A wet, windy and wild passage

Clearing out from Grenada (in Hillsborough, Carriacou) our plan was to head to Union Island, a short trip across with the whole day to do it.

As we left the relative comfort of the anchorage and headed west of Jack a Dan (a large rock jutting out of the water, home to pelicans), we immediately caught the wind. Unlike Grenada, Carriacou was very windy on the leeward side that morning. We had already put in 2 reefs prior to leaving and with the wind gusting 30 knots we brought in the jib as well. A difficult sail, we continued to beat up the coast until we cleared the north headland. As we started our crossing to Union Island, not only did we have the gusts to contend with but also the swells. By this point I am starting to feel ill so gladly helmed to keep focused as we pummelled the waves. As Dylan went down below to check that nothing was flying around in the saloon, another gust took us and we broached. Having never broached before I was terrified. Clutching onto the wheel I squealed as the boat heels right over and the steering becomes too tough to fight against, wind loud in my ears, I see Dylan's startled face from below. Ever the protector, Dylan starts to sing a silly song, diverting the attention away from the situation. Stubborn mule that I am, although petrified I continued to fight the wheel until after what seems like an age, our rudder pops back in the water and we continue sailing as if nothing happened. In hindsight the whole scenario lasted a couple of seconds but it was enough for me to hand the helm over to Dylan and disappear below to study the charts instead!! During that ordeal the boat made a 'twang', when Dylan went on deck to investigate further he found that the starboard aft stay had completely sheared from the deck and was swinging in the wind. A bungee cord and several twines later we secure it to the other stay and start to discuss our next steps.

Shaken from the experience I proposed we head for the nearest anchorage and survey the damage, wanting to quickly get out of the wind and swell. We were nearest to Union Island but to get into the anchorage would have involved numerous tacks and we didn't fancy worsening the situation! Managing to demast 3 weeks into our adventure was not a story I wanted to tell our grandkids in years to come. Why not use the engine? We are hardly like the Pardys but with the large swell running and 30 knot wind right on the nose we were doing almost 2000 revs, reaching almost 180 degrees and only going 1.8 knots! Petit St Vincent although a little further away could be reached on a port tack, was an easy anchorage to access and required little engine use so that was a winner! Of course we hadn't been there before so we were just trusting my navigational skills and our newly acquired seamanship. Luckily the trust we put in ourselves paid off and we sailed a further 4 nm with no problems and dropped anchor with plenty of daylight left (feeling quite chuffed with ourselves for overcoming our first dilemma at sea!).

After a stiff rum and coke (always fruit juice for me as Grenadians don't seem to stock diet anything!) we investigated the severed chain plate and found it was heavily corroded and the last load it had endured when we broached just tipped it over the edge shearing the plate. We plugged up the hole to make it water tight and started to relax, surveying our surroundings.

Petit St Vincent (PSV) is the most beautiful place I have been to, to date. It is exactly what you think of when you picture the Caribbean. A very small private island, it is surrounded by bright blue waters and white coral sand with no inhabitants other than the hotel guests and when we arrived...no charterers!! The island is a resort for the rich and famous where one goes for utter seclusion, staying in stone cottages with a flagpole that needs to be raised if you wish to have room service. With privacy in mind, as yachties we are unable to explore the island but we are free to walk on the beach as long as we are discreet with hotel guests. On one walk we found a hoard of black coral that had been washed ashore which we quickly put in our bags, keen to make the most of this find as normally you need to dive between 300 and 3000 ft to get it!

Looking over the side of Orion we could see 6 metres down to a whole family of conch. Keen to capture our own conch, prepare and cook it we went on our first snorkel which in itself was a daunting experience. According to our Garmin, the current was running at 1.5 knots which made jumping in the water a little scary, unsure whether we would be swept out to sea! Thankfully we could swim against it and started to dive seeing puffer fish, lion fish, arrow crab and a huge starfish. Finding the biggest conch in the area for our dinner we brought him onboard to start the dinner preparation. Dylan was appointed chief preparer whilst I volunteered to be the photographer. We started by knocking a hole in the shell between the 2^nd and 3^rd ridge and to loosen the claw, this allowed us to pull him out of his shell. Next step was to remove his stomach, eyes, snout and skin. Finding a conch basher in the galley, Dylan then began pounding the meat until translucent. We wanted to be able to taste the flavour so we just dipped the prepared conch in breadcrumbs and fried it. Although a lot of effort to catch and prepare the conch, he tasted lovely – like a non rubbery version of calamari. Shall definitely be helping ourselves to more of those off the ocean floor!

After a weekend near this paradise island, we figured it was time to face the music and get our rigging fixed. The wind had been gusting up to 36 knots but on Sunday they were a casual 25 so we made a dash for it. The islands further up the chain would become more remote with very little technical yacht services so we made the decision to backtrack and sail back to Carriacou. Not what we really wanted to do as our plan was to work our way North but as we are quickly realising, all plans need to remain fluid!

A couple of hours of motoring but this time with the swells, we surfed our way into Hillsborough, Carriacou. Unfortunately the swells only got worst and we spent the night feeling like we were on a ride in Alton Towers!! 8am comes and we make our way back to customs and immigration that we had only left some 4 days earlier. A little perplexed to see us back so soon and having no country stamps in our passport to account for the last 4 days (PSV is part of St Vincent so we never cleared in) we turned on the charm and got welcomed back into Grenada.

A further 2 hours of motoring and we arrived back in Tyrell Bay. Having read Doyle's cruising guide he states that there is a great French guy here that specialises in stainless steel fabrication, now all we need to do is hunt down his trimaraft workshop!

You have nothing to fear...

but fear itself...

And never has this been more true. There were a lot of things that I was very anxious about when I first convinced Sally to come sailing.

Sure I had sailed a boat before, I had taken watches and manned the helm on a few night passages while both racing and for pleasure. I had crewed countless times on racers and cruisers, with friends family and competitive skippers. What I had never done before, was everything else...sailing is the easy part!

I had never owned a boat before. Short of a Day Skipper course to teach some of the basics around mooring, anchoring, navigation and seamanship, all of this was new to me.

I had a list of 'things that made me anxious', that I tried really hard to research in order to become more confident with knowledge (theory) prior to actually doing them. These included, anchoring in a crowded bay (how to pick the right spot, how to set an anchor, how not to drag, how not to look like a novice / idiot doing it), clearing in and out of a port (what documents are required and what is the process?), yacht maintenance (what anti-fouling to use, when to use a primer, engine basics), etc.

Our first 'dropping of the anchor', I made sure we had a experienced friend with us to help guide us and ensure we did not arrive in some one else's lap later that evening when the wind picked up.

We had to anchor a number of times since then just Sally and I. I must admit we are getting pretty good at it. I guide us in while Sally does her bit on the bow. I still have yet to convince Sal to dive on the anchor and bed it in, she much prefers to sit on the bow and offer guidance. As it turns out, anchoring is not a big deal after you have done it a few times and we are no longer daunted by it.

However we had never cleared in or out of customs before. We dressed up, yachtie style – meaning I wore shoes, socks, longs and a button up shirt...I wouldn't usually, way too hot. Nerves were on edge...do we in fact have the right paperwork and documents...what is the procedure...who do we see first?

Earlier that week friends had shown us where we had to go and who to see first. We strolled in acting like pro's. “Hi, We would like to clear out” I said to the immigration officer. To which he responded. “Coom bak 1pm, cus we is on lunch at 12.”. I looked at the clock...it was 11:45.

We took the paperwork with us and filled it out over a nice fruit smoothie. Sure we had to wait an hour (and a bit) but hey, we are in the Caribbean. Everything runs on GMT here we are told. “Grenada Maybe Time”. So one of the biggest lessons we learnt was patience.

Sure, in fact we did not have all the right paperwork as we did not have a form to clear us in. The previous owner had it. But... as with all things in the Caribbean, nothing is insurmountable and they waved us through after we explained we had just bought the boat. (We did show our Bill of Sale to prove it).

In short, the documents you will need to clear out appear to be...

1. Passports for you and your crew
2. Previous document clearing you in / out of your previous port

As for your ships registration, it will probably be required when we check in some where (but it was not required to clear out).

The process is probably going to be different in each port, but all in all by asking a few people, they will be able to tell you what to do.

Clearing out (and in) is no longer as daunting as it used to be.

Anchoring and more to the point dragging, is still a bit of a concern. When a big gust comes through I tend to shoot up to the cockpit and eyeball all the other yachts to check that we are not dragging and they are not dragging into our pride and joy! The night likes to play little tricks with the mind though. Shapes always appear closer at night and swinging around in the dark leads one to think that you are moving towards other shapes. However, I left the Nav Instruments on the other day during a good blow to see what we peaked at. 36 knots! While probably not a massive blow by some standards, it is not what we were expecting in the “calm” Caribbean. I anxiously sat in the cockpit for 30 minutes listening to the wind, watching the swing and the other boats. I ran all the scenarios. If we drag, then I will wake Sally and we will up anchor and get out of the anchorage and re-anchor somewhere or hove to just out side the bay. If they drag, I will try get their attention. Dinghy over and bang on their hull or something. (note to self: get a fog horn).

Needless to say, our little 35lbs CQR held us firm. I dived on the anchor the next day and we had not dragged a foot. Our regime of: anchor, leave it for 10 minutes to settle, put the snubber on, reverse on it at 2000 revs for 20 seconds and then dive on it and bed it in even further, seems to be paying off.

As a note, chain does you no good sitting in a chain locker...as a result, we pay out all our chain regardless of the depth of water. As I write this we are in 20ft of water and I have 140ft of chain out. As I have mentioned before, about 40 feet of chain is not even touching the bottom due to the arc of the chain. This extends to 50 / 60 ft when a solid gust pulls the snubber out the water at what looks like parallel to the sea bed. If I lived by the 5:1 ratio, sometimes as little as 40ft of chain would be on the sea bed. I have 150ft on board and wish I had 300...

I had my best sleep the other night. I only woke up 3 times to check our situation (using two of those as opportunities to have a covert pee over the side while it was still night).

The more we live on board at anchor, the more we are relaxing. We trust the holding power of our bedded-in anchor and confident about the terrain we are anchored in. Sure we have manually moved an anchor just so I could bed it in sand (as opposed to weeds) but hey, I needed the exercise and the lung training.

All in all, clearing out was not a big deal. We look forward to clearing in and seeing how that process works. Off to Union Island to find that out!

Carriacou and the Iguanas

Carriacou and the Iguanas

After a sleepless night at a rolly St George we upped anchor at 7am and made for Carriacou.

The previous night we had done a passage plan, ensuring that we were both comfortable with the trip, a total of 34 nautical miles. Leaving first thing in the morning gave us the privilege of sailing with no other boats around; you could smell and see Grenada waking up. The cockerels were squawking and smoke was coming from the hills as the locals fired up their stoves.

The reason for noticing such detail was that we were hardly moving. With typically no wind early mornings in Grenada, Dylan was sulking as we motored in the lee of the island unable to put up any sails and doing between 2 to 4 knots. The engine ruining the ambience of the setting.

After 3 hours having just passed Gouyave, we finally found the wind and boy did it blow!! By then other yachts and cats were beside us and they headed inshore close to the island. Not Dylan, as the skipper he opted to head offshore to get the sails up, beating into the wind and battling the swells. Having got over the initial fear of the toe rails in the water, I started to relax and enjoy the sail – Dylan was beaming away happily at the helm whilst I clung to the bimini.

As we cleared Grenada and started the open passage towards Carriacou, the swells subsided and we started to relax at the helm. Just as well as constantly checking wind direction and sailing straight into it is tiring work! Sailing along, wind in our hair (well mine at least) we spotted lots of flying fish and even a turtle popped up to say hello.

As I took the helm, Dylan went down below to check the bilges and found that that the engine water pump was leaking, having filled our bilge. As the wind dropped off again, we had no choice but to turn on the engine again and it was my job to keep my head in the bilge clearing it every so often and that may be why at that point I came up into the cockpit looking slightly green....and proceeded to feed the fish over the side. Reluctant to turn on the engine, when we had Tyrell Bay (the anchorage) in sight, we started to tack trying to hold off pushing the starter button (turns out it was just a broken seal). We hear a drumming sound and Dylan panics thinking something else is wrong below...turns out 7 miles offshore we were hearing the carnival celebrations!!

7 tacks later, we made it into the bay and found a nice sandy /slightly weedy spot to drop anchor at 5pm. As we approached our spot we were almost deafened with the sound of reggae music. I reckoned it was a dodgy looking party boat so we moved away from them and realised the music wasn't any quieter. With the sun starting to go down, Dylan quickly grabbed his snorkelling equipment and dived on the anchor, ending up manually re-bedding it so we could get a decent's night sleep without worrying. Meanwhile I was on the lookout for the hooligans playing unsociably loud music. As we looked around the bay, we saw many boats we had got friendly with in Grenada; our neighbours were Patrick and Miriam off Skye so we jumped in and swam over to say hello. These guys filled us in on the source of the music. Unknowingly we had arrived for the start of carnival which was starting on the Sunday and continuing to Tuesday...that night the music didn't finish until 3am.

Carriacou is a quaint place. A small (ish) island where most of the locals rely on fishing and the occasional yachtie to make ends meet. As we awake the next morning, we go into the cockpit and hear a 'skip skip'. As we look over the side, there is a traditional fishing boat with a a guy pedalling his wares. This time he was flogging lobster, mangrove oysters and wine. We politely declined as I remembered Donald Street mentioned the oysters have been traced back to the source of a hepatitis outbreak in 2000.

Keen to get involved in the local festivities, we headed ashore with Patrick and Miriam off Skye and Jim, Stephen and Deanna off My Deere. Fastening our dinghy to the main jetty, we caught a bus into Hillsborough (the capital), 21 people rammed into a 16 seater in addition to 3 kids on laps. We arrived at 3pm when we thought the festival was starting...and ended up spending 3 hours milling around or sitting on the pavement waiting for the locals to get things moving. We should have learnt by now, add at least 2 hours to any start time and we may be closer to island time!

The Carriacouan ladies wore traditional carnival dress, glitzy skimpy bikinis with fabulous headresses, of all shapes and sizes and covered in glitter. As the music got going, the ladies jumped onto a truck carrying massive speakers and started shaking their booty. A line of ladies followed all in groups dressed in the same colours as well as men at the end dressed in multi coloured smocks and head dresses. The music was addictive and you couldn't help but dance along with them at the side of the road. We found a lovely little smoothie shack on the beach where you can sit on their pastel coloured stools and watch the ocean whilst sipping on a soursop smoothie. Gabriel the owner was very friendly and we promised him we would come back for some more.

At around 8pm, the carnival died down so we caught a bus back to Tyrell Bay with Marcy and Keith who had got to Carriacou that day and joined us at the festivities.

Although we didn't see it (as it commences at 5am!) I must mention the Shakespeare Mas. It is tradition every year for locals from Carriacou to dress up in costume and recite lines to each other from his plays. If the local gets the lines wrong, they hit each other with a stick and start jousting!! Sounds a 'hoot' as Dylan would say, but unfortunately the kick off time put us off. So we were in our beds fast asleep when at 5am...the music starts blasting marking the start of this tradition...we might as well have been in the action rather than trying to ram our ear plugs further down our ear canals to block out the commotion!!

The next day we went wandering the town and came across a huge iguana. Having not seen them before in the wild, I was amazed to find this green monster staring back at me and kicked myself for not bringing my camera. As we continued walking down the beach, we stopped to buy fresh fruit from a multi coloured shack and came across some locals cooking iguana! Just getting over my surprise at seeing these things in the wild, I was horrified to see these pretty animals in a state of rigormortis over a barrel, about to be BBQ'ed. Apparently they are a local delicacy and we were invited back to try them once ready...needless to say we didn't make a return trip but I did take photos to show my friends and family back home.

The snorkelling round Tyrell Bay is quite good and a short dinghy ride away we found a great reef teaming with wildlife. A big ray was chilling out on the bottom and the reef walls had a whole community of crayfish. Having heard the tales of his Dad pulling these out by hand, Dylan tried to entice these creatures out of their hidey holes and ended up holding a broken off antennae. We had lentil curry that night...

Having spent 3 days anchored here, we decided to set sail for Union Island via Hillsborough to clear out of Grenada. Our first contact with Customs and Immigration and a topic close to Dylan's heart so I shall leave it to him to fill you in on the next chapter of our story!

Our first Sail...

was AMAZING!

We had our instruments installed, we now knew how deep we were. Time to test everything out.
We went out in about 10 - 15 knots of breeze to have a proper sail.

It was a "trip to nowhere", an out and back experience. A Texan friend of our (Myles) came with us as he is currently waiting for his boat to be repaired in the nearby yard.

We left late in the afternoon as we had some chores to do in the AM. We raised anchor, sailed out past Twizzle (a 183 ft super yacht owned by what must be a very wealthy family).

We raised the main. Thanks to the Antal Cars and the size of the sail, it could be pulled up by hand and then only needed tensioning with the winch.

Out came the headsail next. The centre board was lowered and away we went. As I was busy at the mast prepping the sails, Sally was at the helm. We both found her very well balanced and easy to steer.

She should handle a wind vane very well if this is any indication of things to come. Engine off, a nice reach, full sails. Man, it was nice to be on the water again.
It felt so long since we sat in near silence only to hear the swish of water under the hull.

As we turned in towards Prickly Bay, the sun starting to set on the horizon, I gave a thought to how nice it would be to just stay out there and sail through the night. There is something terrific about sailing at night sitting on watch, thinking, philosophising. This is the boat to do that on!

Our maiden voyage

13:00 – Orion is bursting at the seams with provisions we had bought the previous day. Tins, rice, pasta, coke, rum, treats etc – all stowed away in our copious amounts of storage space in the saloon. We prepare her for sail by taking the mainsail cover off, stowing all loose items in lockers, doing the engine checks, closing the sea cocks, turning on the new navigation instruments. By this time Dylan is like an excitable puppy, anxious to get away and start our maiden voyage. We had done a test sail the previous day but that was with another friend Myles. We had yet to sail just the two of us on a boat...ever. I seem to have fallen into the role of anchor lady, great responsibility as I get to choose the location whilst Dylan follows my hand signals. Not so great when the anchor chain fouls and I have a minor panic thinking we are about to be pushed onto the rocks!! We pull up our anchor and head for the marina.

13:15 – We radio ahead to Prickly Bay marina office and inform them that we want to come in to refuel and get water. Heading over to the fuel dock in Prickly Bay, Dylan steered us through the marked channel, turned us around and brought us alongside. I chuck the bow and stern lines onto the dock for the guy to catch and secure. Killing the engine we breathe a sigh of relief whilst our hearts start to go back to their normal speed. At the dock we are met by Keith and David, part of two sailing couples, they reward us with 2 beers for making it and present us with a bottle of rum for our maiden voyage. All water tanks, fuel, gasoline and jerry cans full, we slip the lines and head off to Grand Anse where we are planning on anchoring for the night.

15:00 – After sailing for well over an hour we have already slipped into a routine. I helm whilst Dylan sees to the mainsail and gib on the foredeck and then Dylan helms whilst I do the navigation. Always wanting to know where we are on the map I happily slip into this role, calling out the course to steer and keeping track of our path on the GPS. The sailing conditions are great, no clouds in the sky, 10-15 knots of wind and a slight swell. We reach our maximum speed so far of 8.8 knots as Dylan continues to tweak the sails, eager to make Orion happy and easier for me to helm. We round Point Saline looking out for the shallow shoals and head for a place to anchor for the night.

16:00 – We spot a place between a German catamaran and a Canadian yacht that doesn't look too rolly and is a decent depth for us to anchor. Sun still strong in the sky for now but we are keen to drop the pick whilst we still have daylight hours to play with. We anchor first time and I send Dylan over the side with his snorkelling gear to check the anchor. Turns out the bottom is coral which really isn't the best but as we plan on leaving at sun rise and there is little wind, we figure it will do.

17:30 – Rum and coke all round as we sit in the cockpit and prepare to watch the sun go down. Chris Doyle's cruising guide to hand (thanks Gem and Dave) we start to plot our course for tomorrow where we intend to leave Grenada and head up to Carriacou on the west coast, avoiding Kick Em Jenny which is an active volcano – should make things interesting and put my day skipper navigation to the test!!

The 'Hash'

Dylan and our new friend Myles convinced me that Saturday afternoon's were best spent doing a hash. I had no inclining what this was other than it was a form of exercise and people seemed to love it. Not one to miss out on these opportunities I found myself on the bus, destination Westerhall Rum Factory with my hiking shoes in tow.

When arriving at the factory, Dylan and I were ushered into the 'virgins' group. This team was set up for all the new people to hashing. I still didn't really have a clue what I was getting myself into and listened in anticipation whilst the main guy explained how to follow a paper trail with such commands as 'are you?' and 'on on'. Slightly clueless we decided that we were going to laugh off the running trail and stick with the walkers.

We started up the hill with around a hundred other people, all dressed in red to mark valentines day. There were people of all shapes and sizes ranging from the American student energizer bunny with chihuahua accessory to an obese local lady with a kid strapped to her back. We kept up the pace and continued to look out for the mounds of shredded paper. The trail took us up and down steep inclines and at one point had no choice but to slide down on our bums. We crossed a river with no stepping stones as an aid, I admit that I fell in once and have the bruises now to show for it! Whilst we were progressing with the walker's trail, at times the runners would cross our path, a slight rustle of leaves and a runner would come careering down beside you, knocking you out of the way with no prior signal. Certainly made for an interesting river crossing!

The hash gave us a great opportunity to network with other foreigners and gave us a glimpse of the Grenadian countryside, far away from the tourist spots and cruise ship passengers. The end of the trail was marked with a big drinks hut, stocked to the brim with beers and local rum. They say that 'hashers' are drinkers with a running problem. I tend to agree after seeing the drinking games enforced on certain individuals after the hash in front of all participants. Us 'virgins' had to go and hug each other whilst getting sprayed with beer and then a certificate presented to each of us for 'loosing our virginity'.

A fantastic day out but don't think I will be doing it again, I value my ankles too much!!

Grenada Independence Day

Somewhat delayed post as Independence Day was on 7^th February. Internet signal out in the bay is getting more and more unpredictable with the average log in time of 30 minutes.

We anchored on the Monday and the next day we left the boat for the first time to go and see the independence day celebrations. As we motored away from Orion, we made a mental note of where she was, hoping that we would come back to find her in the same place and not dragged onto another boat!

The bus left Prickly Bay at 2pm and most of the yachties had made an effort, dressing in the colours of Grenada. There were funny hats, multi coloured t shirts, shorts, flags. Dylan and I clearly didn't get the memo as I rocked up in a blue dress and dylan in his grey shirt.

From the bay we headed for the stadium where we were in for a couple of hours of local entertainment before we headed off to watch a pan band. As we approached the stadium, hundreds of locals were swarming into the stands, each one dressed in red, green and yellow. There were stalls set up by the side of the road selling everything from corn on the cob to overproof rum. We were ushered into a reserved area with a prime viewing spot of the stage and proceeded to stare at the same space for an hour with nothing happening. The event as well as the locals were on island time and we appeared to be extremely early. After what seemed an eternity a big guy with a thick gold chain around his neck (Nuish – proper stair grinder) was introduced to us as the minister of tourism. He was treated like a celebrity and after a big applause he welcomed us to the island and thanked us for contributing to their GDP (of which 25% is tourism). He seemed to have been brought all the way into the stands for our benefit and after some hand shaking in the front row he was ushered away. How bizarre, I have no idea who the minister of tourism is in the UK and even if I did, he certainly wouldn't be treated as a celebrity!

The next 2 hours were spent watching paint dry....I mean observing the army, navy, brownies, guides and cadets marching up and down the field. Very talented to all keep in time but after a couple of hours of it, Dylan and I were falling asleep having not slept much the previous night for fear we were drifting off our anchor (we didn't).

Just as we were about to be leaving, the fun started. Ten members of the parachute regiment jumped from a plane and started floating towards the ground aiming to land on a marked square patch of grass in the centre of the stadium – none of them were successful. Just as they jumped, the wind picked up and it started to pour with rain bringing visibility to almost zero. The guys started hitting the ground, sending the swarms of army and naval regiments running for cover. No casualties luckily but one guy did severely overshoot the mark and ended up in the stands (photo below).

Fun over we were shooed back into the bus and chaperoned to St Pauls where we found ourselves in a deserted basketball court. No words of explanation, a group of around 30 cruisers stood around, scratching our heads, looking for some signs of life whilst the torrential rain continued. We eventually were greeted by a guy who was the community centre warden. Dylan (ever the South African) asked on behalf of the group whether there were beers for us whilst we were waiting for the pan band to start up. Cheers of encouragement forced the warden to pick a lock so we were presented with a few crates of Carib and rum punch to keep us quiet.

After a further 2 hours 'liming' – a popular island past time, the pan band started playing and we were entertained with fantastic traditional Caribbean music as well as learning about the history of the drums. For food we were served the dish of Grenada – oil down. Complete with breadfruit, salted pork, tons of saffron and callaloo, its and amazing dish that can only really be made on a big scale.

We eventually got taken home around 11pm (way past cruiser's midnight) but not before I was followed by a local guy wanting to do some 'sexy dancing'. Dylan, ever the opportunist, encouraged this guy to taunt me but I was having none of it. I didn't really fancy such intrusion into my personal space!

Lights went out at midnight with the ring of the pan drums still in our ears.