Potter's Cay

Potter's Cay is a narrow strip of reclaimed land under the two bridges to Paradise Island, and it is where the Bahamas actually feeds Nassau: the mail boats that serve the family islands tie up here, unloading fruit, vegetables, fish and everything else, and a row of wooden stalls sells it on. It is also the best place in the country to eat conch salad, made in front of you by people who have been doing it for decades, with piles of discarded shells alongside. Fish is gutted and sold on the dock, land crabs are kept in barrels in season, and the whole thing runs from early morning until very late at night.

What you actually see

• Conch salad stands - made to order, the best in the country.
• The mail boats - loading and unloading for the family islands.
• The fish dock - catch gutted and sold straight off the boats.
• The shell middens - piles of discarded conch shells along the water.

When to go

Year-round. Mornings are for the boats and the fish; late afternoon and evening for the conch stands, which run late. Land crab season in summer brings barrels of them to the stalls. Mail boat arrivals vary by island and route.

Honest expectations

It is a working dock, not a tourist market: it is scruffy, it smells of fish, and the stalls are basic. Conch salad is raw, so pick a busy stand with fast turnover. The area under the bridge is fine in daylight and busy in the evening but is not somewhere to wander alone late. Parking is difficult.

Nearby

Paradise Island is over the bridge; downtown Nassau is ten minutes west.