Yesterday we ventured out to one of the three general stores on Staniel Cay. We’ve read that it’s one of the best stocked around and they also have a dock that we can tie up to, which is always a plus. I’ve stocked the boat with a lot of canned goods, rice, pasta, sauces and such, but wanted to get some fresh foods.

We arrived at low tide, so it was a bit of a challenge to tie up the boat and climb up onto the pier, but we managed fine.

Not a bad view from the pier either.

Disposing of trash can be somewhat challenging while cruising. Small islands usually don’t have dumps and trash service. However, Staniel Cay does have a dump, and the general store will take your trash, so we brought it along (Scott is still loving his big straw hat).

It was HOT, HOT, HOT inside! Within minutes, I was soaked in sweat. Aside from being a sweat box, they managed to fit a lot into the relatively small space. We found groceries to the right. Below is the produce section; this is all there is. We grabbed bananas, green and red peppers, avocados, romaine lettuce and “pink” tomatoes. Canned goods, crackers, sodas and such are at the back wall.

The baskets stuffed with food on the floor belong to crew members who were buying things for a charter yacht. We felt bad for the locals, as these guys put a dent in the fresh stuff. Stores on the island get their stock from the mail boats that come once a week, so these greedy shoppers irritated Scott to no end. He gave them the stink eye the whole time we were there.

Along the wall is the refrigerated and frozen food section. One refrigerator was empty, but the other had milk, eggs, butter, sliced and block cheese, some juices and sodas, yogurt, and limes. One freezer held chicken, beef, hot dogs, steaks and lunch meat. The other had frozen vegetables (peas, mixed veg., corn on the cob and broccoli) and ice cream (one flavor of Breyers, and some Klondikes). How someone, in a car or boat, was going to get ice cream back home without it  turning to liquid is beyond me. You’d have to bring your spoon to the store. Even then, you’d have to race to eat it in that sweat box.

Through the openings is the side which has hard goods.

Paper products and “household” items were in the far corner. Jewelry and nautical charts were on either side (of course). I grabbed a box of quart-sized, Ziploc freezer bags….for 7.75!!

The last corner held tubs of interesting miscellaneous items.

In the center of the store were boat and motor parts and chemicals, cleaning and laundry items, hardware items, charcoal and snorkel masks. There were also racks with cards and videos. I meant to get photos of this stuff, too, but by then I had sweat in my eyes.

We were held up checking out, because the charter crew had so much stuff. The woman behind the counter looks up the prices in a binder, and adds it up on a calculator. Once it was finally all boxed and totaled, their card didn’t go through. Mercifully, another crew member appeared and payed with cash. By this time, sweat was running down my entire body. I was afraid that it was going to start to pool on the floor at my feet.

While we were waiting, a local man cut in front of us, wanting to pay for a can of WD-40 spray. They couldn’t ring him up, because the register was tied up with the greedy crew. The can was $12.00, and he had a 20.00 bill. The woman told him to come back for the change on Monday (they are closed on Sundays)…HA! How would that go over in the US?

Finally, it was our turn to check out. As she weighed my peppers, the woman thankfully let me know that, by the way, your red pepper is $6.00! ONE red pepper! It promptly went back to the bin. Our little basket of things came to $87.00. We loaded our cold items (which were now half warm) into the cooler bag we’d brought, and headed back to the boat. I managed to not succumb to heat stroke, and we are now experienced island shoppers!

“Shells Sink, Dreams Float. Life’s Good On Our Boat!”