Clifton Union, Attitude adjustment for Gaby and Willy, Jan 24-25th

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Gaby and Willy had not been having much fun due to all the wind.   Apparently, this was a first “sailing” date Gaby had been on, and she was “stuck” on the boat for three weeks.  They had picked up their boat in Trinadad and motor sailed 22 hours of heavy winds and waves to Grenada!  I can’t even imagine if that was my first taste of “sailing”, I might have went straight to the airport when we got to Grenada.

Tuesday morning we encouraged them to sail over to Union Island about one hour away and anchor at Clifton.   We were convinced her attitude would soften with it’s lovely island setting and  charming local ways.    We did not see them for a while after we arrived and hooked up to moorings, but when I saw Gaby the next time, she threw kisses to me saying that this was paradise.  Glad we could help their date!

 

Our mooring that looked out to the reef and had a busy surf-kite activity.  Tried to download some of the video of the surfers!

The Happy Island Bar.  Built on the reef out of conch shells and then mortar!

We usually were the ONLY customers at the Happy Island Bar!

Ken and I spent Tuesday and Wednesday relaxing, snorkeling and visiting  The Happy Island Bar.  Ken and I took advantage of the Yacht clubs great internet  before we set off to the Island of Mustique.   Before we left, Gaby and Willy arranged to have a beach BBQ, complete with lobster.    Their local cook was Martin who did all the shopping, cooking and cleaning.  We only had to bring our dishes and glassware (and wine).   It was really lovely and a nice change from restaurants and/or eating on the boat.  Lobster taste so good outside!

Ken, Willy and Gaby (behind) at “our” beach lobster BBQ

 

Our host, Martin, complete with lobster, potatoes, salad, and Island dogs for cleanup afterward.

 

 

Martin, washing our dishes!

One of the “local” dogs that had very good manners.   Did not care much for our left over rice!  Pick-y!

 

 

 

Carriacou, Petite Martinique and Petite St. Vincent (PSV)

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Saturday Evening, January 21, 2012

I think I had 2 rum and cokes sucked down when  at 6:30, we finally laid anchor in the bay which was at this time full of charter catamarans and cruisers.   Salty, wet and exhausted,  we showered in the boat, had dinner and set the anchor alarm on.   It was very windy and by 1:30 the alarm went off to tell us that we were not holding.  It had not moved much so we reset the alarm and went back to bed.  I decided to sleep on the settee and at 2:30 the alarm went off again.  I went up to take a look and realized that we were about 5 feet from the boat in back of us.  I encouraged Ken to get up, we started the motor and pulled up the drifting anchor.   With foredeck light on and us trying not to awake our neighbors at such a late hour, we reset the anchor and tried again.  This time it held, and at 9:30 Sunday morning we left to motor to Petite Martinique.

Sunday’s ride to Petite Martinique

Again, straight into the wind and weather was still  rainy.   What looked to be a short sail or motor around the tip of Carriacou and over to Petite Martinique actually took about 2 hours  and when we arrived in the small harbor, I called the local beach restaurant (Palm Beach Restaurant)to see if we could use their mooring.   We had read that if you eat at their restaurant, you could pick up one of their two mooring balls. They answered my call,  but said they were closed for Sunday, but yes we could use the big orange mooring!  Sweet!

Got our first line on the moorings plastic loop after a bit of trial and error (the wind was NOT helping), and then decided to put a second line on the moorings rope loop as a back up.  (with all the wind through the night, we discovered one  line had actually been cut by the sharp plastic of the mooring’s decapitated loop)   We were only held by the second (after thought) line!  We now put two lines on every mooring as a rule.

Petite Martinique Fuel dock

Monday,  after a trip to the beach for breakfast (at Palm Beach Restaurant), we decided that we would get a water taxi and go to Petite St. Vincent for drinks and maybe a light meal.   While we had been on the Petite Martinique, we met another boating couple (Gaby and Willy) at the beach restaurant and asked if they were interested in going also.

As it turned out, they had to move their mooring and in doing so, Gaby dropped their only boat hook in the water and could not get hooked up.   They called over to us and asked if we could help with our dingy.   We set out to motor to their boat, but soon realized we would be soaked from the wind and waves and decided to seek help from a local fishing boat that was moored behind us.   Our instantly new local friends, Calvin and Howard,  jumped into their beautifully painted  wooden boat that was tied up next to their larger fishing boat, and went off to help Gaby and Willi.  Despite the wind and the waves, the “boys” soon had them on their new mooring.  Calvin and Howard then came back to pick us up as we had also asked them to take us to PSV as a water taxi.  While motoring past Gaby and Willie’s new mooring, we asked if they would like to jump on board and go with us. They quickly agreed ( I think Gaby just needed to get on land and was happy to come with us!).  After the 5  minute motor to the PSV dock at the resort, we arranged for a 8PM pickup to get back to our boats.  (We paid them 120 EC to thank them for all their taxi help even though they did not ask for anything)

Petite St. Vincent dingy dock

PSV’s Resort Bar open to the public

Lobster heading to the grill

View of Petite Martinique from PSV

PSV is a private island with a very lovely resort located on the West side.   Most of the Island is off limits to the public and held exclusively for the guests of the resort.   This is where we saw the two
LARGE yachts anchored off with rumor of Kate and Prince William.   No sighting, but did see a helicopter  fly over and land on one of  the yachts.   (Bryce Berndt says the yacht on the left is called “Eclipse” and at 536 ft,  is the largest privately owned yacht in the world)  .  We had a lovely time enjoying several cocktails and appetizers while watching the sun set before getting ready for our pickup.

 

Sunset reflected off our glass table on PSV.

Grenada, Gordy & Anna, and the second 1/2 of Ken’s 60th!

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Coming into St. George Harbor, Grenada

We  set sail at 9:30 and headed out for our 7 hour sail to Grenada.  15-20 kt winds at 130 degrees.  Reefed main and furled jib.    Gordy and Anna Kopke were  scheduled to be in Grenada to surprise Ken for his birthday and I kept it a secret as long as I could but Ken likes to make his own plans and when he decided we should stop somewhere else, I had to break the silence of why we HAD to get to Grenada (St. George).  Coming into Port Louis, we got a temporary tieup until the marina staff could find our slip we could have with our 110 shore power.

Ken and I walked to the bar to wait for this, and of course, Gordy and Anna were there!  Perfect.  Ken was so pleased to have them come and surprise him for his 60th!   We had a great time for the next 2 days before Anna and Gordy had to make their connections out of Grenada.   Our other mission for going to St. George was to check out the  boatyards where we would keep Grateful Red
during the hurricain season so Thursday, we took the local bus to check out one Ken had picked out.    We ate at “de big fish” there and after Ken’s filling out some paperwork, took the bus back to
the marina.

Friday we walked to St. George downtown to check out the local market and found a  great small bar “The North Pole”, had some beer and bought some Lambi (conch) soup to take home for later.

North Pole Bar

Found the bus station and caught the #1 local bus back to the marina in time for some good pool time!

Buses are unique and why they are not all bashed up, we will never know!

Lovely, double rainbow…can you see it?

In the evening, we took a taxi to a recommended restaurant down a road that should have been condemned, but making it to La Luna, we had a cocktail there (almost the cost of a  dinner!) and then walked to the neighboring restaurant “the Beachfront” and had some great starters for our meal.   Our taxi road home was different and well paved from the Beachfront and we were happy about  that.

Saturday,  January 21, Gordy and Anna left the boat to catch their taxi ride to the airport around 5:45.  It was such a fun, relaxing time with them and it was too bad our wind and time would not allow a sail for them.  Next time!    Ken and I worked on getting the boat ready to leave by filling water tanks, last showers, and final food purchases.    Our trip north was dead into the wind and
mid-way up the west coast of Grenada a storm blew in and we were soon crashing through the waves and quite wet.   Our jib came unfurled at the top and it took about one hour to finally pull it
down.   Later we realized a halyard was crossed up on top of the forestay which would not allow us to pull-out the sail and get the unfurled back in place.  I had to be in front, (riding the bucking horse) and try to pull the sail down and tie it on the deck.  I was NOT fun!