Carriacou

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Hello all, Carriacou was a very beautiful laid back island. There is over a hundred rum shops and only one gasoline station. The local rum is Iron Jack and they say it fries your brain. From talking to some of the locals we think there is truth in it. It is a peaceful place though, you can see a pelican sitting on a bouy, with a seagull sitting on the pelicans head, both very content. It is 17 miles northeast of Grenada, a rural island with small villages and great beaches. The island has about 6000 people, lots of dogs, cats, goats, sheep and donkeys. The people here live by farming, fishing and seafaring and they are all very friendly. We arrived first in Hillsborough to check in with Customs, Immigration and Port Authority. We only stayed one night in that anchorage as the holding was very bad. The next morning we headed over to Tyrrel Bay on the southwest end of the island. It is a deep, protected bay with a sandy beach that fronts the village. Tyrrel Bay is very peaceful, only two boat vendors to speak of, one sold mangrove oyster and the other wines and champagne. This is Robert, he is the mangrove oyster guy. He will harvest the oysters from the mangrove that are in a narrow lagoon in the northern part of the bay. It is an islet that goes back quiet a ways. He will harvest them then bring them back to your boat and shuck them for you. They are very small - and cost about $1 US dollar apiece. Well, we wanted to try the oysters, but also wanted the experience of seeing them get harvested. So Michael struck up a deal with Robert that for $20 US dollars we would tow him to the oyster beds (as he just had oars on his boat) to watch and film him as he was harvesting them. Robert said sure and made a date for the next day. So we tow Robert to the mangrove and we have our cameras on and shooting. The process - Robert gets out of his boat and steps on to the mangrove - but "Wait" he says, "don't laugh but I have to take my shorts off." Okay we think this is part of it, we have often seen local fisherman shed their clothes before they dive in the water to check their nets or traps, so didn't think much of it. They don't want to get salt water on their clothes. Remember fresh water is a commodity on any island. So we keep filming, next think you know we turn around and yep completely naked. So Kim turns away not wanting to be too intrusive and Robert continues to harvest approximately 30 oysters. We then tow him back to the boat (after he put his clothes on) and he shucks them for us. We find out a lot about Robert while he is shucking the oysters. It turns out his real name is John Bedeau and he has a reputation on the island for being an adventurous entrepreneur. He once owned a 100 year old Carriacou sloop on which he sailed, but its gone now. His latest venture, he told us, was to harvest oysters and sail them up to St. Martin to sell them. He is also very fond of Iron Jack, so we took everything with a grain of salt.

We took a hike over to the hill to another bay, and found a beautiful beach. With a guest house and a little restaurant. The beach is called L'Esterre. The guest house is called Hope's Inn and is located on the north side of L'Esterre. We had lunch here and enjoyed the view and the waitresses son, who kept us entertained. There were quiet a few characters along the main road in the village along Tyrrel Bay. We met a woman, Venus, but she introduced herself to us as Sexy Venus on our first introduction. She had a fruit stand in front of her house and sold us some very good fruit. She lived in the house behind, but it was a very bad disrepair. She also said she owned the land the house was on, beachfront property. She told us the local people were not nice to her, we never got the story of why. We told her they must be jealous, because she owns that nice beachfront property. She had a litter of Kittens also. The momma cat was gone and she was taking care of the kittens. We brought her some tuna to feed them, and a bag of dog food - none of the stores carried cat food so we thought that was better than nothing. We also met Sally a former cruiser who had opened a restaurant in Tyrrel Bay. She did have a business in Grenada - but the hurricanes destroyed them, so she ended up in Tyrrel Bay. Her breakfasts were great, and she said if you don't see it on the menu just ask. Her kitchen in the her house and the seating was on here patio. It was great and the stories she had, definitely and old salt. She also told us that she had come here because of the peaceful atmosphere, but the local currents ran very deep - but we never got the hear those stories.
We found this guy on the beach who was teaching the local kids to sail. The kids were great, and were enjoying it. The liked to show off a bit, when they saw someone watching.
Thats all from Carriacou, Cheers Mike and Kim

Petite St. Vincent and Petite Martinique

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Petite St. Vincent is a private island with a very upscale resort (click HERE to see the resort website). We had wanted to vacation here about 4 years ago, but the prices were so high, we decided on a cruise instead. The place was founded back in the 50's by a couple of guys who retired from the Air Force and came to the Caribbean on their s/v Jacinta. They chartered and one of their clients thought it would be fun to buy a Caribbean island and built a resort on it. The man asked if the two men would build and manage it for him. They did and one of the guys Haze Richardson is still there managing the place. We think we got a glimpse of him while we were on the beach, but not sure. You cannot go anywhere on the island except a small portion of the beach. It was on this beach that Unplugged taught us to play Bocci Ball...you must have cocktails while playing this and remembering whose turn it is or what color you are is half the fun...then of course chasing the balls that slide into the ocean.

Petite Martinique was a little island not far from Petit St. Vincent. We were able to dinghy there. They had good prices on groceries and beer so we stocked up there. The island people live by boatbuilding, seafaring and fishing and in the old days, smuggling. We took a walk down the main street and saw lots of goats a few graveyards. The graveyards on the islands are very unique, they pop up all over the place. In front of grocery stores, right in the middle of a houses or wherever they can fit them. They make beautiful boats here and we were lucky enough to see one in the process. To finish up on the island we had conch fritters - very delicious :)

Till next time, Cheers Mike and Kim

Union Island

Hello all, and hello to Mary who works with Kim's sister Linda at the City of Reno. We met her yesterday on the phone call to Linda that we made using Skype. We can call from our boat (because we have free wireless connection in the bay were in) and it only costs $.02 a minute. It is a very slow connection so if you get a call from us, be patient and listen as there is a delayed reaction

So the adventure continues in Union Island in the Grenadines, we anchored at Frigate Island, just around the corner from the main town of Clifton. We were able to dinghy over there passing through a reef and going on the inside. We explored the island a bit, but mainly provisioned here for our visit to Petit St. Vincent and Petit Martinique. At Frigate Island construction started on a large development, including a 300-berth marina. the company went bankrupt, and the the project stopped. now the mainland is connected to Frigate Island, and there are unfinished docks throughout the bay. It's really a shame, we think the bay was probably very beautiful at one time. It seems that abandoned, bankrupt projects are common in the Caribbean and the sites are just left to rot.

We got our vegetables from a lady in Union. She had a recipe for everything and we finally found out how to eat Passion fruit.....you don't....you take the seeds out, mash it with some milk or water, add some sugar and then discard the seeds. We we told her we ate the seeds, she laughed, shook her head and said not good. We also got directions on how to better prepare soursop, cook the Caribbean pumpkin, plaintains and lots more. Some of the people we meet are just great.


We found the local hotsauce to be very spicy...and as the name implies..its some very potent stuff!! After provisioning in Clifton we headed out the Petite St. Vincent to check it out and meet up with Second Wind and Unplugged. Cheers Mike and Kim

Grenadines

Hello all, were are currently in Union to provision and catch up on internet stuff. We will check out of the Grenadines here and head down south in a few days. We will first stop at Petit St. Vincent, which is a little island with a resort on resort on it. They have bungalos that are completely private. If you want anything you just raise a flag and the staff sees it and comes running. We had looked at this place when we were landlubbers as a place to vacation - but at $500 a night, we went on a cruise instead. We will be able to at least walk on the island now.

We stayed in Bequia for about 7 days,it was a very nice island. We did some hiking over this very steep road and ended up on the other side of the island. We hiked down to Hope Cove a completely deserted beach....very cool. Unfortunately all the pictures we took came out blurry but we put a few in. There was a little house behind all the palm trees and we think it was inhabited so we didn't check it out. It was the windward side of the island so the surf was rough with a lot of undertow so we couldn't go swimming, but it looked like someone had tried to surf it --- once. We hiked back up to the road around lunch time and found this restaurant called Hope Estate. It was actually someones house and they but in a bar and some tables on the patio - parking area. No one was there, so we yelled out and a lady came out of the house. She said she usually cooks by reservation since she makes everything from scratch - but she would be happy to cook for us if we didn't mind the wait...of course we didn't mind waiting, give us a Hairoun (the local beer) and we'll talk to your parrots. Very good lunch, the owner Kathleen Ollivierre also made hot sauce,and other things and sold them to the local markets. She said people usually come in before they hike to the beach, order lunch and then she has it ready when they get back...well- we just like to do things backwards.

We also visited Moonhole. It is a very isolated community, founded by the late American architect, Tom Johnson and is not easily accessible by either land or sea, there is no road and no good anchorage. You have to call the owners to bring you in. They do tours, but we just brought the dinghy in for a look and didn't go ashore. The original house was built under a natural arch known as "Moonhole." It was abandoned when a huge boulder fell from the ceiling and crushed the empty bed. The other houses grow out of the rocks without straight lines or right angles. They have huge arches, fantastic views and great patios. There is rarely glass in the windows and the breeze is constant - and no electricty. People use them as vacation homes.

From Bequia we sailed to the Tobago Cays. The Cays are a national park. They are a group of very small islands surrounded by Horsehoe Reef. There is Petit Rameau, Petit Bateau, Baradel and Jamesby - and we explored every inch of them. The Iguanas on the island are huge, we saw a few of them, but didn't get a picture of the really big one, this is a smaller one. The huge one we saw actually looked like a dinasaur. There is also an Island outside the reef, Petit Tabac. When you anchor behind the reef you have a great view of the Atlantic Ocean, the seas do not get to you because of the reef, but you do get some winds. For us that was good, because our wind generator was constantly going creating energy for us. The reef was beautiful every place we snorkled was gorgeous. We saw lots of fish and one shark, it was about 5' long and we think it was reef shark. The boat boys in the Cays were not too bad, there were lots of them but they know the regular cruisers don't have a lot of money to spend so they don't bug you with the tourist stuff they go straight for the charters. But they do have necessary things like bread, fish, ice - so you stay out there longer. It was probably the most beautiful place we have seen so far, however, it was very crowded with charter boats, so after about seven days we headed for Mayreau. This is a very small island and also part of the Cays, but again we got boxed in by charters, literally, and left the next morning. The achorage in Mayreu was connected to the other side of the island by about 50 feet of sand, the beach on the other side was GREAT - it went on forever and we had a nice walk.

We had asked one of the local guys in the Cays where there was an anchorage with fewer boats, and he told us Chatham Bay on Union Island - so we headed to Chatham Bay, when we saw the anchorage we just sighed with relief, one boat and a huge bay and beach...heaven. We hiked up the mountain and had some beautiful views. The path on the way up was filled with goats, cows and bulls. On the otherside of the island is Bloody Bay, were the French and English had a major battle. The beach on that bay, had one house made of stone, the path to get down was washed out though and we couldn't get down to see it. We asked the local guy on the beach "Shark Attack" about it and he said they were selling it for $4 million US or you could rent it. So if your interested contact "Shark Attack" in Chatham Bay and he can hook you up - he also does beach barbeques for the yachties. There was also another guy on the beach, who was a squatter who had just started building a little beach restaurant. Very nice man from a town across the island. There are not roads that lead down to Chatham Bay, just a path about a mile long, so he either had to walk from his home town (a 2 hour walk he said) or he'd get a ride from a water taxi if he could. He would bring his lumber in by water taxi. The only visitors there are yachties so we didn't think he'd get much business, but he said an Italian guy was building a hotel down the beach, right in front of where we were anchored. There goes another perfectly good deserted beach. We saw the guys clearing the land for the hotel, everyday we were there we watched them put some twigs and branches on a fire - and after two hours they were gone - hard days work. I think it might be awhile before the hotel comes to be built.



We sailed around the corner from Chatham Bay to Frigate Island, where we are currently. Construction started on a large development, including a 300-berth marina. The company went bankrupt, and the project stopped. So Frigate Island is not an island anymore, but a peninsula with ruins of an almost built marina, its very sad. I think is was once very beautiful here, with a reef protected what was once an open bay. But it is very enjoyable here, and still very pretty. We went to the town close by, Ashton, and it was very cute, clean and nice people. One guy started asking us to buy him a drink or some food, and another guy started yelling at him, telling him to leave us alone, and he did, very small community. We spoke with a local women in a little grocery store who said she had just come back from New York and Canada and couldn't stand the cold - you had to wear too many clothes she said. We said - yep - we prefer less clothes too - and no shoes :)) We dinghied over to Clifton, the main town yesterday to catch up on some email. The ride was about a mile long, but we finally figured out how to get through the coral reef, so it made it much less rough than the open ocean. We are heading back there today to buy some groceries, update the web, and then we'll head south again.

We are making plans to head to Venezuela with another group of people that we met. They have three boats in their group and invited us to join them in a flotilla from Grenada to Bahia Redondo in Venezuela. They are the ones who recommended the Marina we will staying at, they will be there as well. We are very glad to have other boats to go with, as they say pirates sometimes prey on yachts from Los Testigos to the mainland, if you are alone. They do not usually bother you if you are in a group. That's all for now, hope you all are doing well and we will update again when we can.

Cheers Mike, Kim and Ka'imi