Week Two

Approaching St George's

Kool Kat's helm

St George's harbour

St George's Carenage

This will be a lot shorter than my previous posts :) Before our guests arrived, we wanted to have a quick trip around to St George's, the capital of Grenada, to fill up with fuel, see how KK handled and to try the anchorage. So we upped anchor and motored out through Prickly Bay, around the bottom of Grenada and up the coast. We just got out of Prickly Bay and spotted a large turtle which promptly took a dive. Mal played around with the Chart Plotter and the auto pilot and KK handled beautifully so we had a great trip. No sailing yet.

We approached the Grenada Yacht Club to refuel and a small dinghy was already at the wharf looking to fill some gerry cans. The husband had gone looking for someone to assist and his wife looked on ominously as we approached; David and Goliath. We held back a little but she waved us in and quickly hopped out of the dinghy, moved it out of the way and then proceeded to help us with tying up. Debbie and Dan on Ladyhawk are from Delaware and they were absolutely delightful.

Mal talking to Jnr Kofi

Stunning passionfruit

All fueled up we then motored out of the harbour to find a good anchorage. The first attempt saw the anchor drag so we moved in closer to shore, about 15' of water, and this time the anchor set beautifully. Mal does the anchor and I do the helm which seems to work well. We took Kitty into shore and did some food shopping. We hadn't been back long when Junior Kofi pulled up alongside selling fruit. We bought pawpaw, tangerines, a couple of mangoes, which unfortunately are at the end of their season, and a dozen or so passionfruit. I was a bit worried as the outside of the passionfruit was very unfamiliar to me but I needn't have worried, the taste was fabulous.

L-R Hope and Wendy

Chicken Roti overlooking harbour

We returned to Prickly Bay and the next morning I was invited by two American cruisers, Wendy from Merengue and Hope from Starshine, to join them in a girls' day out; lunch and shopping in St George's. Sounds good to me so off we went by bus for a day's shopping and a chicken roti on the Carenage. The girls showed me all the little places they go to and we toured a few local art galleries. Good day out!

Giselle and others

Cordial and cake

Saturday morning I went with Hope and some other cruisers to a private home in the hills of Grenada to participate in the Mt Airy Reading program. This program is run by volunteers and offers extra tuition and practice in reading, writing and maths for young Grenadians, mainly aged from 6-14. We start off holding hands in a very large circle and say The Lord's Prayer. Unfortunately, we had a few cruisers cancel through sickness so there were less volunteers than is required. This meant I had eight children to work with when the norm is four but we managed. We break into our groups and each student takes a turn at reading out loud and I check their comprehension, assist the poorer students and generally provide an audience for them to practice. Following reading we play games; some wanted to play scrabble and others didn't. For those who didn't I set them challenges with their times tables. They were really good at that so I had to pull out all stops and test their long division; that was really stretching my memory! Following this everyone, about 40 students, gather to take turns at reading a story out loud. Then one of the volunteers reads the whole story out loud. Then we celebrated birthdays, medal winners from the recent sports day and sang a song. Then a final prayer holding hands again and it's time for cordial and cake. I'm exhausted but it's been fun :)

Back in the bus and we're off home. Mal and I spend the afternoon relaxing and then we're off to collect Jo and Bob Almond from the airport. Our next post may be a "guest" post!

Until next time, love to everyone, Sue & Mal xx