Blackbeard's Beach: Skip Nassau's Glitz. Explore instead the deserted strands and grottoes of Exuma. February 16, 2004 Written by: Dirk Smillie Hemingway found Bimini, but Harold Hartman, one-time owner of New Jersey box company, made the tiny island of Staniel Cay his adopted home. His only trouble: getting there. Landing a small plane on the isle's short gravel airstrip was an adventure. So in the mid-1970's he and partners invested more than $150,000 in improvements that included a 3,000-foot paved strip. They donated it to the Bahamian government in exchange for land on the island's east side.

Hartman died in 1991, but the do-it-yourself ethos among U.S. expatriates continues to pave the way for better tourism in the Exumas, a chain of 365 Bahamian islands and cays (pronounced "keys"), low reefs of sand or coral. From the air they look like tiny stepping stones ringed by translucent hues of jade and sapphire, the sands on their deserted beaches soft as powdered sugar.

In the 17th century the cays' hidden inlets, coves and limestone caverns were the favorite haunts of such pirates and privateers as Blackbeard, who plundered Spainish galleons leaving the New World. With most of the archipelago lying less than an hours flight from Nassau, these same sites now lure eco-tourists. On Leaf Cay, for example, yard-long rock iguanas sun themselves with a languor unbecoming an endangered species. To the south, on Stocking Island, luminescent red starfish grow to over a foot in diameter.

In 1973 Hartman neighbor Martha Wohlford, a novelist, used sideband radio to set up the first communications link between Staniel Cay and the outside world. Later the Bahamian government built a 200-foot telecommunications tower to bring phone service to the island. Still, getting a dial tone can be nearly impossible. Visitors and island residents, some of whom go back seven generations, instead use VHF marine radio.

Not a bad alternative. Part of the charm of visiting Staniel Cay, which is a 30 minute flight from Nassau, is eavesdropping on other visitors over channel 16, used as a kind of public address system by all 100 of the island's residents and 40 vacation homeowners. The chatter starts daily at 8 a.m., wehn a woman with the call sign of Blue Yonder delivers the day's weather report. Soon after, yacht captains talk about where they're heading an swap tips on anchorage conditions. Tourists in the know use the channel to place orders for fresh bread from baker Vivian Rolle or to make dinner reservations at the Yacht Club, the only restaurant that's consistently open.

Private home building on 640-acre Staniel Cay is flourishing and gives some parts of the island a ramshackle appearance. That doesn't mar the view from Wohlford's home, which overlooks Thunderball Grotto, a snorkeler's paradise. The Bahamian government has promised to step up efforts to bring paved roads to the cay, where cars aren't allowed, only golf carts. But progress is slow in the Bahamas, so watch the rocks.