description.  The law at the time required that that cargo go to Nassau and be sold at auction.  A small slice of the proceeds from that auction would go to the government as a tax, a small slice would go to the previous owner of the vessel, and the bulk of those funds would go to the local residents who had saved the cargo.  Well, the people around here became so dependent on that as a source of income, that when the government tried to build a lighthouse, they sabotaged it.

Eventually, however, it got built and today it is a major tourist attraction.  It is one of the few lighthouses in the world that has not been automated.  It houses one of the last hand-powered Kerosene beacons still in use.

The light and the base that turns it were made during the early 1900s in Birmingham, England, and they still work perfectly.  The light source is provided by a kerosene vapor lamp that burns with the brightness of 325,000 candles.  Just below the lantern room there is a hand pump that is used to pressurize the kerosene.  The kerosene travels up a tube into an atomizer that sprays it into a mantle.  Some camping lanterns operate on the same principle.

The mantle light is concentrated by five bull’s-eye lenses into a piercing beam that is directed out to the horizon.

A cable of weights is pulled up to the top of the tower.  As it descends it turns a series of bronze gears that rotate the lamp every fifteen seconds.  The lighthouse keeper must pull up the cable every two hours.

The system weighs three tons and floats on a circular tube that is filled with mercury.  The mercury reduces the friction at the base of the housing and allows it to turn. The turning mechanism is like a huge grandfather or cuckoo clock.

The light is 120 feet above sea level and shines for 15 miles.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Between the climbing up the 101 steps to the top of the lighthouse and pulling up those weights every two hours, the lighthouse keeper gets a pretty good workout.  All he really needs is something for his abs, which shouldn’t be hard to find, after all, we are in Abaco.

The next island north of Hope Town is called Man-O-War Cay.  The residents are very proud of their history and determined to preserve their way of life.  They will not allow any hotels or resorts to be put up on their island, and no liquor has ever been offered for sale.  A reminder of their puritan past.  Man-O-War was the center of Abaco’s shipbuilding industry and still has a number of successful boat yards.  Most of the boats that are in for maintenance come over from Florida.  The owners like the traditional craftsmanship of these yards; they also feel that they get a good price for the work and they love the idea of waiting in the Bahamas while the work gets done.

Most of the people on Man-O-War can trace their family heritage back to Pappy Ben Albury and Mammy Nellie Archer who settled here in the 1820s.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Nellie was a young teenager who came over to this island one day with her father to work on a small farming patch that they owned.  While they were weeding away, they began to hear sounds from the beach.  And when they came over to investigate, they saw a group of young Bahamian sailors coming ashore after their ship had wrecked on the reef.  In charge of the group was young Ben, only sixteen years old at the time, but it was love at first sight.  They courted, they married, and moved back to this island where they first met.

These days the Alburys and the Archers represent most of the residents on Man-O-War.  They still meet, they still fall in love, but they only marry if they are second cousins or more distant.  It appears that love conquers everything but genetics. 

A few cays north of Man-O-War on a strip of land called Green Turtle Cay is New Plymouth.  New Plymouth was once an important commercial center: lots of boat building, and a major pineapple plantation, but over the years it has settled back into a less stressful existence as a fishing village, with houses that look a lot like the saltboxes of New England.

This New Plymouth saltbox was built in 1826 for a successful businessman. Today it is the home of the Albert Lowe Museum. It was the first historical museum in the Bahamas and it is dedicated to the history of the British settlers who founded New Plymouth in the 1700s, and to the shipbuilding business that they developed.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  As you come into the museum, one of the first things you see is a portrait of Albert Lowe.  He was a great lover of the sea, but he was also a great builder of model boats.  He liked to build replicas of the boats that had actually been built in full scale in the Abacos and used commercially.  This is a good example.  A lot of these boats were used to transport lumber that was cut from the forest in Abaco for sale in the United States.  They also did a little trading in pineapples.  There are half a dozen absolutely beautiful models here that he made.  There are a number of paintings along the wall, some of them over a hundred years old and they show you what life was like in the old days, though, it really hasn’t changed very much.  This is a guy named William Curry.  He loved his house, which was here in Abaco, and one day he decided to move it -- all the way to Key West.  He broke it down, packed it up, and shipped it over.  I’m very impressed with this, because even if he got a great deal and he went first class, the overweight was going to be enormous.  Now remember, everybody here was a loyalist.  They believed in the King and Queen of England and their power, and there are a number of paintings that represent that attitude.  This is Queen Victoria at her wedding to Prince Albert.  Boy, Albert was in good shape -- he’s wearing very tight pants.  This is Queen Victoria at her coronation; this group here are all of the ladies-in-waiting where we see the Queen with her ladies-in-waiting.  Waiting was a small town just to the south of London and they were in there all the time.

“QUEEN VICTORIA”:  “We are not amused.”

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):   Clocks, chairs, tables, doilies, hundred and fifty-year-old lamps...Hold on -- a love letter:  “Richard -- when it comes to giving...”  I don’t think we’re going to share this.

New Plymouth is also the site of The Memorial Sculpture Garden, a national monument honoring the early settlers in the Bahamas and their descendants.  There are twenty-four sculptures; each likeness represents a person who stands for a particular achievement in Bahamian history.  At the center of the garden is a plaque dedicated to the American Loyalists.  It deals with a part of the Revolutionary War that is usually not well-covered in American history books. The first paragraph reads:

“Divided by civil war, defeated in battle, stripped of property and possessions,    persecuted and exiled by their neighbors, American Loyalists were forced to   abandon their homeland and seek their king’s protection in the Bahama Islands.”

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Not quite the same text that was in my high school year book.  Clearly, there are at least two sides to every story.

Time to eat!  And the place is Wally’s Restaurant.  During the mid-eighties, Barbara and Maureen Smith came to the family islands from Canada to help their dad begin his retirement.  Which turned out to be a restaurant -- a restaurant whose specialties are Grouper Nantua, which is a grouper salad served on toast.  They also make a mean mahi-mahi burger, which is mahi-mahi good.  Also on the menu: a grouper in a spicy tomato sauce...  traditional British fish and chips, and finally, Wally’s signature dish, Bahamian lobster salad.

They also have a nice little boutique.  There’s John Blackman, my sound engineer, spending his hard-earned money.  Hey John -- you’re supposed to be recording my voice!  John!  JOHN!

We also had a good meal at Mangoes in Marsh Harbour.  Libby Roberts did all her cooking at home until 1989, when she decided to turn pro and opened a little restaurant right on the water.  After extensive marketing research, she decided to call it “Mangoes,” because that was her favorite fruit.  The restaurant specializes in grilled fish.  Grouper with black olive sauce is the most popular dish.  Everybody in the crew also enjoyed the chicken salad and the jerked ribs.

The Abacos are one of the world’s great centers for yachtsmen and many of the resorts are designed for people who sail up as well as drive up. The Great Abaco Beach Resort is a good example.  The resort is half hotel and half marina.  The marina contains 185 slips with hookups for fresh water, electricity, telephone, television, and what appears to be the most essential facility for yachtmen -- a laundry!  Yachts from all along the east coast of North America pull into the resort to relax and unwind after their passage to the Bahamas.  And they also use it as their home port as they travel through these islands.

The hotel property is spread out over twenty-three acres of beachfront.  Most of the rooms are set into villas that have been placed just above the shore.  There’s a pool, an outdoor bar and all the other amenities that are normally associated with a tropical resort.  Plus a very pleasant hotel staff who are interested in doing what they can to help you relax.

Clearly, Abaco beach is a good spot to head out for some deep sea fishing.  Two of the great deep sea fishing tournaments -- The Bertram-Hatteras Shoot-out and the Bahamas Billfish Tournament -- are based out of Great Abaco Beach.

STEVE WILLIAMS:  Typically, we’ll arrange the charter for you, pre-book it; you’ll arrive here, everything will be ready for you.  We provide the tackle, the bait... the mate, the captain will all be here.  And basically all you have to bring is your sunscreen.  And we try to tailor our trips to the experience level of the angler.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Big game fishing as a sport got its start in Western Europe in 1496 with the publication of the first book on the subject.  The book was called A Treatise On Fishing With An Angle.  Fishing with an angle meant fishing with a hook as opposed to a net or a spear or a harpoon.  Gear in those days included a rod made of local wood, line that was made from braided horsehair, and a hook cast from iron.

In 1655, Izaak Walton wrote a book that became the most famous fishing book ever published. It is called The Complete Angler, and it introduced the idea of the reel. The basic equipment has changed very little over the years, although the materials and the construction techniques have taken advantage of our most modern technologies.

Boating became popular right after World War Two and big game fishing became the ideal activity to occupy the powerboater.  The introduction of plastic made the gear lighter and stronger. (“Stay with him, Helen!”)  Monofilament nylon line could withstand hundreds of pounds of pull and still be light enough for long casts.

But despite all these advantages, the angler still has to find the fish, a task which has became easier because of fish-finding sonar.  It uses a radar-like device to search the bottom of the sea and send back a signal outlining the fish.  Trolling from the boat allows the anglers to cover a large area of the sea and send their lines down to considerable depths.  A massive rod with a heavy reel is set into a socket in what is called a fighting chair.  The fisherman is held into the seat with a harness and the battle between man and big game fish begins.  Or the battle between man and boredom.

But how big is a big game fish?  Well, recent records have included a white shark at twenty-six hundred pounds, a black marlin at sixteen hundred pounds, and a bluefin tuna at fifteen hundred pounds.  Now, the bluefin tuna is particularly impressive when you realize that that single fish was responsible for over ten thousand individual tuna sandwiches.  Which reminds me -- I owe you a recipe.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  One learns to live with disappointment.

George Malone is the chef at The Great Abaco Beach Resort.  Being a true Bahamian he prefers to do his cooking outside whenever possible.  Right now he’s preparing the fish that I did not catch -- grilled grouper fillets with a citrus sauce.

He starts with a marinade which eventually turns into a basting sauce and then into a serving sauce. Very efficient. One cup of orange marmalade goes into a mixing bowl, followed by a quarter of a cup of white horseradish and three tablespoons of chopped garlic. Then a quarter of a cup of chopped parsley is added and a teaspoon of Tabasco sauce.

The next set of ingredients consists of the juice of one lemon, a cup of pineapple juice and a quarter of cup of dark rum.  The rum is optional.  A little salt and pepper.  A little mixing.  And finally a quarter of a cup of vegetable oil is whisked in.

The boneless, skinless fish filets rest in that mixture for and hour and a half... at which point they go onto the grill to cook.

At the same time, the marinade goes into a saucepan and over the heat where it is brought to a simmer.  As the fish is cooking, the marinade is used as a basting sauce.

BURT WOLF:  If I can’t get grouper, what else could I use?

GEORGE MALONE:  You can use grouper, you can use tuna, you can use wahoo...

BURT WOLF:  Big fish.

GEORGE MALONE:  Yeah, any big fish that’s good for grilling, no small fish.  You know, small pan-fried fish that we call, like, grunts.  Basically big fish.

BURT WOLF:  You got it.

When the fish is finished cooking, it comes off the grill and is served with the warm sauce on top.

And as long as we are out here and the coals are still hot, George is going to make grilled chicken breasts with a traditional Bahamian sauce.

GEORGE MALONE:   Alright, we’ve taken a piece of chicken that’s already been seasoned with salt, pepper, and lime juice.  And we take it and throw it on the grill for about fifteen, twenty minutes.

BURT WOLF:  Ah, the wind...the magic ingredient in outdoor cooking.  The magic ingredient we’d like not to have in the outdoor cooking.

We cook the chicken with the skin on because it will keep the meat tender, but anyone who is trying to lower the fat and cholesterol content of their diet should take the

skin off after the chicken is cooked.

While the chicken is cooking George prepares the sauce.  An ounce of vegetable oil is heated in a saucepan.  Two ounces of bacon cut into pieces are added -- not great for fat watchers, but there are limits to the sacrifices I’ll make.  Then a cup of chopped onion, a cup of green pepper strips and a cup of chopped celery are added.  All that simmers for ten minutes.

At that point two cups of diced tomatoes and their juices go in, plus four ounces of tomato paste.  Two minutes of heating and stirring and it’s time to add two cups of chicken stock and the seasonings, which are two tablespoons of Worcestershire Sauce, one teaspoon of thyme and a pinch of salt.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  George and I are joking about the wind, but it really is an important factor in outdoor cooking.  If you’re looking at a recipe and it calls for grilling the meat for ten minutes outdoors, and there’s a heavy wind, that wind is going to move the heat away, and you may need fifteen or twenty minutes.  So if you’re cooking outdoors and you’ve got a wind, try and put up something that will block that wind so the heat can go directly to the food.

Five more minutes of cooking and the sauce is ready.  And so is the chicken. Bahamian peas and rice and coleslaw are the side dishes. The chicken joins in and the sauce goes on top. 

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Just one more story.  In 1973, when the Bahamas gained their independence from Great Britain, everybody here was thrilled -- everybody but the people living on Abaco.  They were Loyalists, and they wanted to remain loyal to the king and queen of England, and stay part of Great Britain.  What a neighborhood!  And talking about loyalty, I hope you will join us next time as we travel around the world.  I’m Burt Wolf.

Origins: Eleuthera, The Bahamas - #105

Every place in the world has a series of things that give that spot a special character... and make it different from every other place.  When you look at the ORIGINS of these things, you often end up with a better appreciation of the territory -- and that makes it a lot more interesting to visit.  And sometimes, these ORIGINS help us understand why we live the way we do.

The Bahamas are a group of 2,700 coral islands. Most of them are small and uninhabited -- little strips of land scattered in a chain that starts off the coast of Florida, and runs down to the tip of Haiti.

The capital city of the Bahamas is Nassau. It’s an important port for Caribbean cruise ships, a center for duty-free shopping and a popular vacation spot.  Most of the tourists coming to the Bahamas end up in Nassau.

But there’s another side to these islands, a side which is quieter, softer and gentler.  A side that will allow you to leave the commercial world behind and just relax. A side that is found on what are known as “the family islands.”

The first European to arrive on a family island in the Bahamas was Christopher Columbus. He looked around, didn’t see any gold and moved on.  And that was pretty much the story for everyone else who came by.  “No gold? No silver? No treasures?  Hey!  Let’s go!”

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  The first settlers to show up in the Bahamas with the intention of setting up a permanent colony were a group of Puritans who came down here from Bermuda in 1649.  They were looking for a place where they would be free to practice their religion -- the same situation that sent a different group of Puritans out of England to establish a colony in Massachusetts.  The group that came here were under the leadership of Captain William Sayle.  They were known as the Eleutheran Adventurers.  Eleuthera is the Greek word for freedom.

Their ship was wrecked on the reef out there, but they were lucky enough to be able to make their way to this shore. Their search for shelter led them to a cave just off the beach. They had lost most of their supplies when the ship went down, and were forced to live, as best they could, off the land and the sea. This cave was their only shelter. 

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA): Captain Sayle built himself a small sailboat, and with eight of his men headed off to get help from the British colony in Jamestown, Virginia.  And, amazingly, he pulled it off.  He returned with enough supplies to last the Eleutherans for two years, at which time they needed help again.  Not wanting to tap the same source too often, his second request was made to the British colony in Massachusetts.  They responded by sending a shipload of supplies and the Eleutherans thanked them by sending back a shipload of hardwood and a request that some of the proceeds from the sale of the hardwood be used to support the development of Harvard University.

The Eleutheran Adventurers used this cave not only as a place of shelter but as a place of worship. They carved this rock into a form that could be used as a pulpit and conducted their services. With its cathedral shape and light shining down from the holes in the top of the cave, it’s easy to see why they thought themselves blessed. Today it’s called Preacher’s Cave.  

As the early settlers began to spread out, they took up residence on an island called Spanish Wells.  Spanish Wells is just off the northern tip of Eleuthera and it got its name because it was the spot where Spanish ships would stop to take on fresh water just before they made a quick right turn and headed back to Seville with the treasures that they had stolen from the local natives. Almost all of the people who live on Spanish Wells are descendants of the original Eleutherian Adventurers and most of them still speak with a distinct British accent.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Spanish Wells has the distinction of being the wealthiest community in the Bahamas, and they owe it all to changing fashions in food.  For about three hundred years, they tried to earn a living by bringing in the local lobsters.  But for 250 of those years, nobody really cared.  Lobster was considered to be junk seafood.  As a matter of fact, farmers along the Atlantic coast of North America would use lobsters as fertilizer on their farms.  Then, in the early decades of this century, everything changed.  Lobster became the seafood to eat.  Supplies went down, prices went up, and the guys on Spanish Wells got rich.  And if people continue to pay big prices for big lobsters, people on Spanish Wells will remain in ship shape.

And speaking of shapes, Eleuthera has a rather unusual one.  It is 110 miles long and for most of that length it is only about a mile wide. At its widest point it only thickens out to about five miles.  Its thinnest point is about five yards, which is a spot known as the Glass Window.  On one side you have the Atlantic Ocean and on the other the Caribbean Sea. You can stand on this small bridge of land and see the difference between these two bodies of water.  The Atlantic: aggressive, uninviting, often covered with waves and whitecaps. On the other side, the Caribbean: smooth, gentle, inviting you to pull up a beach chair and relax.

Beaches are Eluthera’s big attraction, miles and miles of them, one stretch more beautiful than the next and always uncrowded.

Most tourists to Eleuthera pass their days on Harbour Island.  It’s just off the coast of the mainland of Eleuthera and you get there by water taxi.  The center of Harbour Island is Dunmore Town.  It was named after Lord Dunmore, who was the Governor of the Bahamas during the late 1700s.  Dunmore Town was once a center for shipbuilding, sugar processing, and the production of rum.  The rum business was particularly successful during the period when the United States was under the influence of the 19th Amendment to the Constitution -- the one that outlawed the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages.  The law did not extend itself to Eleuthera but Eleuthera did extend its rum distribution to the United States, proving once again that a friend in need is a friend in deed.

I passed a day on Harbour Island walking through the streets, looking at the architecture, talking to the people, and enjoying the food.

FISHERMAN:  Bahamian conch... that’s for conch salad, cracked conch, conch chowder... a delight!  That’s the conch!

One of the more unusual sights in Dunmore Town is called the Aura Corner.  It’s sort of like a giant collage of... well, it’s like a collection of thoughts that... actually, it’s whatever Ralph Sawyer wants it to be.  Sawyer is the curator of Aura Corner.  Uncle Ralph, as he’s called, collects slogans, sayings, words of wisdom, whatever.  He gets them from the visitors who stop by.  Then he paints them on wooden slats and hangs them up in front of his house.  And anyone can leave a memento of their own -- hey, Jimmy Buffett did.  My favorite is Uncle Ralph’s Recipe For A Happy Marriage:  3 cups of love... one cup of forgiveness... one barrel of laughter -- a recipe!  How appropriate.

I began my gastronomic day with a traditional Bahamian breakfast at Angela’s Starfish Restaurant -- pineapple juice, yellowtail fish on grits, and johnnycakes.  Angela Johnson, who runs the place, is also an expert on the science -- and the art -- of using everyday plants as medicines.

ANGELA JOHNSON:  Well, bush medicine began from before my time.  My grandmother, she used to take care of people that were sick.  And she used to boil up medicine and give them medicine to drink.

BURT WOLF:  So you’re making a tea, really.

ANGELA JOHNSON:  Yeah!  I put a little salt in it, like you get the lime, or the sour orange -- a big sour orange -- and you squeeze it in there and you drink that down.  That wakens up that flame...

BURT WOLF:  What are some of the herbs that you use?

ANGELA JOHNSON:  We got the bay leaf, you know the bay leaf is good, too.

BURT WOLF:  What’s that for?

ANGELA JOHNSON:  If you got diarrhea, you can boil that and make a tea, too.  Yeah, here... smell it... It smells real good.  You see?  Mash it... You cook with it...

BURT WOLF:  Mmmm...It smells good!

ANGELA JOHNSON:  Yeah!  It’s good!  And then you got the sweet basil, which you can make tea also, good for the stomach.  And they’re also good to cook with, you know that.

BURT WOLF:  Yeah.

ANGELA JOHNSON:  They grow, I guess, all over America.

BURT WOLF:  Ah, so what does sweet basil do for you as a medicine?

ANGELA JOHNSON:  It’s good... It cleans the stomach.  Yeah, it’s good, mash it!  If you got fish on you -- you been fishin’?

BURT WOLF:  Yeah...

ANGELA JOHNSON:  Wash your hands and the scent not leavin’?  You rub that in your hands, it take away the scent.  But sometimes the fishy scent doesn’t leave for a while, you know?  And you just take that and rub it in the hand there and wash the hand again.

BURT WOLF:  They smell sweet!

ANGELA JOHNSON:  Yeah!  You smell like a loverboy.

BURT WOLF:  Plus, a lot cheaper than Calvin Klein, let me tell you.

ANGELA JOHNSON:  Yeah!  That’s right, it’s good stuff.

If you take a mid-morning coffee break, the place to do it is Arthur’s Bakery.

ROBERT ARTHUR:  Basically, we do about thirty different items every morning.  Our mainstay is bread.  We start with a base of the Bahamian white bread -- we do a lot of Bahamian white bread -- and then we do interesting things with it.  We do a cinnamon raisin bread, we add jalapeño and cheese to it, we do a jalapeño-cheese bread, herbal bread, coconut bread, and that’s the basis of our breads.  We do a nice baguette, and then we get into the pastries.  We do danishes, donuts, cookies, cakes, pies -- we do an excellent key lime pie.  We began in our house.  My wife enjoyed making cheesecakes.  She was an accountant and she was bored, so she started baking cheesecakes. Other people on the island had heard about these wonderful cheesecakes and they started ordering cheesecakes from her.  The people at the Pink Sands Hotel, they heard about it, and they asked if she would come work for them as a baker.  And she said, “No, I don’t want to work for anyone, I’d sell you my goods, though.”  And we started baking out of our little house for the Pink Sands Hotel and other customers, and that’s how Arthur’s Bakery got started.

Well, if Pink Sands is good enough for Arthur’s Bakery, it is certainly good enough for our lunch.  It has a three-mile private stretch of pink beach; it’s pink because of the coral deposits that have broken down and washed ashore.  The resort also has some of the best and most imaginative food in the Bahamas.  The specialties include Tandoori Chicken Spring Rolls with a tamarind and guava dip... Marinated Black Tiger Shrimp on mixed greens with caramelized tropical fruit... and a warm tuna salad.  Chef Stuart Betteridge explains the preparation.

STUART BETTERIDGE:  Okay, we start off with some locally grown cucumber, which is sliced, we arrange this on the plate.  We then use some of the Eleutheran tomatoes that a farmer locally grows for me.  We then have some warm wedge potatoes that have been marinated in garlic and thyme that have been roasted through the oven.  We also add some eggs; this is a sort of a play on the classic Niçoise Salad that we’ve just broken down with the same ingredients, only actually we’ve made it our way.  The plate looks like that -- then we take some home-grown red lettuce that we grow in our garden here at Pink Sands... this just finishes off the dish.  And then we get the tuna; it is a yellowfin tuna that’s caught locally, and we have that cooked medium-rare.  Thank you, Terence.  That goes on the center of the plate, giving it a very nice decoration.  This is kept medium-rare to keep all of the moisture inside of the fish.  We then finish it off with a balsamic and caper vinaigrette.  Thank you, sir.  We put the vinaigrette and the capers over the top of the tuna, this gives it a nice flavor and also keeps in the juices.  Then pouring it around the plate, and over the top of the salad and all of the ingredients.  And the final touch we use is crispy yams that we get locally grown and this adds a little bit of sweetness to take away from the sour of the vinegar.  And then some nice fresh lime wedges just to squeeze onto the fish.  And that is the warm fish salad.

The Landing was built in 1800 by a wealthy fruitgrower and remained a private home until 1992, when it became an eight-room hotel and a restaurant.  We settled in for supper and started with conch salad... followed by lobster with a Catalan sauce, which is made with olives, capers, tomatoes and celery... tuna with shrimp, served on a bed of rice... lobster with homemade fettucini... and for dessert, poached pears, crepes suzette, and strawberry cheesecake.  (There were six of us and we split everything.  I don’t want you to think that was just for me.)

The water taxi from Eleuthera crosses the harbor in four minutes and ends up at the dock of the Romora Bay Club.  There are thirty-eight small houses on the property, lots of local vegetation, a few tennis players, and a very laid-back main lounge.  As a matter of fact, the whole place is laid-back and quiet.  Rosie and Goldie are the two noisiest guests, and fortunately they have a very limited vocabulary.

ROSIE:  Hello!

Everyone I saw at Romora Bay was taking it easy, with the exception of the guests that were taking to the sea.  Romora Bay has an exceptional watersports program, under the direction of Jeff Fox and his diving dog!

BURT WOLF:   So that’s the famous diving dog, huh?

JEFF FOX:  This is the famous diving dog.

BURT WOLF:  How did he learn to dive?

JEFF FOX:  Well, we do a introductory SCUBA program here that teaches people to dive in shallow water.  And during the shallow water diving section, he would swim out and circle the divers as they were down below.  Eventually, one day we were teaching, and he swam by!

BURT WOLF:  Just dove down?

JEFF FOX:  Dove down, swam by, went on up -- which obviously caught everybody’s attention.  And we’ve progressed from that point using weights or swimming masks -- anything that we could -- to get him to retrieve.  He would swim out, circle, and eventually go down to get it.

BURT WOLF:  That’s amazing!

JEFF FOX:  And we’d move it deeper, and deeper, until he finally got down to close to twenty feet.

BURT WOLF:  So at some point he actually had to grasp the idea of holding his breath...

JEFF FOX:  Oh yeah!

BURT WOLF:  ...and not trying to breath underwater.

JEFF FOX:  That’s the amazing thing; he coordinates a running, jumping entry, times his breath hold, fights his way down against the buoyancy of the saltwater, and picks up, sometimes, a four-pound lead weight.  So, we tell everyone, if they can do that, they’re certified.

BURT WOLF:  So let’s see him dive!

JEFF FOX:  Sure!  Bri, you up for a little diving today?  All right!

BURT WOLF:  He certainly is up!

JEFF FOX:  Oh yeah!  Come on, Bri, you ready?  All set for this?

BRI:  Woof!

JEFF FOX:  Okay... Look at the object...See that mask, Bri?  You see that?  Wait for it to go all the way down.... Go!  Good man, Bri!  Excellent!  Good man!  All right, Bri, go on to the shore, now.  Okay, there you have it, guys.

For many years Eleuthera was a major center for pineapple production. It has a number of large pineapple plantations and because the pineapples are allowed to ripen slowly without chemical assistance they’re extremely sweet.

FRANCES THOMPSON:  There are two different kind of pineapples, so the pineapples that you get in the Bahamas are not the pineapples you would get in the United States.

BURT WOLF:  Ahh...

FRANCES THOMPSON:  So there is a difference.  In the United States, they’re from Hawaii and they’re very chewy; they have less juice.  But the ones you get from the Bahamas, they are very meaty, and they have a lot of juice, and they are very sweet.  They don’t grow as big as the ones that you get in Hawaii.

BURT WOLF:  But they taste better.

FRANCES THOMPSON:  One hundred percent better.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  Every June, Eleuthera has a pineapple festival during which they celebrate the history, folklore, and culture of the pineapple.  There is an Olympic-like Pine-a-thon in which they do a little running, and a little swimming, and a little bicycle riding.  There are pineapple growing contests, and pineapple cooking contests, and the dreaded whole pineapple bobbing contest.

Pineapples have been cultivated in the Caribbean for thousands of years. Scientists have reached that conclusion because the Caribbean pineapple no longer produces seeds, and that is a sign that the fruit has been farmed by man for so long that it no longer feels responsible for its own reproduction.  Talk about getting lazy.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  The Caribe Indians would hang a pineapple in front of their hut as a sign that they were home and visitors would be welcome.  But they would also plant a row of pineapples at the edge of their village so that the sharp edges on the pineapple leaves would keep intruders away.  Another sign with a mixed message.

Pineapples are high in vitamin C,  which made them perfect fruit for sailors who wanted to take something along to prevent scurvy. They also discovered that the tops of the pineapple could be planted in the sandy soil of tropical islands, and when they would sail back months later there would be a fresh crop. Even then they knew how important it was to plan for dessert.

BURT WOLF:   Do you ever get tired of eating Eleutheran pineapples?

FRANCES THOMPSON:  Well, to tell you the truth, me myself, I can only eat the core of the pineapple.  I don’t eat the meat of the pineapple, just the core.

BURT WOLF:  How come?

FRANCES THOMPSON:  Because I’m just sick and tired of them.

The job now is to have the chef at the Romora Bay Club come up with a few recipes that use the local seafood and the local pineapples.  Ludovic Jarland, who is from France, is the chef at the Romora Bay Club and today he is going to prepare a freshly-caught grouper.  It’s presented in a tomato-based sauce with scales of zucchini.

He starts by taking two zucchinis that have been carefully washed and sliced into rounds that are about an eighth of an inch thick. You should end up with about two cups’ worth, which are transferred into a pan of boiling water for two minutes. At which point they are drained from the pan, run under cold water to stop the cooking, and set aside.

Now Ludovic starts the sauce. An onion is diced. Two tablespoons of vegetable oil are heated in a saucepan. The diced onion is added and cooked for three minutes. Four cups of canned tomatoes and their juices are added to the onions.  A little salt and a little pepper go in, plus some fresh thyme and ten leaves of fresh basil. All those ingredients cook together for about ten minutes.

While the sauce is cooking the fish is prepared. A boneless, skinless fillet of grouper is salted and peppered and placed into a non-stick sauté pan. The zucchini slices are placed onto the fish, forming an overlapping pattern that looks a lot like the scales of a fish. A little more salt and pepper are added and a half cup of dry white wine. Wine is optional; you could do this with chicken stock or fish stock or plain water.  The pan goes onto the range top and gets heated until the wine starts to boil. Then a cover of aluminum foil is carefully formed over the pan and the pan is placed into a 300 degree Fahrenheit oven for ten minutes.

While the fish is cooking, the sauce goes into a blender and is processed into a smooth puree.   A serving plate is given a light coating of the sauce. The fish is taken out of the oven and carefully transferred onto the sauce. The dish is ready to serve.

The chef’s second recipe is for a pineapple upside-down tart.  It starts off with a few pineapples being peeled, cut in half, cored and sliced into pieces that are about a half-inch thick. Then three ounces of sweet butter go into a hot sauté pan. As soon as the butter is melted, a cup of sugar is added and the mixture cooks for about three minutes.

BURT WOLF (ON CAMERA):  At first the mixture looks very dry, but the heat causes the water inside the sugar to come out, and everything gets liquid again.  Then, the heat and the water combine to turn the sugar brown.  That’s caramelization.

When the sugar has caramelized the pineapple slices are layered into the pan and allowed to cook for ten minutes.

While the pineapples are cooking, a standard pie dough is rolled out to a thickness of about an eighth of an inch. The pan of pineapple is taken off the heat. The disc of dough is placed on top, trimmed to the edges of the pan and tucked in around the pineapples. Then the pan goes into a 350 degree Fahrenheit oven for an hour.  When it comes out, a serving dish is placed on top and the tart is flipped over and out. The pineapples end up on the top and the tart is ready to serve.

Well, that’s a brief look at Eleuthera in the Bahamas; please join us next time as we travel around the world.  I’m Burt Wolf.

Travels & Traditions: The Grand Bahamas - #907

BURT WOLF: The most northerly of the islands of the Bahamas lies about a hundred and fifty miles off the east coast of Florida, at about the same latitude as Palm Beach. There are over seven hundred islands in the Bahama chain, and they swing down to the southeast until they come to an end just above the Dominican Republic.

When Christopher Columbus finally hit land in the New World it was one of the tiny islands of the Bahamas that he banged into. Spanish explorers following Columbus called the area Baja Mar which means the shallow sea. Eventually the islands came to be known as the Bahamas.

Today it is one of the most popular resorts in the western hemisphere. It has some of the finest beaches... places for scuba diving... boating... deep-sea fishing... duty-free shopping... gaming... and spots to just hang out. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The first people to live in the area were known as the Lucayans which means people of the islands. By all accounts they were a friendly group. They had started out about two thousand years ago in South America and moved north through the Caribbean. One of the reasons they kept moving was to avoid another tribe known as the Caribs. The Caribs, like so many modern nutritionists, believed that the more different foods you included in your diet the healthier you would be. The Caribs included the Lucayans in their diet. And that’s one of the reasons that the word cannibal is found in the languages of Europe. Unfortunately when the Spanish showed up, things did not get better. The Lucayans got out of the food chain only to find themselves in the chains of slavery. Within twenty-five years they had all died and the islands were deserted.

BURT WOLF: Back in England, the king had become head of the Anglican Church and he thought that everyone should follow him. The Puritan congregations, however, preferred to follow God without the king as a middle man. The king made life difficult for the Puritans, and many of them decided to look for a new place to live. Some of the Puritans that left England ended up on Plymouth Rock and founded Massachusetts. The Puritans who were in Bermuda were also being persecuted by the English government, and they escaped to the Bahamas. In 1647 they formed this nation’s first permanent settlement of Europeans. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The next meaningful migration took place during the last decades of the 1700’s. It was made up of American colonists who had decided to stay loyal to the King of England and wanted to have nothing to do with the newly formed United States of America. The Loyalists who arrived here came with their slaves and enhanced the racial mixture of the islands. Then in 1843 the British Empire decided to abolish slavery, and much to the credit of all of the Bahamians there was an easy transition to a British colony made up of free citizens. 

BURT WOLF: In 1973, after more than 250 years under British rule, the Bahamas became an independent nation. Today it has a democratically elected government, a stable society, and a prospering economy. But figuring out how to make a living in the Bahamas was not always a simple task.

Most of the islands in this part of the world have a volcanic base which gives them a soil that is ideal for agriculture. The Bahamas, however, are formed from limestone with very little topsoil. This is not an easy place for farming. And that has influenced the history of the Bahamas in some ways that are positive and in some that are not so positive. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Without the ability to grow sugar cane which was the major cash crop for the early European colonies in the Caribbean, the Bahamians turned to other businesses. For hundreds of years the major local occupation was the salvaging of wrecked ships. These were dangerous waters, and thousands of boats went down on the reefs surrounding these islands. The locals made a living by salvaging what they could. 

BURT WOLF: They also realized that they could improve their business by shifting the shore lights so instead of directing a ship to a safe passage, the light would send the vessel into a rock that was conveniently located for the salvage team. Efficiency has always been important to a well-run business. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Now, some of the salvagers felt that waiting for a ship to get into trouble, even if they helped it along, was just inefficient. They wanted to salvage the ship and everything on it before it wrecked. Now if you did that for a ship that was from your own country, it was called piracy. But if you did it for a ship from an enemy country it was called privateering and that was a totally legitimate business. As a matter of fact, many of the great heroes of the British navy were actually privateers and the Bahamas became a major center for the business. The Spanish would come along and steal the gold from the Native American tribes. They’d put it on their galleons and sail it back to Spain. As they passed the Bahamas, the English privateers would come out and try and get the gold from the Spanish. When they got it, the pirates showed up and tried to steal it from the English. What a business.

BURT WOLF: The next significant commercial development for the Bahamas came during the War Between the States. The navy of the north tried to block the major ports of the south. Bahamian ship owners made great fortunes by running the blockade, bringing in food and military supplies and taking out cotton.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The end of The War Between The States put an end to the blockade running business. But, you know, blockade running is a lot like bicycle riding, you can not practice for years and years, then you get back on and your skill level is right there. When the U.S. federal government passed the 18th to the Constitution, outlawing the manufacture and consumption of alcoholic beverages, many people along the east coast of the United States who did not agree with that law, and many people who owned boats in the Bahamas began to sing the same song. “Seems like old times...”

VACATION PARADISE

BURT WOLF: The idea of taking a vacation in a warm and sunny spot by the sea goes back for thousands of years. Ancient documents show that over two thousand years ago, the well-to-do of Rome were heading to the seashore near Naples when they needed a break. The first person to try and put the Bahamas on the vacation map was a man named Henry Flagler. 

During the 1800s, Flagler had put together the railroads of Florida and the tourist industry that went along with them. He felt that he could do the same in the Bahamas by setting up the Miami-Nassau steamship line and building a new hotel in Nassau to receive his passengers. Nice try, but too early. Neither made enough money to stay in business -- but the idea of making Nassau into a vacation paradise hung on.

During the Roaring Twenties the magnificent private yachts of the great industrialists cruised into Nassau. The Whitneys, the Vanderbilts, the Astors, if it floated, and you wanted to flaunt it, Nassau was the place.

And then, in 1940, the ultimate seal of approval for the rich: a royal resident. The Duke of Windsor, the ex-king of England, became governor of the Bahamas. He was fashionable. He was elegant. He had given up the job of king to marry Wallis Simpson, an American. He was media perfect. And the Bahamas became the jewel in the crown of vacation spots.

NASSAU

BURT WOLF: The island of New Providence may not be at the geographic center of the Bahamas but its capital city of Nassau is clearly the political, economic and tourist hub of the nation. Much of the architecture is from the 1800s, including the public buildings which were the original structures housing the Court, the Legislature, the Assembly, other government officials and the Post Office.

The Nassau Public Library was built in 1798 as a prison. Today it holds a collection of books and photographs that deal with the Bahamas.

That’s Government House; it was built in 1901 as the official residence of the Queen’s representative in the Bahamas. In front is a statue of Christopher Columbus trying to figure out the right direction for the rest of his trip.

As I mentioned earlier, the first permanent colony of Europeans in the Bahamas came in search of religious freedom, and that is certainly one of the hallmarks of this nation.

This is St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. It was built in 1810.

The St. Francis Roman Catholic Church was the first Catholic Church built in the Bahamas. It was constructed in 1885.

The Greek Orthodox Church is rather new. It was built by the Greek community in the 1930s. A substantial number of Greeks had come to the Bahamas to set up a natural sponge industry, which unfortunately came to an end as the result of a sponge blight. The sponges were gone, but the Greeks stayed on to soak up the sun.

FAMILY ISLANDS

BURT WOLF: The Bahamas are a group of 2,700 coral islands. Most of them are small and uninhabited -- little strips of land scattered in a chain that starts off the coast of Florida, and runs down to the tip of Haiti.

But there’s another side to these islands, a side which is quieter, softer and gentler. A side that will allow you to leave the commercial world behind and just relax. A side that is found on what are known as the family islands.

The first European to arrive on a family island in the Bahamas was Christopher Columbus. He looked around, didn’t see any gold and moved on. And that was pretty much the story for everyone else who came by. “No gold? No silver? No treasures? Hey! Let’s go!”

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The first settlers to show up in the Bahamas with the intention of setting up a permanent colony were a group of Puritans who came down here from Bermuda in 1649. They were looking for a place where they would be free to practice their religion -- the same situation that sent a different group of Puritans out of England to establish a colony in Massachusetts. The group that came here were under the leadership of Captain William Sayle. They were known as the Eleutheran Adventurers. Eleuthera is the Greek word for freedom.

BURT WOLF: Their ship was wrecked on the reef out there, but they were lucky enough to be able to make their way to this shore. Their search for shelter led them to a cave just off the beach. They had lost most of their supplies when the ship went down, and were forced to live, as best they could, off the land and the sea. This cave was their only shelter. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Captain Sayle built himself a small sailboat, and with eight of his men headed off to get help from the British colony in Jamestown, Virginia. And, amazingly, he pulled it off. He returned with enough supplies to last the Eleutherans for two years, at which time they needed help again. Not wanting to tap the same source too often, his second request was made to the British colony in Massachusetts. They responded by sending a shipload of supplies and the Eleutherans thanked them by sending back a shipload of hardwood and a request that some of the proceeds from the sale of the hardwood be used to support the development of Harvard University.

BURT WOLF: The Eleutheran Adventurers used this cave not only as a place of shelter but as a place of worship. They carved this rock into a form that could be used as a pulpit and conducted their services. With its cathedral shape and light shining down from the holes in the top of the cave, it’s easy to see why they thought themselves blessed. Today it’s called Preacher’s Cave. 

As the early settlers began to spread out, they took up residence on an island called Spanish Wells. Spanish Wells is just off the northern tip of Eleuthera and it got its name because it was the spot where Spanish ships would stop to take on fresh water just before they made a quick right turn and headed back to Seville with the treasures that they had stolen from the local natives. Almost all of the people who live on Spanish Wells are descendants of the original Eleutherian Adventurers and most of them still speak with a distinct British accent.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Spanish Wells has the distinction of being the wealthiest community in the Bahamas, and they owe it all to changing fashions in food. For about three hundred years, they tried to earn a living by bringing in the local lobsters. But for 250 of those years, nobody really cared. Lobster was considered to be junk seafood. As a matter of fact, farmers along the Atlantic coast of North America would use lobsters as fertilizer on their farms. Then, in the early decades of this century, everything changed. Lobster became the seafood to eat. Supplies went down, prices went up, and the guys on Spanish Wells got rich. And if people continue to pay big prices for big lobsters, people on Spanish Wells will remain in ship shape.

BURT WOLF: And speaking of shapes, Eleuthera has a rather unusual one. It is 110 miles long and for most of that length it is only about a mile wide. At its widest point it only thickens out to about five miles. Its thinnest point is about five yards, which is a spot known as the Glass Window. On one side you have the Atlantic Ocean and on the other the Caribbean Sea. You can stand on this small bridge of land and see the difference between these two bodies of water. The Atlantic: aggressive, uninviting, often covered with waves and whitecaps. On the other side, the Caribbean: smooth, gentle, inviting you to pull up a beach chair and relax.

Beaches are Eluthera’s big attraction, miles and miles of them, one stretch more beautiful than the next and always uncrowded.

Most tourists to Eleuthera pass their days on Harbour Island. It’s just off the coast of the mainland of Eleuthera and you get there by water taxi. The center of Harbour Island is Dunmore Town. It was named after Lord Dunmore, who was the Governor of the Bahamas during the late 1700s. Dunmore Town was once a center for shipbuilding, sugar processing, and the production of rum. The rum business was particularly successful during the period when the United States was under the influence of the Amendment to the Constitution -- the one that outlawed the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages. The law did not extend itself to Eleuthera but Eleuthera did extend its rum distribution to the United States, proving once again that a friend in need is a friend in deed.

I passed a day on Harbour Island walking through the streets, looking at the architecture, talking to the people, and enjoying the food.

FISHERMAN ON CAMERA: Bahamian conch... that’s for conch salad, cracked conch, conch chowder... a delight! 

BURT WOLF: One of the more unusual sights in Dunmore Town is called the Aura Corner. It’s sort of like a giant collage of... well, it’s like a collection of thoughts that... actually, it’s whatever Ralph Sawyer wants it to be. Sawyer is the curator of Aura Corner. Uncle Ralph, as he’s called, collects slogans, sayings, words of wisdom, whatever. He gets them from the visitors who stop by. Then he paints them on wooden slats and hangs them up in front of his house. And anyone can leave a memento of their own -- hey, Jimmy Buffett did. My favorite is Uncle Ralph’s Recipe For A Happy Marriage: 3 cups of love... one cup of forgiveness... one barrel of laughter -- a recipe! How appropriate.

I began my gastronomic day with a traditional Bahamian breakfast at Angela’s Starfish Restaurant -- pineapple juice, yellowtail fish on grits, and johnnycakes. Angela Johnson, who runs the place, is also an expert on the science -- and the art -- of using everyday plants as medicines.

If you take a mid-morning coffee break, the place to do it is Arthur’s Bakery.

ROBERT ARTHUR ON CAMERA: Basically, we do about thirty different items every morning. Our mainstay is bread. We start with a base of the Bahamian white bread -- we do a lot of Bahamian white bread -- and then we do interesting things with it. We do a cinnamon raisin bread, we add jalapeño and cheese to it, we do jalapeño-cheese bread, herbal bread, coconut bread, and that’s the basis of our breads. We do a nice baguette, and then we get into the pastries. We do Danishes, donuts, cookies, cakes, pies -- we do an excellent key lime pie. We began in our house. My wife enjoyed making cheesecakes. She was an accountant and she was bored, so she started baking cheesecakes. Other people on the island had heard about these wonderful cheesecakes and they started ordering cheesecakes from her. The people at the Pink Sands Hotel, they heard about it, and they asked if she would come work for them as a baker. And she said, “No, I don’t want to work for anyone, I’d sell you my goods, though.” And we started baking out of our little house for the Pink Sands Hotel and other customers, and that’s how Arthur’s Bakery got started.

BURT WOLF: Well, if Pink Sands is good enough for Arthur’s Bakery, it is certainly good enough for our lunch. It has a three-mile private stretch of pink beach; it’s pink because of the coral deposits that have broken down and washed ashore. The resort also has some of the best and most imaginative food in the Bahamas. The specialties include Tandoori Chicken Spring Rolls with a tamarind and guava dip. Marinated Black Tiger Shrimp on mixed greens with caramelized tropical fruit. And a warm tuna salad. 

THE DIVING DOG

BURT WOLF: The water taxi from Eleuthera crosses the harbor in four minutes and ends up at the dock of the Romora Bay Club. There are thirty-eight small houses on the property, lots of local vegetation, a few tennis players, and a very laid-back main lounge. As a matter of fact, the whole place is laid-back and quiet. Rosie and Goldie are the two noisiest guests, and fortunately they have a very limited vocabulary.

ROSIE THE PARROT: Hello.

BURT WOLF: Everyone I saw at Romora Bay was taking it easy, with the exception of the guests that were taking to the sea. Romora Bay has an exceptional water sports program, under the direction of Jeff Fox and his diving dog.

BURT WOLF: So that’s the famous diving dog, huh?

JEFF FOX: This is the famous diving dog.

BURT WOLF: How did he learn to dive?

JEFF FOX: Well, we do an introductory Scuba program here that teaches people to dive in shallow water. And during the shallow water diving section, he would swim out and circle the divers as they were down below. Eventually, one day we were teaching, and he swam by.

BURT WOLF: Just dove down?

JEFF FOX: Dove down, swam by, went on up -- which obviously caught everybody’s attention. And we’ve progressed from that point using weights or swimming masks -- anything that we could -- to get him to retrieve. He would swim out, circle, and eventually go down to get it.

BURT WOLF: That’s amazing.

JEFF FOX: And we’d move it deeper, and deeper, until he finally got down to close to twenty feet.

BURT WOLF: So at some point he actually had to grasp the idea of holding his breath...

JEFF FOX: Oh yeah.

BURT WOLF: ...and not trying to breath underwater.

JEFF FOX: That’s the amazing thing; he coordinates a running, jumping entry, times his breath hold, fights his way down against the buoyancy of the saltwater, and picks up, sometimes, a four-pound lead weight. So, we tell everyone, if they can do that, they’re certified.

BURT WOLF: So let’s see him dive.

JEFF FOX: Sure! Bri, you up for a little diving today? All right.

BURT WOLF: He certainly is up.

JEFF FOX: Oh yeah! Come on, Bri, you ready? All set for this?

JEFF FOX: Okay... Look at the object...See that mask, Bri? You see that? Wait for it to go all the way down.... Go. Good man, Bri. Excellent. Good man. All right, Bri, go on to the shore, now. Okay, there you have it, guys.

PINEAPPLES

BURT WOLF: For many years Eleuthera was a major center for pineapple production. It has a number of large pineapple plantations and because the pineapples are allowed to ripen slowly without chemical assistance they’re extremely sweet.

FRANCES THOMPSON ON CAMERA: There are two different kinds of pineapples, so the pineapples that you get in the Bahamas are not the pineapples you would get in the United States.

BURT WOLF: Ahh...

FRANCES THOMPSON: So there is a difference. In the United States, they’re from Hawaii and they’re very chewy; they have less juice. But the ones you get from the Bahamas, they are very meaty, and they have a lot of juice, and they are very sweet. They don’t grow as big as the ones that you get in Hawaii.

BURT WOLF: But they taste better.

FRANCES THOMPSON: One hundred percent better.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Every June, Eleuthera has a pineapple festival during which they celebrate the history, folklore, and culture of the pineapple. There is an Olympic-like Pine-a-thon in which they do a little running, and a little swimming, and a little bicycle riding. There are pineapple growing contests, and pineapple cooking contests, and the dreaded whole pineapple bobbing contest.

BURT WOLF: Pineapples have been cultivated in the Caribbean for thousands of years. Scientists have reached that conclusion because the Caribbean pineapple no longer produces seeds, and that is a sign that the fruit has been farmed by man for so long that it no longer feels responsible for its own reproduction. Talk about getting lazy.

For Travels & Traditions, I’m Burt Wolf.