Our Six Months in Grenada - End of June 2011

Friday, June 24, 2011
The heat zaps us.  Arising this morning, I looked at our weather indicator.  Temp at 5:45 AM was 84 and the humidity on this clear day was already at 79.  No wonder we stay wet, sweaty.  Our mantra has become - If we don’t do in before 10 AM, it doesn’t get done til after 6:30 PM.  The price of electricity is high, $1.45 cents a KW hour) so we don’t keep the A/C on for the most part.  We do, however, chill the master stateroom in the evening in order to get a good night’s sleep. 

Wax candle INSIDE the boat melted down!

Entrance to Port Louis Marina from the land side

We’ve wandered about a bit this week, but still saving all our real  sight seeing for when Chase, Andy’s grandson, arrives next week.


One of the places I went was to finally take the time to explore the Port Louis Marina - a lovely place. 

Lush greenery everywhere, with colorful buildings all about.

Salt water pool - so refreshing!!

The swimming pool is lovely & overlooks the harbor.

Lots of nice boats abound

Get a load of this BIG one!

Bar/Restaurant near the pool

The outdoor restaurant

Water, water every where

We’re meeting other boaters and beginning to settle in.  Around this area are several other smaller marinas as well as a number of anchorages full of cruisers hunkered down during the hurricane season.

Catching a bus  with a group from this marina, we went to  burger night with a live band at Clark’s Court Bay Marina - fun time.

Saturday we’ve headed to a beach BBQ thrown together by a group of cruisers so we should meet lots more boaters then. 


 Boat chores and the never ending TO DO list consume some of our time.  Andy worked and worked, finally unable to find the leak coming from our hot water heater.  Giving up, we called for the local experts who, after spending a great deal of time getting the thing OUT of the boat, found a crack in the welding spewing out the water.   Andy had them add a shut off value for the cold water going into that hot water heater -- a just in case preventive measure if we ever need it.    Yeah, I know, it’s a boat.  Again, I would expect a weld to last longer than 3 years..................I wish there were a way to hold people accountable for their quality control, or rather, lack thereof. 

Helm Chair showing distress

As to boat repairs, our very expensive Pompanette helm chairs are fraying up on the fly bridge...again, only in real use for 3 years.  Guess what, seems whoever order the helm chairs ordered INTERIOR chairs for the EXTERIOR, according to Pompanette.  They aren’t meant to be outside - although ours are protected at all times by the bimini and curtains -- guess it doesn’t matter.  The manufacturer, Pompanette, will work with us, selling us replacement cushions at their cost -- still about $1,500.  Makes me furious.

The OTHER helm chair

We are still working slowly to get the boat waxed - again, always an early AM job.  We ran out of wax and the stores are out of it too until the next shipment comes in...this coming week.  Ah, life on any island is so dependent on ship deliveries!  Shopping in the grocery store late yesterday afternoon we could find nearly nothing we needed...empty shelves.  Back this morning, full up...the ship came in!  Gotta find a food boat schedule so I can be first in line for the really fresh stuff or start hike up to the local market more often.

Lots of local kids swimming off this dock ahead

 We walked part of Grand Anse Beach yesterday, touted as the prettiest beach in all of Grenada and it was very nice, with pretty tan sand and gentle waves rolling in the aqua water.

The locals are all friendly everywhere we go. always saying Hello and more.  Wandering about, we decided we can dink into here from the Marina, dropping our dingy anchor off shore to swim around.  That will be so much easier than hiking 3 miles and/or catching the local bus!

Local welcoming us, insisting we take a picture!

 The marina grounds are beautiful, full of trees and color.  The 'coa kee coa kee 'sound of the tree frogs lug me to sleep each night and the roosters on the mainland wake me up at dawn every day.

Favorite times on the boat are in the early AM with my coffee, listening to the world wake up.  In the evening, with the cooler breeze blowing and those tree frogs making a racket, sipping a glass of wine as the sun goes down. 

Watching a seagull eat a fish off our aft deck!

He ate the WHOLE thing!!