The Wonderful Spice Island

Ok...I'm going to keep this one short. I can't believe it's almost time to leave our wonderful Grenada. It's been almost 4 months since we first checked into customs in the beautiful island of Carriacou, the northern sister island of Grenada. We spent most of our time anchored in St. David's on the south eastern coast of Grenada. Mike kept busy helping the shipwright in St. David's and I kept busy keeping up with our boat and then flying off to stewardess on the 106 foot motor yacht up in St. Lucia.. While Mike was helping at the shipwrights, he was fortunate enough to help along side some great local guys, which allowed him to learn about the local life and about Grenada in general. We both kept busy including some engine work. We repainted our engine and Mike rebuilt the starter, but more importantly than keeping busy we were able to be part of a community in St. David's and ended up forming friendships that will last a life time.Let me briefly run you through our time in Grenada.
Mike had the opportunity to help deliver a 68 foot wooden schooner to Trinidad....he was in heaven! They had a lovely trip and aside from a 40 knot squall which healed the old girl over, they had a successful trip. Now, I won't bore you with the excitement we experienced with the hurricanes, but for those of you that don't know, 65 knots of wind is 120 km/hr winds. So enough about that. Another exciting thing we took part in, in Grenada was the hashing.
We were first introduced to hashing one Saturday afternoon after our friends on Adventure Bound raved about how great it was. Our first hash found us exhausted, covered in mud and super excited for the next one. We meet at the local rum shop of the location and then run a trail that has been laid out by one of the hashers that takes you through jungles, rivers, fields, up mountains, down valleys...everywhere you could imagine. Then and the end once your completely exhausted everyone meets for a beer and some bbq chicken. The interesting thing with the hash is that when you come to a circle on the trail this means there is 3 possible options for the correct trail and if you take the wrong one you have to turn around and head back to the circle and try another route...this of course makes things interesting! We travelled to Carriacou for one of the hashes along with 2 other boats and our friend Stokley from the local rum shop in St. Davids.Stokley had never been sailing before and unfortunately the motion of the ocean got to him!! However we arrived in Carriacou after a great sail and soon we were in the water for a quick snorkel and then we were off with our running shoes on and were scrambling up a steep incline in the race. After a 2 hour hash we all finished at the local rum shop which just happened to be on the beach and had a big beach bbq...great great day! So speaking of Stokley, we were fortunate enough to meet a fantastic couple in Grenada.
Ironically they own the local rum shop which also sold bread so we were there more often for the fresh bread, despite what you must think! Mary and Stokley were great...they introduced us to oil down (a local dish), salt fish sauté (another local dish), sugar cane, sugar apple, green bananas and also entertained us with great conversation and interesting stories of Grenada. The hardest part of cruising is saying goodbye! With sadness and promises of visiting each other in Canada and Grenada, we said our goodbyes only days ago.
Oh and of course we have Carnival! Now, Carnival isn't just one day it starts about a month in advance. The music starts pumping on the radio, and the locals begin dancing and singing and preparing for the famous Jouvier! All day long we listen to the beats of soca and calypso blaring from the radio and soon we were singing along with it.The actual parade of Carnival was full of color and music and sunshine and sweat and beer and dancing. It was great. The costumes and the dancing and the energy was outstanding. You can help but move your hips to the soca beat. One of the best parts was the steel drum band that won the Carnival competition…they were amazing. They looked like they couldn’t be having anymore fun…the whole thing was a fantastic experience.
So….I promised to keep this short, so I will keep to that and plus we’re in a beautiful anchorage in Carriacou with good friends and have a pizza coming…so I gotta go! I’m off on another charter from November 9th to around the 29th and then again from Dec. 20th to about Jan. 4th. Yes, I know….Mike and I won’t be together for Christmas or New Years, but I can assure you that Mike will be well looked after by the other cruisers…that’s just the way it is. I on the other hand will be serving Christmas dinner this year!
Ok guys…the heat has finally lessened (either that or were getting used to it) and life is good.
Adios for now and Thank you everyone for the birthday wishes.
Kylie and Mike