Grenada

We left Hillsborough, Carriacou, on 28th Feb and took the inshore passage to Petite Martinique noting two large vessels aground on reefs. We navigated carefully and tied up to a dock for the first time for ages to take on much needed water. We filled the tanks and many containers with fresh, drinking water. Wonderful! We decided to stay for a couple of nights and anchored downwind of the fuel/water dock. As there is only one road in Petite Martinique, it was easy to find the well-stocked, small supermarket and buy a few basics and some wine.

Just across from Petite Martinique(PM) is another small island, Petit St Vincent(PSV). They both belong to different countries and as we had cleared out of St Vincent and the Grenadines we were not supposed to return without clearing in so we took the dinghy across, anchored it off the gorgeous beach and snorkelled. The next day we walked the length of the road on PM; continued when it became a track; ended up in a meadow where tethered cows were grazing; tried to find the path, but gave up when the meadow changed to prickly bushes! On the way back, we noticed several cemeteries liberally scattered between houses which ranged from wooden shacks to mansions with pretty gardens. Tethered goats kept the grass cut and children played “cars” in the road with plastic crates while older ones played cricket with bats made from bits of wood. Back on Sal Darago, we went for our afternoon swim but Jeremy smelt diesel and we climbed out just before a slick lapped round the boat. Moral – don’t anchor downwind of a fuel berth!

During the night the mast began to creak and groan. Jeremy checked everything at first light and still the creaking continued. A liberal spraying of WD40 finally stopped it. We returned to Hillsborough and motored over to Sandy Island for the night. Sandy Island has dead coral heaped up on the windward side, a few young palm trees and vegetation planted after the 2004 hurricane destroyed everything, and a long, golden-sand beach with reefs at either side. The water was crystal clear which was great for snorkelling, although it was choppy over the reefs. This small island has two lagoons and a small beach hut. It’s a great place to spend a few hours. Here we met local man, Che, and discussed the state of the world and Grenada for quite a while, returning to SD slightly sunburned. Jeremy found some live conch near the boat. We’ve seen mountains of shells but few live ones. They have eyes on stalks which poke out of the shell and a kind of foot with which they propel themselves along. When they’re served up in restaurants they’re called lambi.

The next day, we sailed round the small island of Mabouya on our way to Tyrrel Bay, Carriacou. We went to the yacht club and found it was rather run down, but the boatyard next door was active with several yachts having new antifoul paint put on their bottoms, including “Sunblazer”, which we had last seen in Barbados,. Tyrrel Bay had a laundry so we had our bedding and towels washed and dried. We took the bus into Hillsborough. I got on the bus first as I had dropped off the laundry. I asked the driver to pick up Jeremy and when the driver said to him, “I’ve got your wife on board”, Jeremy said, “How much do I have to pay you to keep her!” All the men on the bus laughed. I didn’t! At Hillsborough we caught another bus to the other end and side of the island to a village aptly named, Windward. A tragedy occurred here soon after World War 2, when a mine floated ashore and blew up workers who were building boats on the beach. Many of the dead were members of the same families. A monument and plaque commemorated this dreadful event.

We caught the bus back and asked to be dropped near the hospital. Nobody was ill but the hospital is on a hill overlooking both sides of the island and we were told the view was spectacular. We were dropped off at the bottom of a “gravel” track and told to follow the track. We did and we went up and up but we never reached the hospital. We did find a ruined windmill, had a bizarre meeting with a female, American cyclist in the middle of a wood who gave us directions back to Hillsborough and met a local couple who had lived in Huddersfield for 39 years. Exhausted and hungry, we finally made it back to Hillsborough and enjoyed local food in a great value café. Later we had coffee back in Tyrrel Bay with Mary and Philip on “Papa Kilo”. They have left their yacht in Power Boats in Trinidad and gave us lots of useful information.

The next two days were spent exploring uninhabited islands near Carriacou. There was another Frigate Island, which we managed to land on by dinghy and walk across through cacti to the other side. We nearly stepped on tortoises, which disguised themselves very cleverly as rocks! There was a lagoon and a beach but breaking reefs everywhere. We returned to SD with bamboo poles and long lengths of plastic line. Well, you never know when you might need a spare spinnaker pole! Snorkelling off the island was good although I was convinced some smooth coral was concrete! The other islands were equally interesting but we were soon joined by three other yachts. We anchored very close in to Saline Island but we really wanted to visit White Island which had a high rock at one end and a long sandy beach. Unfortunately, it was too rough to risk anchoring there with reefs breaking all around. Still, we enjoyed exploring Saline Island which had an empty wooden house just behind the palm fringed beach, a rocky shore, high cliffs with basalt columns, a round fort, a coral shore and a mangrove swamp. Once again the water was crystal clear and we could see how close to the bottom we were when we snorkelled. As we had to move, we went back to Tyrrell Bay at my suggestion, but it turned out to be a mistake because a big, uncomfortable northerly swell had come into the anchorage and we had a rocky rolly night.

We are now in Grenada having sailed down past some small islands called Les Tantes on the windward side. We thought we might anchor off another Sandy Island or Green Island, but it was too rough, so we sailed past an arch and some rocks called London Bridge and made our way to the capital, St George’s. We’re anchored in a lagoon near a very pleasant yacht club with all facilities, including cold showers, nearby.