Bonefish on the Brain Bonefish and all that relates (maybe a bit about tarpon too).

I now want a golf cart. I want to drive around Alameda in one. That’s how you get around Treasure Cay on Abaco. It isn’t a big place and maybe you could walk, but why would you when you have one of these?

Treasure Cay is located about 45 minutes or so from Marsh Harbour. It has it’s own airport, but probably you’ll fly into Marsh Harbour as there are more options on flights.

We flew direct from Ft. Lauderdale via Silver Airlines. Silver is, not to be too blunt, but a horrible airline flying out of FLL. They seemed to have no idea what was happening with flights heading anywhere and there were lots of delays. The problem seems to be FLL, as we had no issue heading out of Marsh Harbour at all. I’ve heard some real horror stories about folks headed to Abaco via Silver, so, if you have other carrier options, take them.

Treasure Cay itself is a fairly small settlement, on the East side of Abaco. There aren’t any big resorts there, but there are several smaller hotel operations and many private condos to rent. When we were looking for a family vacation spot we picked Treasure Cay for the following reasons:

• Three bedroom condo meant everyone had their own room (Wife and I, my daughter and my dad… our son was in a pack and play in the big closet).
• Nice beach. Didn’t have to drive anywhere to have a nice beach. It was right out in front.
• Pool + Pool Bar. Drinks available at the pool.
• Places to eat nearby. There was a little outdoor restaurant AT the pool, so we had that covered.

Things we found out that we liked about Treasure Cay once we got there:

• The place came with a golf cart and that is the way most people got around. Made it kind of fun to go and pick up breakfast or go out to dinner or go anywhere. I invented reasons to need to drive that thing around.
• There were a couple of bonefish flats I could get to in the golf cart.
• There is a little bakery that had some good fresh bread and cinnamon rolls every morning.
• There were lots of families and lots of kids around so my daughter pretty consistently had other kids to play with.
• I caught a few jacks casting from the shore with a spinning rig.

Things we didn’t too much care for:

• Airfare. Holy wallet buster. We picked the Bahamas Beach Club in Abaco because it was about $1,500 less than a place in Playa del Carmen in MX, but when we went to book tickets to get there we found the savings in the lodging was destroyed by the cost of air fare. Ours cost about $1,200 a ticket, which was… um… tough to swallow.
• Cost of food. On the last night we went to a restaurant that was only open Fri-Sun. There we ordered a pizza for my daughter and son. That pizza was $25 and came on the cardboard circle it had been sitting on in the frozen pizza box they pulled it from. Every meal was $100 or more with “Pasta Night” being about $250 for 4 of us. A hamburger was $18, cracked conch $25. It was just pricey. You have to be prepared for that. The food was pretty good at the places we ate, it was just expensive and, after a while, not that varied.

In terms of a family-friendly place for a vacation, I kind of loved it. It wasn’t too built up. It wasn’t the Atlantis. It wasn’t too crowded. We had plenty to do and plenty more we could have done (hard with a 15 month old to really get after seeing the sights when he needs a couple of naps). The beach would have been a lot more enjoyable too if my son hadn’t been intent on trying to drown himself if left unsupervised for more than 5-10 seconds. He’ll grow, though, and by the time we plan our next Caribbean trip he shouldn’t be hellbent on throwing himself in the water.

There were a lot of fishing options too. I took my daughter out for a half-day down to Cherokee Sound and that was fun. It was a bit far though and I’d probably opt for a closer fishing trip if we head back. You can rent a boat in Treasure Cay, with a captain, and go out and soak bait and catch all sorts of stuff. I’d look at doing that in the future. There were a couple of places to soak bait off docks in Treasure Cay as well and there are even a couple/three tarpon living in the Marina.

My dad went out birding and saw a few “lifers.” We also had a day of bonefishing out of Abaco Lodge, which was fantastic.

From the fishing, to the digs to the vibe of the place, I’m kind of sold on Treasure Cay. I hope to get back. We’ll see.

 

 

Tags: Abaco, Spring Break 2015, Treasure Cay

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 15th, 2015 at 10:56 am and is filed under Locations. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.