July 10th, Bahamian 36th year Independence Day. The Islands were celebrating with Junkanoos, bands, decorations, music, games, food and fireworks. But not for us. We are partied out! Instead we went conching between Hope Town and Johnny's Cay. The water here is 5 to 14 feet deep. Larry hangs onto the back swim step with his mask, snorkel and fins on and I motor at about 3-4 MPH. He looks like shark bait. When he spies a conch he lets go, hollers at me, and then dives down for the conch. I back up this tub of a boat to where I last saw him and hope like heck he at least looks up before he shoots to the surface for a breath of air. To keep the mess out of the boat we throw the conch into the dinghy we are trailing behind us. Today we got about 20. We threw the little ones back in. Just before lunch we motored over to Lubbers Quarters Cay to watch the Junior sailing races and to meet up with our friend Janet, and her grandson Teva, who was here visiting from Oregon. They were on her sail boat, Island Gal, also recovering from the races. She won second place once and third place once. Luckily they had company and they wanted to help clean conch. We rafted onto Janet's boat, the conch cleaners went to shore to do the dirty work, Janet took a nap and I read, watched the boats through another short thunder storm and cleaned. Tomorrow we will all get together and have conch salad. But tonight, Larry and I are going over to Doug and Debra's yacht, Amazing Grace (a 70 foot motor yacht) for dinner. So we packaged up the conch and motored back up to Hope Town to anchor next to Amazing Grace. Larry and I cleaned up the best we could and went over to our neighbors beautiful boat. After we were greeted, Olga, Debra's Mom, took Patti, another guest, and I for the boat tour. Everything was gorgeous; my favorite was the remote control coffee table that becomes a dining room table and the silverware that was shaped like fish. Debra was a terrific host and dinner was fabulous. We had a fresh green salad with homemade mandarin orange dressing, potatoes, asparagus, carrots and filet mignon, which Bob cooked on the grill to perfection. Amazing Grace, thanks for your hospitality, help and racing expertise. We couldn't have done it without you.