Oildown, fish and Atlantic Crossings

Current Location: yes, it's still Grenada Marine, Grenada

Days follow each other here each with a similar pattern. Up by seven am, usually Gill first, wee in the wee bucket, greet Carpe Diem on the next cradle, breakfast of cereal, freshly made mango chutney, fresh little bananas and yoghourt, a quick review of the day ahead and then into boat jobs. At four in the afternoon we stop and go for a swim in the Caribbean Sea (or is it the Atlantic on this corner of Grenada).Maybe to the bar for a beer as the sun goes down and then dinner on Petronella or Carpe Diem. Mondays are yoga and pizza days and Saturdays hash days. You see we aren't really on holiday here (or wherever we happen to be), it's just our life now and it's hard to imagine returning to a shore based existence.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago we were invited out to a beach meal with a Grenadian family. We ate "oildown" a tradition meal out here. It includes all manner of exotic vegetables like bread fruit and calalou as well as saffron flavoured coconut milk, two types of bananas (plantain and ripe fig) and loads of other stuff all cooked up on a fire on the beach in a big cooking pot. It should have had pigs' ears in it too but they were omitted this time as we had several vegetarians with us. All in all a great afternoon.

Bananas, coconut oil, dried fish, calalou etc, etc

Preparation

Cooking

Naishe

The finished oildown

Lunch on leaves plucked from a tree

The Party

In return the following weekend we and Carpe Diem cooked mahi-mahi for our hosts but first we had to prepare it. Jack knew how to so we spent an entertaining half hour on the workbench filleting it.

Skin

Carefully ease knife along centre line

Remove Fillet

Prepare to eat

Discard carcass

Another place where our minds are spending time at present is out in the Atlantic. Our friends M-C (of osteopathy fame in Ulverston) and Dave were due to cross the Atlantic with the Arc, an annual sailing rally, when the owner of the boat they were sail to on fell and broke four ribs. We emailed all our sailing friends and indirectly they eventually found a different boat Dona Flor to make the crossing on. At present they are just over halfway across as are friends from Turkey on another boat, Azimuth. If you are interested you can follow them here. We think of them experiencing the things we experienced earlier this year, and I for one, wish I was out there again in the big blue.

Last night we popped down to the bar to see the Friday night crowd. Jenny, the lady who owns the fantastic wooden house up in the mountains, was there excited that she was going to be crewing for Serge the Frenchman up to Martinique and then Andrew (the owner of the hobbit house, see previous posting) is going to fly her back to Grenada in his private plane. Also present was another Frenchman, Michel I think, who usually lives on his boat in the Amazon in French Guyana. At this time of the year though when the rivers are low, he sails up to Grenada for a few months. He occupies his time in the Amazon by fishing and gold panning.

Petronella is nearly ready to hit the water again but first we will return to the UK next week to spend some time with my Mum and Dad in their new apartment and to give brother Philip and his wife some time off from the arduous task of helping them through each day. Then to Uruguay for Christmas and New Year before working our way back here in January.

Liquid Sunshine

Current Location: Grenada Marine Boatyard, Grenada, West Indies

Last night it absolutely poured with rain...all night. Liquid sunshine they call it. Liquid sunshine - my arse, this was just a monsoon-like downpour. This morning we woke up to find the boatyard afloat with shoes, heavy plastic sheets, dog bowls, jerry cans and anything else that could float. A tide line halfway up the wheels of Jack's car showed just how wet it had been. Down at the little restaurant looking out over the bay the land had eroded where the water had simply run underneath the building. Pretty amazing and not good for all those boats due to launch in the next couple of weeks.

A wet morning in paradise

We thought something was up during the night when water started to drip on my leg! Oh no. Surely not a leaking window. A couple of years ago we spent over a month taking out the old windows, welding in some new pieces of steel where water had leaked in over the years and then installing replacement windows. This was a BIG job and we didn't want to be repeating it.

So, as it dried up this morning and Gill went on a hunt for missing shoes, flip flops and hardener, I took the headlining down in our cabin. This is a hot, sticky job in temperatures of 28 degrees C and humidity of 93%. Eventually, all the wooden strips were removed and I can see a rusty hole well above window level. Thank goodness for that, it is just a hole in the coachroof. Why? Well it seems the gas pipe from the gas locker used to run through this hole but when the gas feed was moved someone did a bodge job of blocking it up. Eventually the repair rusted through, spraying water onto me. Up on deck we can see the hole is actually under the gas bottle locker. Removing the locker proved less difficult than expected and we started to clean out the hole. Just as I have the rust removed it starts to rain again. Quick, get a bucket because now it is not just drips it's a continual stream onto my bed. That's the current state of affairs and we are thinking of ways to effect a repair once things dry up again. It could be I epoxy a piece of plastic to the underside of the ceiling, find a washer of other piece of steel to fill most of the hole and then epoxy it in. not an ideal solution but it should be fine for a good few years once it is sanded down and painted. There goes another few days then. The cruising life - fixing boats in exotic places! Oh yes, the ongoing work means we now have no gas which in turn means it is cold sausage soup for lunch.

Rain outside, headlining down...and a hole in the ceiling!

Otherwise the boat is coming on quite well. All the electric works are complete and the outside (keel, topsides and white stripe) are just about finished except for antifouling the hull which we will probably leave until we return from Uruguay. Gilly's been working extremely hard on the "blue" jobs whilst I play around with fiddly stuff on board. We do have some jobs for the welder though. This is always problematic as we are in a queue with loads of other boats and progress on all of them is pretty slow. We just have to keep nudging them gently to fix the rudder pintle, free the windlass grub screw and straighten the Aries leg. Exciting stuff!

Removing salts from the green topsides

A bit of excitement yesterday. Fizzy walked the dogs down to the beach and came scampering back to say the local fishermen had caught a shark. Turns out it was a Tiger Shark. Not just a little chap either. At over 8 feet long they said it could take a man's leg off and the jaws certainly looked fearsome enough to do just that. And to think we go swimming every evening. Yikes!

Big shark head, fearsome rows of interlocking teeth and possibly a shark gullet.

Build-A-Shark!     That's one impressive liver too.

Delicate shark catching tackle. Thick rope, 12 inches of chain and hook bigger than my hand.

Right, at last the rain has stopped and I can review the hole in the deck again.

Dis an Dat

Current Location: Grenada Marine boatyard, St Davids, Grenada

Wow. It's been hot since we've been back.

As usual the change from UK family life to foreign country cruising life was abrupt and surprising. This time it was the slogans on the local cars and minibuses that emphasised the difference. In England you might rarely see a souped-up Cortina with "Darren loves Shaz" across the windscreen. Here in Grenada we started to write down some of the slogans we saw after seeing "Doggy Style" emblazoned across a windscreen. Here are some more of our favourites...

"Less friends, more money" - on a paying minibus/taxi
"De baddest and de meanest"
"XS Meat"
"Godfather"
"Road Spinners"
"Under de Blood" - what?

But the best just has to be "Birds don't eat guava in mango time". So what's that all about then and why on earth did someone spend valuable time and money getting it made and stuck on?


We've fallen back into the off season cruising lifestyle where conversations are from boat to boat propped high up in the air rather than bobbing serenely on the water. It can be dangerous. You clamber up and down ladders, usually carrying too much on often slippery rungs trying to evade the next torrential downpour. At this time of year the yard is starting to get busier as people arrive to start their preparations for the new season. The noise of antifoul being sanded off, brackets being welded on and newly hoisted flapping sails fill the air. I've spent several long sessions up the mast replacing the wind speed instrument and VHF aerial which were both affected by the strong winds during the Atlantic crossing and Gilly has been stalwartly doing the shitty "blue" (as opposed to "pink") job of sanding the hull in preparation for the new antifoul. Well done Gilly. Jobs are actually going pretty well and we are a bit ahead of schedule. I still have to replace the forestay (the wire the front sail goes on) together with its furler and we also need to sort out the rudder bearing (well actually there are no bearings just three hefty chunks of steel turning inside three even heftier chunks of steel). The VHF aerial is still not completed either so there is at least one more trip to make up to the top of the mast.

It's not all work though. Saturdays are now becoming "hash days" (yes Wendy and Barrie we've finally succumbed). The Hash House Harriers seem to spring up wherever there are Brits (in particular) abroad. You all drive/cycle/catch a bus out to some neat place in the country (read jungle) and do a paper chase. At least one running route and one walking. Then, in Grenada at least, you eat traditional "oil down", a fiendish concoction including pigs' ears and "dog turd" dumplings [other sustenance may also be available] and drink lots of beer. Otherwise know as "drinkers with a running problem" it's a great place to catch up with old friends and meet new ones. We opted for the walk last week as we were still not acclimatised and it was around 30 degrees. As it happened it was pretty easy and we made it round without a problem. There were students from St George's University, sailors from many nationalities and some extremely fit Grenadans.

The Start

Yesterday though Fizzy and I decided we would do "The Run". Wow. It began high above the Caribbean Sea and for the next two hours we bashed through the jungle, scrambled up watercourses, slithered down banks and leapt from bamboo trunk to bamboo trunk. We climbed high up above the starting point and then just as we thought we were finishing, the trail led down and down. Before we knew it we were down on the beach at Black Bay, with its dark volcanic sand. Down at the sea meant we had to climb right back up again, this time via a 40m dark cave filled with (vampire?) bats with a little hole to scramble out of at the other end. An amazing afternoon.

On the road, before heading off into the jungle

Hashing is not the only exercise though. We've also been to yoga. Once in the gorgeous environment that is St George's Medical University overlooking the sea. Once at Prickly Bay (the most famous bay on the island) where we were put through our paces by a Frenchman who must have been from the French equivalent of the SAS or from the French Foreign Legion. All the yoga I've ever done before has been relatively gentle. This was not gentle. In fact at one stage "Downward Dog" got so hard I sicked up into my own mouth. Yuck!

And last week we went dinghy sailing for the first time in years. It was blowing a bit as we arrived at Le Phare Blu and we were all a bit nervous (at least Fizzy, Gill and I were; Jack was really up for it). We had a great day though. We lost the first race, drifting backwards over the start line to begin but then went on to win several losers races before being defeated in the final by an expert Hobie sailor. We were well chuffed as we picked up our third prize and certificate. Jack was not!!

A perfect start....and the Douches are ahead

Third place for the Hobie virgins. Where's Jack then?

Oh yes. Big news. For the first time in 43 years Gill and I did some "real" dancing. Salsa!!

Please, please, please. Do not tread on my toes.

Today we are off to Jenny's house. She is an expat who lives out here up in the mountains where she grows amazing vegetables and makes fruit juices from her fruit trees. This might get a bit messy as we are due there at 12.30 for lunch at 4.00pm. Anyway Gilly is hard at work cooking up some Turkish mezes for starters so I'll finish for now.

Oh no. Whatever happened to the Big Walk?

Lying in a sweltering bed last night, unable to sleep, I suddenly realised that yesterday's "list of good things during our time in the UK" had omitted the Big Walk. "What's that?" I hear you clamouring.

Well, thirty years ago, after we arrived back from four years in South Africa, we asked a group of friends if they wanted to do a long walk so we could catch up with what they had been doing since we left. That first walk across the North York Moors, known as the Lyke Wake Walk, followed the ancient coffin route from west to east, a total of around 40 miles if I remember correctly. Since that time these walks have become annual events. Over time we've picked up new walkers and a few have gone by the wayside. One, Julian, who died of bowel cancer ten years ago is still remembered by us every year. Some of the current regulars were introduced not by us but by other members of the Big Walk club which is great. These regulars now come from Ireland, England, Norway, Germany and South Africa. Even better, whilst we have been away for the past few summers they've carried on without us. And even better better - this year with us being back in the UK during the summer they welcomed us back into the group as if we had never been away.

The routine is pretty much the same each year. Meet on Friday night with a pub meal, walk on Saturday (all day, especially nowadays!), another pub meal and a long sleep, a leisurely breakfast on Sunday morning when someone volunteers to coordinate the following year's walk. With luck a date and venue is set and the cycle begins again.

At the start the "rules" said that the walks must not get any easier as the years go by. We like to think that that is still true but I have a sneaky suspicion that this year's 22 miles across Exmoor in the south west of England was maybe just that little bit less of a challenge than the Lyke Wake Walk was thirty years previously. We generally have a support minibus that meets the walkers every 6 or 7 miles providing refreshments, muscle balm and encouragement. This year's walkers were a particularly fit group - no stragglers and a strong finish by everyone. Thanks guys - we hope to see you all again next year on the South Downs Way.

How the years pass!!

2003 - The Black Forest

2004 - Hadrian's Wall. Built by the Romans to keep the Scots out!

2007 - The Yorkshire Dales

More recent acquaintances may struggle to recognise Gill in this photo.

2015 - Dunkery Beacon, the highest poin

Compare and Contrast

Current Location: The Hobbit House, S Grenada

Welcome back to all our blog followers. We've spent the past three months in the UK, much of it with my ageing parents trying to find somewhere for them to move to. In thirteen weeks we've been on one hell of a journey, so unlike the life we've become accustomed to that it almost seems unreal. Not much fun or sunshine, lots of half empty glasses and plenty of worries. To my mum and dad though, this is and has been their life for the past 30 years. With my brother Philip and his wife Jane we've researched care homes, assisted living places and live-in carers, found a place they can accept and finally moved them to Dursley, close to Phil's home in Gloucestershire. Are they happy now? Not really, but we feel we've done the very best for them that we could have and that's all we can do. In the process my half marathon with Emma went by the board (pulled calf muscle) and Gill's singing of the Armed Man in a massed choir had to be cancelled (move date intervened). We did however have a great family week in Devon, worked well with Phil and Jane on the moving, had an excellent weekend with Gill's sisters (including the famous meal from hell), caught up with Dick and Mary (Alakazam) and Dave and Melinda (Sassoon), and got to know my cousin Hilary properly for the first time. And of course, thanks to Hugh and Linda for the loan of their big house in Sonning, a welcome bolthole from Southampton and Dursley. I left the UK feeling an odd mixture of sadness, exhaustion and guilt – not a good combination.

So on Friday we began the return to our other life. We only had a few hours to close up Hugh and Linda's house and pack for the return to Grenada. This was obviously not long enough as I was still in the loft trying to find my sunglasses when the taxi arrived! Then in the rush to catch the train to Gatwick we got off at Gomshall (the ticket did say "via Gomshall") instead of Redhill. As a result we had a lovely hour in the sunshine waiting for the next train to Redhill. To put it lightly Gomshall is very quiet. Still no harm done there. We were due to meet Jack from Carpe Diem at Gatwick. As if our journey was not eventful enough Jack arrived in the back of a police car! He had decided to walk from the terminal to the Travelodge to save £3. Unfortunately his route, complete with airport trolley, took him along the main road. No pavements, plenty of lorries roaring past. Mr Plod took exception and escorted him to the hotel. He lost the £1 deposit on his trolley so only saved £2. Good job Jack!

Next day an easy BA flight brought us into Grenada via the very nice customs people who have been cracking down recently on incoming boaties. Warmth again, both from friends and weather though it was absolutely pissing down as we arrived. It was a bit of a squash in Jack's little jeep with four people and thirteen large pieces of luggage including a full sized guitar. Laughter. We are now staying at friends of Jack and Fizzy in an amazing Hobbit-like house. It's owned by a Swedish American couple who have a big motor boat tied up at the end of the garden. For some reason they prefer to live on the boat than in the house so they lent the house to Fizzy while she was doing some medical work! The house owner runs a commercial diving business in Venezuela and flies his own plane down there on a regular basis. Venezuela by all accounts is not a good place to be.

One day back and already we are planning Christmas in Uruguay with Jen and Marcus. We are hoping to work our way back to Grenada in January via short plane hops and buses. We shall see.

OK, time to prepare for a dinghy party in the next bay. It seems that there's to be a gathering of yachties, each bringing their own food and drink, followed by a bit of a musical afternoon.

Back in the UK

Ah, the M25. How I've missed it. Friend (and Ibiza to Gibraltar crew) Linda met us at Gatwick. We had plenty of time to catch up because the motorway barely moved for 2 hours. Luckily it was the hottest day of the year so that was nice.

Interestingly we saw no taxis with "The Avenger" or "Abraham's Seed" or "Love the Lord" emblazoned across the windscreen during the entire journey. Equally the roadkill were foxes and badgers rather than mongooses (mongeese?) and cane toads. People seem greyer here, there are traffic cameras everywhere and none of the houses are on stilts.

But the sun is shining, Murray is through to the second week of Wimbledon and The Chilterns were spectacular as we caught up with Hugh and Linda's news during this afternoon's walk.

Little changes in Southampton except my Mum and Dad are even older and less able to cope than last time we were back.

Putiing these things down in writing usually crystallized ideas and makes them happen. So you might as well know I've agreed with Emma we will run a half marathon on 4th October. Today's exercise will help but the ice cream, meringues and shortbread biscuits probably won't.

I'm still the Membership Manager for the informal Atlantic Crossing Group google group and we're just starting to get this year's group of excited and nervous Crossers starting to join. Good luck to them all.

It's Hard on the Hard

Blogger: John

Current Location: Grenada Marine Boatyard, St Davids, SW Grenada

It might have been Kipling that wrote:

In the jungle,
The jungly jungle,
The Tree Frogs croak tonight

But then again, perhaps it wasn't.

We have finally lifted and are perhaps 10m from the perimeter fence and the rain forest jungle. The cicadas are chirping, the land crabs are scuttling and the tree frogs are weep-ing. And yet 100m the other way is St Davids Bay, a whale sling for lifting boats out of the water, a pretty comprehensive set of services ranging from riggers to a sail loft, welders and engineers. There's even an Island Water World chandlery and, most important, a very sociable bar and basic restaurant maybe 3m from the water's edge.

Petronella, sails off, waiting to lift out

The boatyard bar. Petronella in the background. Sometimes life is just TOO tough.

The night before Jack and Fizzy left we decided to go out to celebrate. Not to celebrate the fact they were leaving but to look back at what we had all achieved over the last year. We ended up a the posh Calabash restaurant where we had another "trouser incident". Jack and I were wearing shorts - not just any shorts you understand, but our best shorts. "Not allowed I'm afraid sir." OK, no problem we'll go elsewhere we told them. "Wait. We have trousers you can wear. Go to reception and see what they have". We both have 36" waists and the smallest pairs were 38" and 40", and that's US sizes too. Here we are with our own shorts in our hands and our Grenadian smart "pants" covering our legs, after an excellent meal. Bye J and F. It's been a blast, see you in Reading!

We came out on Monday at 8am after taking Jack and Fizzy to the airport in their smart new Suzuki Jeep (shame it now has a slow puncture and only one brakelight but there you go). By the time I was back and we had untangled the very tangly bow ropes the marina was calling for us on Channel 16. "Petronella, Petronella, this is Grenada Marine. Please make your way to the hauling bay and enter stern first". Bugger. It's blowing a bit, there's another boat in the way and P doesn't really do backwards. Still, with a slight nudge from the boatyard's rib (rigid inflatable boat) we are in and hoisted. We thought we would be pretty furred up after 15 months in the water but we appear to have 3/4 of the total Atlantic fauna attached to our hull. So much so that the yard staff think the boat has been sitting at anchor for a year rather than boldly crossing oceans.

Oh no! My bottom does look dirty.

No wonder the bowthruster wouldn't work.

Anyway, they lift us, clean us (amazingly just the standard cleaning fee) and then off we trundle to our allotted space, right next to Carpe Diem. Excellent. THEY won't mind if we do a bit of grinding over their decks - especially as they are not here any longer!

Dropped in to place. Right next to Carpe Diem.

So, that was Monday. Since then we have been working like very hard working people. All the sails are washed, all the ropes are washed, half the hull is prepared for the next three months, all the washing is done, the engine oil has been changed, as has the filter, the raw water filter has had its crabs and seaweed removed, we've run the engines, changed the radiator cap, measured ropes that need replacing, taken the sails to the sail maker for stitching, dropped the anchor chain, inspected (and found wanting) the anchor locker and a host of other jobs too. Carpe Diem's wet cover and fizzy's shoes are stored below and Island Swift's dessicating crystals are in place.

Washday viewed from above.

On Sunday we make our way to La Sagesse for two nights of luxury courtesy of Jen and Emma for my 60th birthday present (I'm now 61 so it's a bit late really). By then we must be finished here with P all set for the next three months whilst we're in the UK. We're taking hurricane precautions so we are not just in our usual cradle but we are tied down by straps too to big buried concrete blocks. To keep the bugs at bay we will grease all points of contact with the ground, install cockroach traps and block up all holes in the hull and boom end. Today we have been watching as a pair of wrens set up home in the exhaust hole of the expensive Halberg Rassy next to us.

Phew. We're knackered.

World Cup Qualifier - Grenada v Puerto Rico

Jack came across last Tuesday morning from Carpe Diem. "Why don't we go to see Grenada play Puerto Rico this afternoon in their World Cup Qualifier?"  Great idea, the jobs can wait for a bit.


1.00pm sees the boys take the dinghy ashore at Whisper Cove. We walk up to the road and wait..and wait for a minibus. Eventually our friendly bus driver, Shademan, arrives. He takes us to the main road via a roadside garage who might have a Suzuki jeep for Jack to buy. We catch the Number 2 bus into St George's and walk to the ground. Its 2.30 and the game is due to kick off at 3.30. There is no one, just nobody around. Jack's T shirt generates interest from a Rasta. "Respect mon" but otherwise it is quiet. Finally we find a way into the Grenada National Stadium, often full for Test Matches, but rarely it seems for World Cup qualifiers. We determine that it is indeed a 3.30pm ko and we finally see some other supporters....the crew from Oyster Mist! After an almost complete circuit of the ground we finally get in. About 20 others greet us. No beer but for 16EC (£4) we can get a half bottle of Grenadian white rum, two cokes and two bottles of water from Grand Etang, the lake in the middle of the island we visited last week.




By kickoff there are perhaps 180 people in the ground. We think that Grenada are 1-0 down after the first leg. They play in green with a vertical yellow and red stripe (the national colours).  Grenada is known as the Spice Island so not surprisingly we are cheering for "D' Spice Boyz". Oh yes, there's a dog in the outfield too. This must be a pre, pre, pre qualifier because the finals are not until 2018 in Russia.



Before the teams come out the ref and linesmen come out to do their own warm up. They must be mates, or they were practising in the hotel the previous night, because every stretch, every jumping antelope, every twist and turn is done in unison. The sole camera there for the game laps it up and so do we.

The National Anthems are interesting because they don't appear to have Puerto Ricos anthem on their playlist. The Puerto Ricans all stand there with hands on hearts waiting for it to start. It's half a minute before they finally find it deep in the archives. Even when it does get going it is just the same as everyone else's. Nobody boos it, everybody stands and is thoroughly respectful.
Kick off and it is fairly evenly matched. Puerto Rico are the better footballing team, Grenada have lots of energy. Nobody knows the offside rule, or in many cases the corner rule either. We're just having a super afternoon out. Then Puerto Rico score. Luckily it's an own goal, a cracker from around the penalty spot. All square and suddenly Grenada believe they can win it. A wave of anticipation ripples through the meagre crowd. It stays 1-0 until half time when the teams return up the steps to the 'pavilion' more used to hosting test match players then soccer idols.

It must be free to get in now (rather than the £2.20 we paid) as people are flooding in and the tannoy lady has to tell us to keep the aisles free. It's chaos on the way to the toilets as I have to pass through the rum bar, now doing great business.

The second half starts and Grenada have more belief. The crowd is getting noisier (read drunker). Another great save from the goalie. Then he tries to throw it out to his left full back but it bounces in front of him instead. What the hell. I might as well dribble it past the halfway line, beating three men on the way and leaving the goal exposed. Wow! Biggest cheer of the afternoon. But now the captain is coming back to castigate him. Castigate him, my arse, it's high fives all round. Eat your heart out Hart.

With 15 minutes left it's a corner to Grenada. Great corner, great cross, great header. 2-0 Grenada and now the place is rocking. The dog gallops the full length of the pitch and the final whistle blows. The players come over to salute us, the crowd. Everyone seems to know at least one player personally. What a game. Grenada are into the next round of the 2018 World Cup.

Jack and I walk back into town looking for a roti. A woman tells us rotis are for the morning.  They will be bad by now and might kill us. We find one though at The Nutmeg Restaurant overlooking the harbour or careenage.  Great value and a fantastic local nutmeg ice cream to finish.

It's getting dark now and we've had a few beers. The bays along the south of the island where we are anchored are complex and we only know we are close to a hamlet called Woburn. We find a bus stop. We need a No 2 but not just any No 2. It's has to be a Woburn one. They all look the same but eventually yet another No 2 comes round the corner. "Stop", the Mommas shout. He stops. We are the only passengers for most of the four mile ride back to the Marina. It costs us 2.50EC* (60p). What an afternoon.

* ECs are Eastern Caribbean dollars. They are used in all the former British colonies over here,  whilst the French islands stick with euros. There are 4.6 to the UK pound. Prices are often quoted just in dollars and then you don't know if they mean ECs (cheap) or US dollars (expensive). EC notes and coins have a very young looking Queen adorning them. I've no idea why they can't get a more recent picture of Her Majesty. All this means we have one purse with ECs, one with euros, another with US dollars and then one with UK pounds for when we go home. Plus of course bits of Turkish lira. We never have enough of the correct currency when we get to a new country. C'est La vie.

Transatlantic Pictures

I really don't know whether these will work or the files may be too large.

For a link to our best Trans Atlantic photos click here

Do let us know if these work.

Changeover Time

Blogger: John

I was cold tonight. Not British cold but just enough to think "it's a bit chilly, perhaps I should have put some clothes on before coming to bed". I can't remember the last time that was the case. Things are changing. We get a squall most days now, usually early in the morning. Strong winds and often heavy rain for maybe 30 minutes. Yesterday morning I was caught out in one. In seconds I was soaked, the dinghy was bucking around and I could barely see the boat a couple of hundred yards away.

All the rain, which heralds the start of summer here, is bringing out new green growth on the bushes. The previously nondescript black trees along the shore are now speckled with gorgeous white frangipani flowers. And it feels as though the season for sailing is just about over. Although we are still hopping slowly along the southern Grenadan coastline it's more about renewing friendships than sailing. Tonight we are anchored off Hogg Island near Whisper Cove and we went with Jack and Fizzy to Taffy's little bar cum restaurant for fish and chips (and probably one too many beers). Many of the people we have met on the way "down island" were there along with sailors we'd never met before. We ended up with 15 on our table from England, USA, Germany, South Africa and N Ireland. Jack was able to ask a former air traffic controller what Miami airport was like as they have a 7 hour stopover there on their way back to the UK and we learned to take spare set of clothes to tomorrow's hash on the west of the island.

The bays we've anchored in over the past couple of weeks are well sheltered and picturesque. Most of them have at least one jetty with a small bar. Buses are frequent and everything seems to work pretty well. Life is cool. However this time of year is also boat work time. Petronella has been on the move now for over a year. During that time only essential maintenance has been done. Rust needs attacking (thanks for the loan of the rotary blaster Graham). Paintwork needs sanding down, treating with rust inhibitor, primer, undercoat and topcoat. We washed the mizzen sail in a squall the other day, folded it and stored it and are waiting for another squall to do the same to the staysail. There is still a long list of things to do but Gill is doing a great job slowly working through the tedious paintwork task. P is now spotted with grey paint prior to getting her final coat when we return in October.

Yesterday the footpump that brings water into our little sink started to wheeze after 8 years of flawless performance. So my unplanned job yesterday was to take it to bits to see if I could fix it. It sits under the cooker so first that had to be wedged out the way. Then it took 20 minutes to work out how it was fixed in place (three very inaccessible screws). After it had been installed the bowthruster cables had been run behind it so it was hard to extract even once it was loose. Finally it was out, disassembled and the problem identified. As expected one of the two rubber diaphragms had split leaking a small amount of water on every pump. Amazingly, but not surprisingly, I found a used spare one in the pump spares bag. That should do the job until I can buy a repair kit back in the UK.

Talking of the UK my parents, as well as my brother and his wife who selflessly help them manage on a day to day basis, are finding life increasingly difficult. It remains to be seen what the future holds for us in this respect but along with the seasons here in Grenada I think we might be seeing some changes.

Meanwhile we have been exploring Grenada. We rented a car with Jack and Fizzy for a couple of days. First we went looking for spares parts; canvas, CO2 bottles, mould inhibiter, boric acid to feed to the cockroaches etc, then on to St Georges Medical University for a look around. Into the capital St Georges and then to a gorgeous beachside restaurant for lunch. The effect here was somewhat marred by a very black gigolo and his overweight white companion bouncing around making whoopee in the sea just a few yards away!

Next day was exploring day up through the middle of the island to the cool central lake or Grand Etang. Onwards from there to Grenville which felt more like the less developed islands further north. We had a great roti (spicy fish or chickpea filling in a wrap type of envelope) here which we ate by a disused airfield amongst old rusted planes with cows munching around them. Very odd. Made even odder by then driving fast along the old runway making plane like noises and videoing a simulated take off.

The Grand Etang

Yum, yum. Rotis!

Grenada International Airport

In the afternoon we visited a traditional rum making establishment. It's a modern commercially run distillery producing Rivers rum but the machinery and health and safety is out of the industrial revolution. Owned and run by three locals it employs 70 people who manually load the sugar cane onto the conveyor driven by an overshot water wheel made of British steel and through the crusher. Then through pipes, furnaces and tanks until it comes out as rum at least 75% proof. It has to be diluted to be allowed on a commercial plane. Testing at the end was very enjoyable.

Then it was a cocoa processing plant. More modern with most of the production going into the famous Grenada Chocolate this was also a fascinating process. Cocoa beans develop inside a pod a bit like a coconut in size. There are about 30 in each pod. White and slimy they need to be dried before they turn into the beans we might recognise. All in all a fascinating day.

Our cocoa plant guide

A cocoa pod. The seeds are inside; white and slimy

Traditional cocoa driers at work

Only nine days til lift out now just five miles east along the coast at St Davids on 22nd. The daily hurricane warning emails we get say no hurricane is expected for at least five days. However there are a couple of "Tropical Waves" predicted between now and 22nd with winds in the squalls up to 40k. Fingers crossed the anchor is well dug in and we don't get a nasty shock so close to haul out day.

Right. It's 2am and time to go back to bed.