Adventures in Coxen Hole

Today we went to the Flying Fish fresh fish market in Coxen Hole. The men were still unloading the fish from these holding tanks, and two fish inspectors were on board checking things out and having a big argument over some of the fish which were then thrown back into the tank. They looked like very large fish. Soon they were all laughing and then each inspector chose which fish he wanted and took a nice big bag of fileted fish with him.

We had been trying to go to this market for some time, but never seemed to hit it right. We learned that the boats come in on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. 90% of the fish is exported. The remaining 10% is available for purchase on Thursday and Friday only. They had fresh grouper and red snapper today and fileted it for us while we waited (and watched), and then vacuum packed it for freezing. While we waited, we watched all the activity outside, the young boys and girls in rubber boots scrubbing out the holding tanks with soapy water and push brooms, then rinsing well. The inside of the building also appeared freshly scrubbed. We were tickled to see a boy on a bicycle riding away with two large fish, maybe 20 pounders, draped over his handle bars.

We bought 6 snapper filets for $4.50/lb. and one large grouper fillet for $6.50/lb. They even packed it with a little bag of ice to keep it fresh for the hot ride home.

Have I mentioned that the air-conditioner in our car stopped cooling? Dennis led us to a place in Coxen Hole, which we would never have found on our own, where they repair air-conditioners. It was way back behind G & G Hardware, down a deeply pot-holed road. I really should have taken a picture of this place. It looks somewhat like a junkyard. Merlin talked to the repairman, telling him what we needed and asking if he could just add some freon to it. He said yes, but we had to go back to the hardware store and buy the freon. The store was out of freon, which was just as well since we didn't know which kind of freon we needed to buy. So, we put that off for another day. It's not that bad riding around with the windows down. We don't drive very far and really, I've given up worrying about my hair. I do think we should get it fixed before rainy season starts in a couple of weeks because we may not be able to keep the windows open.