BACK TO GRENADA

At 7am we pull up anchor and set for Grenada.  When I get up Rick and Alessandra are readying the boat to sail. There's no word about breakfast and I am thankful for coconut bread I bought on Mayreau as I set about making tea, a cold drink, and buttering a couple of slices of the bread.

There's a rainbow in the sky as we leave the harbour. It is sunny with clouds. I have to wear a light shirt as my back is sore with sunburn.

When we sail past Kick'em Jenny, Rick suddenly realizes that we are in the no-sail zone.  Eeek.

Off Grenada we hit a storm and I am ordered below. It's raining very hard and the wind is really strong, blowing the sails all over. Lines are whipping about as well. It's not fun. After what feels like an hour, we get through that and eventually head in to Port Louis Marina.

Rick has been asked to video a local girl singing at a club there tonight and he has agreed in exchange for moorage at the marina. There's a pool there and I am looking forward to that, especially because there is no breeze at all in the sheltered port and it is stinking hot and particularly stifling below deck. It will be hard to sleep tonight. What I wouldn't give for some air-conditioning right now! I am teeming sweat.

It's almost 4pm and we haven't eaten today, other than what I made for breakfast, and I decide I am going to make a meal for the three of us. I use lots of the vegetables we bought and have barely touched, chicken breast, and cook up some rice and make us a huge stir fry. It is absolutely delicious and Rick certainly seems to enjoy it. I honestly don't know how these two survive on the slim pickings that have been our meals. We never do use the fish we bought and not even half the bag of chicken. At one point I asked Rick about the bar-b-que he has on the rail, wondering if we could use it to cook up some burgers if I bought some ground beef. He didn't want to use it, citing it needing a new grill or more propane or something or other. I was dying for a burger (I rarely eat red meat) at that point and was very disappointed. As this will most likely be my only charter cruise, the whole meal situation has been quite the let down.

I am super frustrated because an adapter I recently purchased for my iPhone 4 enabling me to use the iPad cord, thus needing to pack only one cord for charging both, has broken. I bought it very cheaply online direct from China. It's a piece of garbage now and it leaves me without a way to charge my iPhone and for some reason I can't get online with my iPad.

The swim in the marina pool is very refreshing and I float about for over an hour waiting for Rick and Alessandra to join me... they were supposed to be right behind me. They eventually show up, just as I am thinking about getting out because my fingers are prunes. I stay a bit longer then leave to use the showers at the marina to clean up... what a treat and they are so much nicer than I expect!

Rick and I head over to YOLO, the bar at the marina, toting lots of video equipment. And it is air-conditioned!! Oh wow, does it ever feel amazing. What a relief!

We get a drink each and then Rick sets up the equipment. There are a few people in the club and I get to talking to a fellow beside me. Turns out he is the captain of a big luxury yacht in the marina called GO. We first saw the boat when we left Port Louis on our way to the Grenadines. We also saw them everywhere we went up there and we were so surprised to see them behind us when we pulled into Port Louis today - basically they had the exact same itinerary we had. He is a really nice guy from Texas and he shows me some photos on his iPhone of the interior of the yacht. It's gorgeous.

Tammy Baldeo arrives with her accompanist, a fantastic guitar player, and we get busy filming them. I take the camera on sticks and Rick works the steadi cam. The singing is really good, especially seeing this is one of her first public appearances, and I very much enjoy the evening.

While we were there the Prime Minister and Governor General of Grenada show up with a retinue including a female uniformed guard, red braid and all. They sit outside on the patio and have a meal and then leave without coming inside to hear the music. Rather exciting, regardless.

TO THE TOBAGO CAYS - OTHERWISE KNOWN AS PARADISE FOUND

I wake up at 3:30am with something banging about in a rolly sea.  Sounds like it is something stowed just ahead of me in between the wall of my cabin and the hull.  I don't sleep much after that. Later when I mention it to Rick, he thinks it might be something in my medicine cabinet and, sure enough,  the culprit is a can of hairspray that fell over.

I make myself toast and jam with some grapes for breakfast.

Rick has pretty much completed the video and set it to music that someone on the island wrote. It has lyrics and is actually quite good. He wants us girls to add a line at the end so we record that and then he finishes it up. It has turned out great.

Rick's video for Grenada Tourism

We head back into Clifton at about 10am. Rick forgot to check us in yesterday. Ooops. I also want to buy and mail some postcards. I buy 10 and sit down at a picnic table next to one of the fruit stand huts and write them all out while sipping on a frosty Ting. I am so grateful for the shade as it is easily 100 degrees out. Before I leave, I buy some fruit and vegetables from the lovely lady who owns the stand, as a thank you for letting me sit there for so long.

 Postcards all done

Buying tomatoes and mangoes 
from the lovely lady who owns the stand

I head back over to the little shop down the main street where I bought the postcards and stamps, to mail them in her cute little mailbox.

Mailing the postcards, hoping they will get to their destinations

this year.  Turns out most got there a week or so after I got home.

We dinghy back to the boat and have a lunch of salad. We pull up anchor and head off to the Tobago Cays at 1:15pm.  So excited!

It doesn't take long to get there, we can see them from where we were anchored. They are GORGEOUS. Not what I pictured at all but I love it here. We drop anchor close to an island and we all jump in off of the transom and swim to the beach.

I swam from here to there, and back in beautiful clear, warm water

When we get back to the boat, we hop in the dinghy and go explore. We saw 3 turtles pop their heads up out of the water! Tomorrow we will snorkel in the protected area where they all live.

Off in the distance is Petit Tabac, the island in Pirates of the Caribbean where Jack Sparrow is on the island alone with Kiera Knightly and she has set all of the rum on fire and he asks "why is all the rum gone?"  We will go see it tomorrow and I am so excited about that although, truth be told, I am excited and pretty overwhelmed by all of this. It is so so beautiful here and is the paradise I dream of all the time. The sky is blue with puffy white clouds on the horizon, the air is warm, the water is too, and is so clear and that amazing Caribbean blue, there are palm trees everywhere, white soft sand, beautiful dark skinned people on every island... my heart and soul and mind are full to overflowing. I have read so much about the Cays and longed with every atom in my body to be able to see them someday. I actually get choked up and try to hold back my tears when Rick asks me on the way back to the boat if I am enjoying it. "Enjoying" doesn't even touch how I am feeling.

 A huge pile of ancient conch shells - I will show this to customs in 

Canada if I find a nice one to bring home and they refuse to 

let me in with it because they're endangered or some such stupid reason

A gorgeous deserted beach, one of many around here

Our boat, Sophisticated Lady, silhouetted in the setting sun

Another gorgeous sunset

When we get back to the boat, Alessandra and I sit on the side of the boat with our feet hanging off into the void and talk about the English language (she is Italian) and about reading for an hour or two. It's an interesting conversation and really the first one we've had. It ends up being pretty much the last one we have as well. She isn't very social and spends pretty much all day either sleeping or on her iPhone texting.

She makes chicken for dinner and it ends up being super salty. She added salt without tasting. Rick gives her a hard time about it, in a joking way, and she won't eat hers. I eat mine because I am so hungry, while she protests the whole time that I should toss it out.

After dinner I am in the usual place, the cockpit, reading. I fall asleep and it is all quiet aboard when I move into my cabin at 9:30.