The terrain varies from sloping hills in the northeast to low hillsides in the south fading into stark white flatlands where salt was produced in years ago. Long Island's interesting caves, one of the deepest (700 feet / 200 m) blue holes in the world, gorgeous bays, towering cliffs and rolling hills are in direct contrast with the more tropical landscape and coast lines found elsewhere in The Bahamas.
The area has stunning beaches and, in fact, Cape Santa Maria was voted by a leading German newspaper as one of the ten best beaches in the world!. Visitors headed to one of the resorts at either Cape Santa Maria or  Stella Maris could fly directly from the U.S.A. into the Stella Maris International Airport which offers Customs and Immigration. 
Due to its southeasterly location, Long Island has a pleasant, mild climate. Rainfall amounts to a healthy 50 inches (125 cm) per year. The island's narrow width and relatively high elevation enables it to take maximum advantage of the so-called tropial "trade-breezes".
Long Island is considered as one of Christopher Columbus' earlier stops, probably his third, after San Salvador and Rum Cay. Lucaya-Indians supposedly called it "Yuma" and Columbus named it "Ferandina" , thus dedicating it to his mentor, the King of Spain. After he set sight on Long Island, he wrote in his log-book: "This is the most beautiful island in the World..." . Loyalists from Carolina settled here in 1790 with their slaves. They built vast plantations and thrived briefly growing sea-island cotton, but the abolition of slavery made them unprofitable.

Today, close to 4000 islanders live in tiny settlements lying along the newly constructed Queens Highway that connects the north to the south. Larger villages are Deadman's Cay and Clarence Town in the South.The primary occupations of the population are agriculture and fishing.
The infrastructure of Long Island has been vastly improved over the past few years, with the inhabitants enjoying the services of electricity, water, telephone, internet and satellite tv.

Stella Maris was begun in 1963 built. The project included a small resort, an air field and approximately 2,000 acres of land which were improved with roads and surveyed for some 1,500 lots.

These lots were primarily designed for single family homes, but some multi-family sites and commercial areas were identified also, along with parks and lakes. In addition there were another 1,000 acres of land on the southern end of the site which remained unimproved to this day.

The current owners of Stella Maris are four families, originally from Germany, who have been involved with the project since the mid-1960’s. This group has, over the years, developed an outstanding small resort and a significant land sales and development company. Each of the owners is actually involved in the day-to-day operations of the company. Through these efforts, they have consistently made profits from the venture and have reinvested these profits in improvements to the development.

Stella Maris caters to a diverse group of nationalities with about half of its hotel guests being from North-America (mainly the U.S.), the other half coming all the way across the Atlantic Ocean from Germany and many other European countries. A similar split-up, percentage-wise, pertaining to nationalities is true for the over one hundred thirty homeowners in the Estate.

The Stella Maris Inn - which operates the Resort Club and Marina - is faced with seasonal trends which are similar to the Bahamas as a whole, with business peaking in the late winter and spring, and slow periods occurring in the fall. The Inn does have the advantage of appealing to divers who tend to ignore seasonal concerns more than other guests, and it has an incredibly large number of patrons who return to the resort year after year.

This high percentage of repeat guests provides some stability in business volume. Further, these repeat guests have expressed a preference for the environment of Stella Maris and Long Island. Many of them became owners of lots and homes.