Conception Island, one of the "out islands" east of the Exumas in the Bahamas, is an uninhabited piece of paradise. The small island is located at 23-50N / 75-07W, NW of Rum Cay and NE of Cape Santa Maria at the northern tip of Long Island, an easy one day sail from George Town on Great Exuma Island with favorable winds. Conception is paradiscial -- a lone sanctuary for birds, sea turtles, barracuda and fish. It has two magnificent white sand beaches, excellent anchorages in white sand and in its interior a natural network of deep and moderately shoal canals. The center of the island is flat and watery: the eastern and southern edges are rocky hills with a fifty feet +/- bluff marking Wedge Point. The island could be described as a shell -- almost all of its entire interior is mostly flat and tidal, rimmed to the south and east by rocky hills. The surf is quiet, majestic and timeless. Conception Island is, except for wildlife, uninhabited. Here you must be totally self-sufficient. The closest civilization is Rum Cay, fifteen miles SE of the island, where you can take on fuel and water and very basic foods, including warm, freshly baked bread at impoverished Port Nelson, or marina dockage and dinner at a fairly new gourmet restaurant just north of Sumner Point. If you go to the marina, call on your VHF for assistance in following the channel markers -- and do as described to avoid running aground.