As we made the approach to Big Majors, aka Pig Beach, we noticed on the AIS that Distant Shores was anchored in Staniel Cay, the bay right next to ours. Paul and Sheryl Shard have been circumnavigating the Atlantic Ocean for the last 30 years producing a TV show about their adventures. We began watching their show about eight years ago, and they are instrumental in our sailing adventures today. We contacted them and planned to meet for dinner, but not before we SWIM WITH THE PIGS!
In November 2017 we cruised the Abacos with some friends on a Moorings charter boat. No Name Cay is a small island there that’s only inhabitants are pigs. (We heard they survived the hurricane.) I’d been saving food scraps for a few days to feed them, and as Diana and I approached the beach in our kayak, a big pig made a bee line for my bag. I got nervous and started tossing food scraps to her, (maybe him, I was so nervous I couldn’t tell.) She was grunting and snorting and coming at me. I ran to the other side of the kayak, but she jumped in knocking around. Then she jumped out, turned the kayak over and started at me again. I threw the food scraps as fast as I could (sorry Steve, I know you wanted to feed them) and finally just threw the empty bag on the beach. She rooted around in the bag, saw that there was no food left and meandered, as pigs do, over to some other people who had just arrived. Not even a thank you. How rude! That was enough pig-feeding excitement for me. Someone else was going to feed the pigs today. And that someone was Mike.
After leaving Rudder Cut Cay through the cut to the Atlantic side, we saw the ocean was pretty angry, so we found the nearest exit back into the Exuma Bank and sailed happily under jib alone averaging six knots. The super shallow water in the bank made the trip a little tense at first, but we were comfortable and totally enjoyed the sail.
We anchored in Big Majors right off Pig Beach, took the dinghy ashore and were greeted by Big Mama, a very large, very hungry pig that just had 10 babies last week. Mike was tossing pieces of leftover steak to her, apparently not fast enough. She jumped into the dinghy trying to get to him. What is it with these pigs jumping into boats? Mike tossed the whole baggie out of the boat and that was good enough for Big Mama. She ate everything and swam out to greet another boat. All was good. She got a good meal and we remained unscathed.
There were about 30 piglets born there in the last two months. (Those pigs have been busy, and we only saw two males!) We met a young man named Tyree who showed us around, told us about the pigs, and helped me hold one of the babies. He has lived on Staniel Cay his whole life. He comes to Pig Beach every day with his mom to look after the pigs, make sure they have enough food and water, and care for any of them that might be sick. What a life.
When we begin posting our videos to our You Tube channel, make sure to watch that one. We should begin in January.
December 2019