The Great Bahamas trip: Part 2 / Bimini

Two Years Before the Mast – Bimini

Bimini deserves it’s own article. Why? Because Bimini is a very special place. In essence, it really isn’t that much to look at. Most baseball players can stand in the water on one side of North Bimini and hit a ball into the water on the other side of North Bimini. The island only has two roads. One that runs up the west side, and the main road that runs up the east side. They are only a small block apart. As a tourist, you could actually arrive late, see everything on the island, leave, and get home before supper. It’s hard to put your finger exactly on what makes Bimini special, but it’s a feel that the place has. It’s like a frontier town perched at the edge of the Gulf Stream. You almost imagine that John Wayne and Clint Eastwood could suddenly step out of the End Of The World Bar, or the Bimini Breeze, and have a shootout in the street while wearing flip flops and flower printed shirts.

You can feel the presence of Papa Hemingway in everything you touch on the island. Though his old digs, the Complete Angler has recently burned down, many pictures of Papa and his fish catches still adorn many walls, yellowed and fading. The fireplace chimney is still standing amidst the ruins and you can’t help looking at the fireplace and imagining Hemingway and the many colorful characters that surely sat in front of it as the weather roared and moaned outside.

The End of the World Bar is one of the most despicable places I have ever been in with a sand floor, rough plank benches in front of a rough plank bar. The place has rendered a certain softness though its walls, and the ceiling is literally covered with women’s underclothing that has been signed, dated, and tacked up, giving it a very homey feel. There is word that the End of the World may be coming to the end of its world. I certainly hope not, but am trying to arrange providing a good home for all the panties and bras.

The Bimini Breeze is another must stop as it is the digs of Mr. Yama Bahama. To enlighten you, Mr. Yama Bahama was born in Bimini and as an early man was flown to Miami where he trained as a boxer by some dude that trained lots of famous boxers, some you would recognize. He went on to box in New York, Chicago, some places in Europe, you get it, in the early 1900′s he was a quite successful boxer. At the time this is being written, he is 76 years old, has boxing pictures and memorabilia all over the walls, and serves Kalik Beer so ice cold that you can’t drink it fast. He is an interesting, colorful character and tells great stories about boxing and growing up in early Bimini. 

The Anchorage Restaurant is owned and operated by Miss Betty and besides serving good food and drinks; she is a very nice and colorful character, though a bit refined for the likes of Gilligan.

Hang with me; this is not an advertisement campaign or even an endorsement. I do have to mention that we ate breakfast every morning at Capt Bobs as it was right across from the marina.

A walk south along the main road past the End of the World takes you through the old Chalks Airline ramp and ticket terminal. Sad to see that that era is now past and gone forever. Don’t stop, you have to continue south to the very tip of the island, then up the West coast. A trip to the island isn’t complete till you visit the rusting remains of a little island freighter that got blown onto the rocks during a storm. You can get almost close enough to touch it without getting wet. It is just too cool. 

At the government dock you can catch the water taxi across to South Bimini where the jitney will take you to the Bimini International Airport. This is worth looking at if you are very, very, bored. It is a little one runway strip carved out of the mangrove jungle with a small parking area and a little concrete apron. The terminal building is sparse and archaic and it kind of comes as a surprise when this almost deserted airport with no control tower has a Continental Commuter land to discharge adventurous passengers and pick up those looking to escape the numbing peacefulness of the Bimini Islands.

The people of Bimini are as special as their island. They are warm, friendly, and genuinely glad that you are there. The island has lived with a boom ebb rhythm since the days the islanders settled here. The ebb of sponging gave way to the boom of rum running during prohibition to the ebb after the repeal of the liquor ban. The island boomed again during the heyday of the big game fishermen, but that too passed. There was another boom during the drug smuggling days of the seventies, but that too has mostly become history. The island seems to be in ebb now, but the Biminites are maintaining their island time stride and are content to await the next boom, whatever it may be. If you take your time and listen, you can feel the vibrations of the past, present, and future in the tropical breeze that incessantly blows across the beautiful people and island of Bimini, The Island in the Stream.

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Filed Under: Travels

Tags: Bahamas • Nat • travel