Sweet Caroline Location as of Jan 9, 2010. Click on the link below for their exact location.
We put the 18hp dinghy engine on the boat and pulled the anchor 10/29/09 at 0630 cleaning the chain of barnacles as we were raising it. We have been here in Trinidad for three months and the growth was definitely heavy. After the anchor was up we headed for the Trinidad, Tobago, Sailing Association (TTSA) dock so we could clean the top of the boat and fill the tanks with water. After getting those chores done we hopped a maxi taxi (local bus) and headed for the last time to customs in Chaguaramas to clear out of the country. Everything went without a hitch for once and we boarded a bus back to TTSA where we had our final lunch at the marina restaurant. We said goodbye’s to all our boater friends and departed for Grenada 1630 headed through the Boca channel between the islands. Carol was busy on the cell phone trying to use up the minutes left on the Trinidad cell phone since we probably weren’t coming back here. The seas when we got through the Boca were 5’-6’ and winds from the east 7-10 knots. We again turned off the navigation lights when we got near the Hibiscus gas rig because of the local Venezuelan pirates that like to hang out in the vicinity. We had an uneventful trip with the weather and seas cooperating for once. We arrived outside St. Georges, Grenada 20 hours later. Both John & Carol were exhausted when they arrived and crashed after the anchor was set.
After a 10 hour sleep we got up and had coffee and left to clear customs which cost us $24.63 US dollars. They are still concerned about the H1N1 flu here with several cases being reported since we were here last. After clearing customs we went over to the grocery store down the street and picked up a nice looking steak for grilling later. I still don’t understand how they can sell US steak here cheaper that we can buy it back in Florida.
John filled his days doing odd jobs that needed being done on the boat. At Thanksgiving they had two different American Thanksgiving dinners at two different marinas with a total count of 100+ people. John was in hog heaven eating turkey, dressing, potatoes, gravy & cranberries. For desert they had about six different kinds of pies. John looks forward to this meal every year with anticipation and it’s one of our highlights of the year. It was good to visit with our fellow boaters again.
We spent the days between Thanksgiving and Christmas hanging off the hook outside St. Georges, Grenada in clear blue green water. It doesn’t get any better than this. The temperature averages around 85 to 86 degrees this time of year. It was a treat to see clear water after being in Trinidad for three months where all you saw was a haze of oil lying on top of the water. It is so nice just to hop off the boat and have a swim. The only time you sweat here these days is walking around town and then the water runs off you. We like hanging around here in St. Georges because we are near town, grocery stores, free WiFi on the boat and marine chandleries. Every morning we look out of our floating house and we see cruise ship after cruise ship come in here. Most days there are three different ones in here. They come from all over – Germany, Italy and everywhere else. We even had the Queen Mary II come in here twice which is supposed to be the largest cruise ship in the world They usually come in here in the morning and leave at dusk the same day. I sure don’t know where they get all their passengers. It seems someone still has money to spend. We are planning on staying here in Grenada through the holidays and then head north to Carriacou to get the boat hauled out and the bottom painted. We plan on going to the Christmas day dinner at one of the marinas and most of the boaters will be there. We also are spending the next day which is the English Boxing Day at another marina for dinner with most of the boaters again attending. It’s a treat for Carol because then she doesn’t have to cook but then again we don’t have all the leftovers. We will miss our family and friends back home over the holidays and will be thinking of everyone. This will be our last article for the year 2009 and we wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline
Carol hopped the big white metal bird in the sky and came back to Florida 9-20-09 for three weeks. Actually her main objective was to bring back more boat parts that John had ordered and were sitting at one of our son’s houses. Can you think of any other reason John would let her go back! Before Carol departed she scavenged three suitcases, two check-in suitcases and one carry on from local boaters and friends to fill and take home some items not needed off the boat. She carried on the ham radio in a small hard rolling suitcase with wheels which she was going to get checked out in Orlando when she was there. Both in Trinidad when she left going through security and in Miami she had to take the ham radio out so they could hand scan it. When she got to customs in Miami she whizzed through and they didn’t open any of her bags. John stayed behind and worked on the chain plates which were a major undertaking but one that had to be done. The chain plates hold the shrouds to the boat which holds the mast up. He had to get back in the “Brain Surgeon” mode; design; metal cut; holes drilled; round the ends and polish. To get at the chain plates he had to tear apart half the boat which was another reason for Carol to leave the boat. He had a master German machinist Klaus build the replacements.
While Carol was in Florida she attended the local United States Power & Sail Squadron meeting and gave a little talk about the trip and some of problems that have happened along the way. While there she visited back and forth between both sons’s (John & Steve) and got to see all the grandchildren which are all growing up fast. Also while there her daughter, Renee and Grandson Michael whom she hadn’t seen in about three years came down from Alabama for a few days visit. Grandson Michael while there bowed a 300 game (perfect score) on the WII (interactive game played over the TV).
The three weeks went by fast and now it was time to pack and leave to go back to the sailboat in Trinidad. To get back into Trinidad she had to make a list of every boat part, noting the description, manufacture number and manufacture price. On the boxes she had to mark “Parts for Boat in Transit”. She got through security in Florida and didn’t have to pay any extra fees even though one suitcase weighed in at fifty three pounds. When she arrived in Trinidad and went through Immigration she was told she needed some letter from Immigration that she was suppose to get before she ever left Trinidad. After about 45 minutes they decided to let her in the country and gave her two days to report to the Immigration Office in Chaguaramas. Luck was on her side again when she went through customs for they never opened up any suitcases and just waived her through. She gave a great sign of relief for she was dreading unloading all the suitcases and then have to repack again. As she came out she John waiting for her in the airport waiting area. He had rented a car for two days and it sure looked like it came from “Rent a Wreck” for everything looked like it was falling apart. When he had picked up the car it had no gas and had to stop at the boat and get some dinghy fuel to put in. After five hours, due to a broken water pipe on the only road that goes through Port of Spain and out to Chaguaramas, we finally made it back to the boat and it was too late that day to go to Immigration. The next day when she went to the Immigration Office in Chaguaramas they again gave her a big hassle. It seemed they don’t want any yachties in their county. You almost wished you could just go back to your boat and leave. We spent the next few days putting away parts, etc. and “Brain Surgeon” was now in high gear to finish the last two chain plates.
A week later some Trini friend’s, Joy & David, picked us up for a trip to the Caroni Swamp where we were to see the snowy egrets and scarlet ibis which is the Trinidad & Tobago national bird. When we got there we boarded a 30 ft. open wood boat and went through a maze of mangroves and along the way we saw four boa constrictor snakes in the trees overhead. What a scary site to see them coiled up in the branches and it’s a good thing they didn’t decide to drop down into our boat because I’m sure everyone would have screamed? We found a place in the mangroves to await the birds to come and nest across from us in one of the mangrove bushes. We saw herons, egrets and ibis birds which were the three predominant among the swamps 150 bird species. The snowy egrets were brilliant as was the scarlet Ibis flying in this one mangrove bush and the scarlet ibis glowed fluorescent red in the final rays of the evening sun. We were told later in the year more birds come and the mangroves bushes glow red with the beautiful scarlet ibis. On the way back from the swamp we were sideswiped by a car carrying three black locals who got behind us and kept blinking their lights for us to pull over. We were on a major six lane expressway headed back to Port of Spain and there was no way we were going to stop as it was already dark out. They kept trying to run us off the road and changing lanes when we did. They finally got ahead of us and cut us off blocking our path because cars were coming fast in the other two lanes. It’s a wonder we didn’t get rear ended from the back. A big black local got out and started walking back to our car shouting that the accident was our fault. We were in our lane when we were hit and it was the other car that came over into our lane. It got a little scary for a minute and our adrenalin was really pumping but we then saw a cop car blinking his lights coming up fast behind us. The other car took off real fast when he saw the cops and I really think we were being set up for a car robbery. The cops took off after the car and that was the last we saw of either of them. We did get the license number off the car and David was going to report it the next day at the police station. . When we got back to our boat we looked at the side of the car where we got hit and the damaged was minimal. We decided that was enough excitement for one day.
We are now back again working full blast to get the boat ready for our target date of departure from Trinidad, Wednesday 10-28-09 and head north to Grenada providing we had cooperating sea and fair winds. Our visa expires from Trinidad 10-31-09 and we didn’t want to get an extension even if we could.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline
Just received a SPOT from the Satellite Messenger indicating that Sweet Caroline is back in Grenada. Click on the link below for their exact location.
The day after we arrived back from Tobago, Catherine Tardieu picked us up for some more island touring. She took us down to the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Independence Square and also the Rosary Catholic Church on Henry Street all in Port of Spain. For the looks of things I don’t think it would have been safe if John & I came there by ourselves. Some of the areas we traveled through didn’t look all that safe. We were glad we were with someone who knew where to go. We then went up to Mount St. Benedict Church and Monastery in Tunapuna, which sits on 240 hectares ( 600 acres) at the top of a hill overlooking south and central Trinidad and offers spectacular views. The Monastery is home to 20 aging monks. When we reached the top of the mountain we met her mother, Maggie, who had prepared us a Trinidadian picnic lunch. She made Pe-lau, (pronounced either pi low, pe low), a spicy Caribbean meat and rice dish and contained rice, pigeon peas, beef and chicken. She also made three drinks; Fruit Punch (the best I have tasted); Ginger Beer (not alcoholic), grated fresh ginger, sugar, a small amount of baker’s yeast, and (optionally) lemon juice and is bottled in a 2 liter bottle. It is sealed at room temperature for a day or two before refrigerating; its other distinctive properties include its traditional cloudy appearance, its predominantly citrus sour taste base and its spicy ginger bite which we didn’t care for; Mauby, which is widely consumed in the Caribbean and made with sugar and the bark from a tree of the Buckthorn family. This drink has an acquired taste and a word of warning to first-time Mauby drinkers, “it can cause a laxative initial reaction”. I guess it was a good thing I didn’t drink much because I really didn’t like it. So much for new Trinidadian drinks for I think I will stick to things I know in the future.
The next couple weeks were spent on boat projects with John finishing putting up the new Kiss Wind Generator, whereas he had to get help from another boater to help put the unit in place. Now he is tackling the job of replacing the chain plate’s one on either side at a time. As of this article he has two replaced and working on two more with four after that to go.
After a couple of weeks we received a phone call from the Knaggs our newly found friends from Trinidad that they were going to pick us up on Friday the 11th of September and take us to see their home in Blanchisseuse, (pronounced Blon-she-suhze). It is derived from the French word for launderer – taken from the village women who washed their clothes in the nearby Marianne River. Blanchisseuse is on the north coast of Trinidad and we were once again traveling on the hilly, winding road along the coast towards Maracas Bay. From Maracas Bay the road narrows and the beautiful craggy coastline is dotted with weekend homes and can seem romantic or harsh, depending on your mood. The North Coast Road climbs over the mountains of the Northern Range, through a forest of tall trees, ferns and bamboo while hugging the Caribbean coastline. We finally arrived at another of their beautiful homes, a 4 bedroom with a pool, high on a hill overlooking the ocean. They had a plaque on the gate that read “La Bella Vita”, meaning “The Good Life”. After having a tour and a few drinks we continued on the North Coast Road until we came to their fishing village and went down to the quay to watch the fishermen unload their catches of the day. Each fishing boat is relieved of its motor and this was carried up on the shoulder of one of the natives. We saw him carrying up the steep incline a 40hp engine and then a 48hp engine with little or no effort and this was in the heat of the afternoon. Of course he was a lot younger than us! Each boat was then lifted out of the water by about 10-12 men and placed on the quay for tomorrow’s fishing expedition. All in all there were about thirty, 24’ fishing boats there. David purchased some King fish and they were cleaned on the spot and cut into steaks for grilling later. We returned to their house and walked down the steps to the beach and walked out in the ocean around the rock outcropping to the other beach next door. Once through the rocks it was all sand and easy going. We later swam in the surf but didn’t venture out too far as we had seen red flags flying when we past Maracas Bay Beach earlier that morning and I’m sure this was for rip currents.
Trinidadians have their own language, one of the most fascinating languages on earth. A few Trini (Trinidadian) words we have heard and have stuck in our lingo. We are called yachties here, not boaters or cruisers and Limin’ is hanging out, loafing or the art of doing nothing. I’m sure we will pick up more before we leave here after the hurricane season.
Today sitting here at the marina restaurant working on my articles, Charmaine who works here brought me over a “starch mangos” to try. This didn’t look like any mangos I have ever seen. It was yellow with spots on it and I was told to peel it like a banana and have my head over a dish or sink because it’s really juicy. According to her they have thirty seven different kinds of mangos
Carol is now getting ready for her trip back to Florida the 20th of September for three weeks and will visit with friends and family. John has ordered all kinds of “boat stuff” for her to bring back again this year and they are all taking up space at our son Steve’s house in Melbourne.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline.
We are now back in boat fix it mode for awhile. Our wind generator quit putting out amps so it was time to purchase a new one. What is the saying “A boat is a hole in the water that you pour money into”. John, “Brain Surgeon” tried everything imaginable to try and get it to work but no luck. John & I took off walking to where they manufacture the Kiss Generator here in Trinidad which was about a mile away. We talked to the owner and negotiated a good price we thought, but it was still expensive. John was going to have to rebuild the pole to accommodate the new generator for the poles were different sizes. Of course nothing is easy. John also was off to see about the new stainless for our chain plates which I’m sure wasn’t going to be cheap either.
After a few days in the work mode, John reminded me that one of our friends from the United States Power & Sail Squadron, Gervase Bushe, was born and raised here in Trinidad and to send him an e-mail that we were here. While we were awaiting a reply we got a message on our web page that Catherine Tardieu, a Trinidadian lived here in Trinidad and wanted us to get in contact with her. Her friend lives across the street in Palm Bay, Florida, from EZ Way Storage where John used to work part time. I sent her an e-mail and got a call the next day that she would be stopping by to get acquainted. While she was here we set up a date for next week to do some touring around. In the meantime we also received a reply from our friend Gervase with a list of cousins and friends with their phone numbers to call. We finally got through to his best friend’s wife, Joy Knaggs and she called back later they would be picking us up next week also for some touring around Trinidad.
Wednesday of the next week David & Joy Knaggs picked us up and took us on a tour around the Savannahs area in Port of Spain. We stopped for lunch at the Apsara-Indian Restaurant and had a combination of chicken, shrimp, lamb, vegetables and bread they call “Naan Bread”. Apsara is the only authentic Indian Restaurant in Trinidad & Tobago specializing in mainly northern Indian cuisine. After lunch we went up Lady Chancellor Road which is a very winding road up a mountain and when we got to the top we got a great view of Port of Spain and the surrounding area down below. We also saw the Hilton Trinidad and this is a unique architecturally designs called the “upside down hotel”, (sometimes a Jeopardy question on TV). During the day they invited us to their home on Tobago so we stopped at a travel agency to see if we could get some tickets on the fast ferry that goes there. We were in luck and got some for the coming Sunday at a cost of $33.34 US for both of us round trip. We didn’t expect them to be so inexpensive and are really looking forward to our trip there.
The next day Catherine Tardieu picked us up and first she took us to the Chaguaramas Military History & Aviation Museum which is 12,000 sq. ft. and covers over 500 years of history – along with military vehicles, vessels, artillery and aircraft. We were surprised at the size of this museum because it didn’t look that big from the road. We were then off to lunch which was on a street they call the avenue where we saw beautiful murals painted on the walls along the street. Immediately to the west of Queen’s Park in the Savannahs we saw the Magnificent Seven which between the years 1903-1909, which were truly great years for Trinidad and their magnificent expression, seven beautiful buildings situated on land of the former St. Clair sugar estate. They were truly outstanding mansions of a type never seen before in Trinidad. They are known today as “The Magnificent Seven”. 1) 1904 Queens Royal College – Boys High School – built in an Italianate style and features a grand clock tower; 2) Hayes Court (Anglican Bishops Residence – named after Bishop J. Thomas Hayes; 3) Mille Fleurs – was once a private mansion with impressive iron fretwork and also known as Prada’s House, is now owned by the state; 4) Roomer - a private residence – built in the French Baroque style, was once known as the Ambard Building; 5) Roman Catholic Archbishop’s residence; 6) Whitehall – The Prime Minister government office - opulent Moorish-style mansion; 7) Stollmeyer Castle – built to resemble a Scottish Castle with turrets, and named after the family who built this miniature Rhine castle and now is owned by the government. We then went over to the Botanical Gardens which was on the northern end of the Savannah and saw both the Presidents house and the Prime Minister’s.
The rest of the week went by fast with John doing some boat work and Carol catching up on laundry, work on articles and pictures.
Sunday 8/23/09 loomed rainy and dreary. We took a Maxi Taxi (cheap bus) to the end of the bus line where the ferry dock was located right across the street. For whatever reason, we had to be there two hours before departure. Our ferry was a sleek looking ship that traveled at 50mph and had four engines for a total of 40,000 hp. Even with this speed it took us 2 ½ hours to get to Tobago.
Tobago lies just 20 miles off the northeast coast of Trinidad and has an area of 116 sq. miles and is a typical tranquil Caribbean island with white sandy beaches and clear, turquoise water. When Columbus sighted the island it was occupied by Caribs and he named the island Bella Forma. Today its present name is a corruption of tobacco, a crop which the native Caribs grew. Initially the island was isolated from and unknown to Europeans for many decades until 1632 when Dutch merchants established a colony there. In 1791, over 90 percent of Tobago’s 15,000 residents were African slaves, most of who worked on the many sugar plantations island wide. For the next 200 years, Tobago changed hands 33 times among the Spanish, Dutch, English and French, all of them rival colonists. The island was finally ceded to Britain in 1814 by the Treaty of Paris. On April 6, 1889, Tobago was annexed administratively to Trinidad - on the insistence of the British Government and in an effort to secure more financial stability for Tobago, the island became a ward of the colony of Trinidad. Primarily due to the decline of sugar production in Tobago, the finances of the two islands were then merged and managed under an all-white legislative council of members sent from Britain. Today with a population of 46,000 nestled in 15 valleys around the coastline, this island is the perfect demonstration of how man can live in harmony with nature. Tobago’s central hilly range, the main highland ridge, forms much of the island’s topography and is the home of the magnificent rain forest – the oldest protected nature reserve in the Western Hemisphere. Although Tobago lies to the south of the hurricane belt, it was nevertheless struck by Hurricane Flora on 9/30/1963 and severely changed the face of Tobago’s economy. The hurricane laid waste to the plantations of banana, coconut and cacao, which largely sustained the economy. It wreaked considerable damage to the largely pristine tropical rainforest that makes up a large proportion of the interior of the northern half of the island. Subsequently, many of the plantations were abandoned, and the economy changed direction away from cash crop agriculture toward tourism. In 2004 Hurricane Ivan, although less severe than Flora, also caused significant damage. I was also told this island was the place for the filming location of the Walt Disney movie The Swiss Family Robinson.
When we arrived in Scarborough, the capital of Tobago, David Knaggs and his daughter Lorraine picked us up. They have a lovely 3 bedroom pool home in Bucoo, Tobago with a lovely 180˚ view of the ocean. The next day we went out for lunch at a little restaurant called “Shore Things Café & Crafts”, which had very good food. After lunch it was back to their house for a nice swim and limin’ (hanging out, or the art of doing nothing) for the rest of the day. The following day we drove up to Fort King George overlooking Scarborough Harbor. David then took us on a little island tour around part of the island. After our tour we went down to the ocean and did some snorkeling and swimming off a small reef. The days flew by in a flurry and it was time again to head back to Trinidad on the ferry. What a great island to visit if you get a chance.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline.
We decided that it probably wasn’t too safe to stay in Granada since they had two hurricanes two years in a row, Ivan 2004 and Emily 2005. They hadn’t had one before Ivan for 50 years. Since we had decided not to go to Venezuela we decided to go to Trinidad instead. We got the boat ready with the 18 dinghy engine up on the deck, left at 1300 on Thursday 7/30/09 with two other sailboats. The trip started out with seas 4’-5’ with the jib and mainsail up doing 4-5 knots, sometimes doing 6+ knots. When it got dark we never turned on our navigation lights and also didn’t’ speak on the VHF radio and beforehand had picked channel 19 to use to talk between the two other boats if necessary. We were told to do this because when we came by the gas rigs there could be pirates hanging around. When we got 2/3 of the way to Trinidad we saw the gas rig Hibiscus. It was huge and awesome to view it from about 2 miles east of it. Around 0100 it started to blow and rain and that continued most of the night. It was a horrible crossing with water coming over both sides again. It sure wasn’t what the forecast had predicted. At daybreak we were about 10 miles out and had to slow down so we didn’t get in the Boca de Monos channel until after 0800, otherwise we would have to pay overtime charges. We had lost our traveling companions during the night but we saw one already there when we got to the customs dock. The other sailboat had gone way west and arrived later that morning.
Trinidad is 7 miles NE of the coast of Venezuela. Trinidad and Tobago gained independence from Great Britain 8/31/1962. It became a republic on 8/1/1976. Head of State is the President and Executive power is vested in the Prime Minister and Government following democratic elections every 5 years. Currency is Trinidad & Tobago (TT) dollars and 6TT = $1 US dollar. The language here is English. Trinidad is in the outer edge of the path of the hurricanes and tropical storms. It has 1,864 sq miles in area, 50 miles by 45 miles and approximately the same as Rhode Island in the US. Trinidad as recently as 18,000 years ago used to be linked to Venezuela and part of South America. Trinidad’s first inhabitants – the Caribs named the island “Lere” (pronounced “ayirie”) meaning land of the hummingbird. Today 16 different species of the brilliantly hued creatures inhabit the island. It is also an island which includes rain forests and swamps with monkeys, parrots, macaws, manatees and giant leatherback turtles. Wildlife also includes poisonous snakes such as the fer-de-lance, bushmaster & coral. Its people invented steel pan (a byproduct of the oil industries discarded oil drums), calypso and whose Carnival is considered the best in the world.
During World War II the US established major naval & air bases in Chaguaramas, Trinidad. 30,000 Americans used to live here. Chaguaramas is now part of a national park which includes tropical rainforest, lush valleys and is home to monkeys & parrots. Chaguaramus Bay is in hilly country and supports large numbers of pelicans, corbeaus (vultures) & frigate birds, which ride the thermals like dark kites.
A few years ago yachts rarely visited Trinidad and felt Tobago was to far east to visit. About 12 years ago Don Stollmeyer the manager of a boat yard called Power Boats invested in a used 50 ton travel boat lift and now the industry of yacht services has grown to a thriving industry with over a hundred businesses and thousands of people. A handful of boat yards formed YSAT in 1994 and is a nonprofit organization, is the watchdog, the helping hand and voice of the industry. It wears many hats including contractor referrals, problem resolutions, custom & immigration, tourism information and marketing, government liaison, events, compliments & complaints, environment, moorings in Chaguaramas Bay, water taxi & Caribbean Marine Assistance.
When we finally got to the customs dock in Chaguaramas it was around 0830. Custom & Immigration was pretty straightforward and the cost was $9 US. It was really weird when we got our money changed we were walking around with $100 bills. We thought we were rich for once. When we left the customs dock one of our fenders got caught on the pilling and the attachment line broke. As we were getting it in we noticed that one of the chain plates came out and looked like it was rusted through. I guess the stress of the fender pulling on the opposite shroud made it come loose. One thing good about it happening the way it did at the dock and not while we had the sails up during the horrendous night last night. It could have been a disaster with maybe the mast coming down. We continued on our way around the hill to the other side to a place called TTSA (Trinidad, Tobago Sailing Association) which is considered in Harts Cut. TTSA is the home of yacht racing December through May and has races on a regular basis. When we got anchored we both crashed till the next morning. We sent out e-mails to everyone that we were here and got one back from our son Steve that he was coming for a visit on Monday. It was a mad dash to get the boat in shape for our first guest since we left the states. We had no idea where to go or what to see while he was here. On Monday we checked with the marina to see where we picked up a bus (called maxi taxies here) to take us to the airport. We found out the maxi taxies (yellow & white stripped) stopped right out front. We rode the bus to the end of the line where we walked one block to another terminal which had red & white stripped maxi taxies going south. We were dropped off about a mile from the airport and were told to hail a taxi because they didn’t go into the airport. I guess the information we had received was all wrong which isn’t unusual as we have found out. Our son arrived 30 minutes ahead of time and we were glad to see him. He rented a car and we were off doing a little sightseeing through Port of Spain the capital. John got to drive and being British they drive on the left side of the road so it took some getting used to. Also John wasn’t familiar with the roads yet and it was a good thing we had a map of the area. Steve was intrigued with all the Rastafarian’s around and took pictures like crazy. The next day we loaded up the gas and diesel cans and went and got fuel. Diesel was $1.11 US and Gas $1.75 at the gas station which if we had gone to the marina it would have been triple that amount. Wednesday 8/5/09 we got up and took off for the Chaguaramas Golf Course where we found a path which was to take us to Edith Falls. It was a beautiful walk through all the swaying bamboo and lots of heliconias (flowers). Some places it was thick overhead cool & dark underneath. We never saw any animal life whatsoever except for a few birds and a snake. We were looking for parrots and monkeys. Edith Falls only exist at the height of the wet season. The falls when running, are suppose to be an impressive 600 feet in height with a pool to swim in, but this is only during the rainy season. When we saw them, we called them the “trickle down falls” because only a little stream of water was coming down. The next day we took a winding drive through the Northern Range’s rainforest with beautiful views of Cyril’s, Balata and Maracas Bays. We stopped at Maracas Bay which is a wide, white-sand beach, thick with palm trees contrasting against the backdrop of verdant mountains. They have lifeguards, changing rooms, showers, picnic shelters and food huts selling cold Carib beer and the infamous food delight “Shark & Bake”. We had never tried this before and it was very tasty. The one end of the beach was covered with Bumboat’s (local fishing boats). The next day we took the dinghy and went around to Carrera Prison Island and took a lot of pictures. This island is used as a rehabilitation place for prisoners, not your hard core type. The next night we were sitting in the cockpit talking and around 2350 the band over at the Tsunami Bar/Restaurant (off our stern) started playing extremely loud and you couldn’t hear yourself think. We endured it until around 0200 and finally crashed. When we awoke the next morning they were still going strong and they finally quit at 1000. John said if they were going to blast away next week he was going to break down and turn the A/C on. Steve left after a six day visit and hope he enjoyed his visit here in Trinidad.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline.
Today July 7th, 2009, we took off with Leo our tour guide and six other boaters for another adventure on the island of Granada. We were headed for the Six Sister Falls today. Along the way Leo picked up another local, Damien who was to help him with our trip. We then stopped at the market in downtown St. Georges for vegetables for our island lunch, their national dish called “Oil-Down”. It consists of vegetables and meats boiled down and reduced to a thick stew. Coconut milk is added to give it a distinctive flavor. Ours contained desert bananas, breadfruit (like a potato), okras, onions, garlic, carrots, christophene (pear shaped, either green or white and delicate in flavor and grows on a vine), tania & dasheen (root vegetables), callaloo (an elephant-ear shaped green leaf of dasheen which is like spinach) fish, chicken and many other vegetables I couldn’t keep track of. When we got there we unloaded the van with all the goodies and proceeded on our hike through the rain forest. We trekked along a precipitous trail skirting the walls of a place called the “Valley of Decision”, a lush & panoramic canyon of green. We descended into the valley, clamoring over boulders, walking through groaning stands of bamboo, toward a staircase of seven falls nestled in the bosom of an emerald cathedral. The hike took about 1 ½ hours and at the bottom we came upon the Margaret Waterfalls. Leo and Damien started getting together the fixings for a fire which on top was placed a huge kettle for our “oil down” stew. On the bottom the cut up chicken was placed and layered with vegetables, roots, hot sauce and all kinds of seasonings that they had brought from home. On the top they added salt fish, coconut water and filled it to the brim with water and put a lid on it. It was now ready to brew for a couple of hours. We all made our way down to the pool at the bottom of the falls and took a swim to cool off. Now everyone was ready to start on another hike up to the other waterfalls. We left one person behind to hold down the camp and with Leo in the lead we all preceded up a steep muddy hill with Carol being second to last ahead of Damien the other guide. Carol kept sliding back down with nothing to hold onto so she could pull herself up and decided to wait back down at the camp. It was quite a disappointment but she didn’t want to break any bones. John continued with the group and was climbing like a monkey up this steep hill. When he got to the top there were several falls and the water was running real fast and they had to slide down the river with John just about being washed away. A fellow boater grabbed him just before he was washed over the side and all the time was carrying Carol’s camera. They were passing the camera from one to the other over their heads to keep it out of the water. Going down the river it was filled with rocks and big boulders and very deep in spots and hard to stand up in places. When they got down to the place above the falls where Carol was, two people in our group jumped down the falls, 50’- 60’. The rest of the group continued down the steep mountain clinging on roots and one time John lost his footing and hung on a tree with one hand, otherwise he would have slid down really uncontrollable and would have definitely hurt himself. I think he thought he was Tarzan. When he got down to where Carol was, he was mud from head to toe and had to go swimming in the pool by the waterfall nearby. Everyone was hot and tired and the beer in our cooler tasted really good. After we ate our stew, (which John later said he didn’t like), a group of us including Carol hiked up to another fall called Honeymoon Falls with Damien the other guide. John stayed behind because he said he had enough with the last falls. Damian helped Carol along as did the other hikers. This was an easier climb for Carol because she had some trees and roots to help pull her up. When we got to the waterfall at the top we swam in the pool and what a blast we had. The water was very cool but after our sweaty climb it felt good. After we got back down to our camp we all left for the 1 ½ hour hike back to the bus and this time it was all uphill and hard going. John & I being more mature than the others, had to stop several times to rest and catch our breath. The group thought John was some sort of superman to tackle those falls at his age and they all gave him kudos. What a trip!! John says once is enough of that trip and that it will last him a lifetime.
We have been busy going here and there and not time to really do any maintenance work on the boat. John is starting to get a little cranky and says we need to stay home and work on the boat but two days later we went on another trip with some other boaters and our first stop was the Balthazar River where we went river rafting. It is a first for either of us. We had to wear life jackets and helmets and it was fun riding down the river in the tubes hitting these rocks and bouncing off others. At least this wasn’t too dangerous. After river tubing we went to the Organic Chocolate Factory. They make a high-octane bar that is 71 percent cocoa. They had us melt it slowly in our mouths for an intensely rich, creamy, chocolate flavor, unlike any other commercial brand that any of us had ever tasted. Afterwards we went to the Belmont Estate, a typical and very picturesque country farm, where the cocoa beans grow. We did a tour and watched how the cocoa was extracted from the big fruits using the sun and also got to do a people-powered dance shuffle on the beans. They also showed us how the Grenada Chocolate Factory takes these beans and uses solar-powered, handmade, and vintage machinery. Some beans are squeezed into cocoa butter and some are blended into smooth, rich cocoa mixture. These two ingredients are combined with sugar to become your perfect chocolate bar and I must say they were delicious. While there we got to taste both types of chocolate, one 68% cocoa and the other 71% cocoa. Leo our guide and driver all day negotiated mountain top hair pin turns and all day you felt you were on a roller coaster. He claims he was only going 30-35mph but it sure seemed like 60mph. We were in the very back of the bus that seated 12 and when he went around the turns we were still going the other way. Sometimes it got a little hairy but we made it back to St Georges Lagoon still all in one piece. He would make a good NASCAR driver for sure!
A few nights later a sailboat with two dogs was getting pretty close to us and John thought he would be smart and put out our motion sensor in the cockpit and this motion sensor sounds like a real dog barking when anything gets close to it. Naturally the boat got close to us during the night and it started barking and then the two dogs on the other boat started barking. This in turn started all the dogs around to start barking. Carol went up into the cockpit and pulled the plug and just sat there waiting to fend off if the boat came near enough to hit us. So much for sleep in the harbor that night for anyone and lo and behold at first light the boater with the dogs said “I guess I am a little close and will move my boat”. I thanked him and after he moved went back downstairs for a few more zzz’s. All our friends laughed their heads off when I told them that story.
Our final tour in Granada was to see the Leatherback Turtles lay eggs. Even being from Florida we had never experienced this thrill. We left at 1800 for the NE side of the island. Along the way we picked up a native lady who was a turtle volunteer who was to be our guide for the night. We were told we couldn’t use regular flashlights only the ones with the red bulbs. We could not use any flash camera’s whatsoever. When we got there we walked north along the beach until we came upon some research people who were watching a Leatherback turtle lay eggs. She was huge; approximately 7’ long and probably weighed 1 ton. She was in the process of digging her hole to lay her eggs in. We all watched from the rear so the turtle couldn’t see us, which would stop her from laying eggs and go back into the ocean and drop her eggs there. The research people counted the eggs as she was laying them and she had 86 yolk eggs and 16 non yolk eggs (which are used to fertilize the yolk eggs). As we were watching another turtle came up behind us and went a little further from us and proceeded to do the same thing. The research people keep track with stakes where all the turtles lay their eggs and also tag them. As we were leaving and walking back down the beach we saw another turtle getting ready to lay her eggs and then saw a little further away about 28 little turtles hatching and making their way down to the ocean. What a site to see that was. The little turtles were about 4” long and the guide said only 1 in 1,000 survive. The female turtles after laying eggs go back out to the ocean for about 2 weeks and then comeback in and lay more eggs. They told us they do this about 3-4 times during the season. All in all the turtles travel about 10,000 miles a year.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline.
We are finally here in Granada and hopefully our last stop to wait out the hurricane season. Grenada, a spectacularly beautiful island, has lush green mountains, crystal waterfalls and fragrant spice trees that give the island its epithet “Isle of Spice”. There are more spices here per square mile than any other place on the planet! Cloves, cinnamon, ginger, turmeric, cocoa, nutmeg and mace grow in abundance. Granada is made up of three islands: Grenada, twenty miles to the north Carriacou, and Petite Martinique. Granada, the largest, occupies 120 square miles with its origin being volcanic. It is 12 miles wide by 21 miles long. Currency here is EC dollars (Eastern Caribbean) with a fixed bank rate of 2.67 EC dollars to one US dollar.
Granada’s history has been lively, with early wars and revolutions. More recently Grenada transitioned to full independence in 1974. In 1979 a left wing coup by Maurice Bishop attempted to turn Granada into a socialist state. However, he wasn’t insulated from opposition and within his own ranks second-in-command Bernard Coard, his wife Phyllis and members of the army took Bishop prisoner in 1983. After a massive crowd freed him, an army group executed him along with half of his cabinet. Six days later 12,000 US marines along with Grenada’s eastern Caribbean neighbor (the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States), launched a “rescue mission” and were welcomed with open arms. 70 Cubans, 42 Americans and 170 Grenadians were killed in the fighting. Most of the US forces withdrew in December 1983 and a joint Caribbean force and 300 US support troops remained on the island for two more years.
If that wasn’t enough, in September 2004, massive hurricane Ivan blew through the island and did huge damage throughout the island, especially the rain forest. The three magnificent picturesque, 19th century churches of downtown St George’s, The Catholic Cathedral, St Andrew’s Presbyterian Church and St Georges Anglican Church all lost their roofs. They are all in early stages of being repaired and rebuilt. The Anglican Church features a four sided clock tower that serves as the town’s timepiece and is all that remains intact on that church. Everywhere we went in Granada you could see the damage with some buildings and homes abandoned never to be rebuilt.
We settled into life here in Granada rather quickly. The day after we arrived we heard on the cruiser net, VHF radio channel 68, 0730 six days a week about a “Hamburger Night” at the Clarks Court Bay Marina and decided to go. Before that could happen “Brain Surgeon” John was at it again, working on the refrigeration. “Digger” Carol was doing her thing in the V-Berth again. By the afternoon everything was a go for our first adventure here in Granada. We didn’t know exactly where to meet everyone for the bus ride and didn’t see any other boaters around so we asked some locals and they said to take #2 bus for Woburn. Two #2 buses past us and we wondered if we would ever get picked up. Finally one stopped and we told them where we were going and they squeezed us aboard. The bus never went down to the marina and dropped us off 1 ½ miles away. We had to walk in the heat and John said “we are never doing this again”. I said “every day is a new adventure”! When we finally arrived we met lots of new boater friends which we would continue to see throughout our travels. After our dinner they got us on a bus going back to St Georges Lagoon. The next day we went into St Georges, which is the capital, walking again as was our mode. The harbor of St Georges is like something out of an old watercolor painting of a forgotten seaside village. There are two forts in sight; Fort George and Fort Frederick. It has old brick buildings and capped with old “fish scale” tile roofs, a reminder of long ago when the profitable journeys were outward bound, laden with rum, spices, fruit and the returning sailing ships would arrive “in ballast” of bricks. Off the Carenage there are winding, narrow streets high up and down the hills with massive amounts of cars, trucks and buses going this way and that.
It seems we are on the go again for on Friday night we went with a bunch of boaters to Gouyave for their famous “Friday Night Fish Fry”. The locals rope off two streets and set up their fish/food stalls with everything from fried fish, tuna kebobs, fish quiche, grilled lobster, macaroni and cheese, french fries and lots of other goodies. You sure couldn’t go away hungry from that place.
Sunday 6/28/09, John was back in “Brain Surgeon” mode tearing apart the fresh water pump and replacing it with a new one and still it wouldn’t work. He then took out the filter and it was clogged big time. He now has new famous words “I hate plumbing”. He put “Digger” to work digging out under the pots and pans locker to get out a new charcoal filter. It took two hours to put everything back together but the good news is we now have running water again. “Brain Surgeon” discovered that the old pump still worked and it was just the question of the clogged filter. Oh well, what can I say.
We decided we really like it here in the St Georges Lagoon, if only there was clear water. We have a supermarket, Island Water World (similar to West Marine), a Yacht Club all at our back door just a short dinghy ride away and town is only 4 blocks away. We also have the bus nearby so what more could we ask for.
Thursday July 2nd we took an island tour with some other boaters to Annandale Falls where we all went swimming under the falls. After our swim we stopped for lunch at the Belmont Estates and did a traditional lunch. After lunch we went and toured the River Antoine Rum Distillery which is an historical distillery where the process of rum production has seen little change since the 1800’s. It is the oldest functioning water propelled distillery not only in Granada but throughout the Caribbean. A giant water wheel crushes the cane, the dry stalks are burned to heat up the juice and large wooden scoops manually move the hot juice from one big cast iron bowl to the next as it gets hotter (they call these bowls “coppers” as the original ones were made of copper. We got to sample the rum at the end of the tour. One was 150 proof, one 80 proof and another a rum punch. After sampling everyone seemed to be walking straight lines and we continued on our tour to the Great Etong Forrest and you could see Grand Etong Lake “Crater Lake”. Cutty our tour guide had some bananas and a Mona monkey came out of the forest for them. He knew exactly what we had for him. Continuing our tour we went to a Nutmeg Processing Plant where they showed us how the nutmegs were processed. It was a long day but a very worthwhile tour and we were finally glad to be back to the boat and relaxing in the cockpit with our own rum drinks.
The rains are starting with tropical waves coming frequently. You have to carry umbrellas where ever you go. There is so much to write about so read the second part of the rest of our story about our stay in Granada which will be coming soon.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline.
We never got off the boat in Vieux Fort, St. Lucia and pulled the anchor the next morning at 0540 and headed for Bequia which was 41.5 nm away. We had 4′–5′ seas with ocean swells coming from the east and were cooking at 6 knots. About 0830 a fast storm was approaching us from the east and the seas and winds were picking up. The seas built to about 5′–6′ but none coming over the sides which is a good thing. We decided to put our life jackets on and fastened ourselves to the boat in case the storm hit us. John also put the hatch boards in the companionway just as a precaution, which was the first time since leaving Florida a year ago. John’s favorite remark “everday is a new adventure”. We were fortunate the storm finally went behind us and we didn’t get the full brunt of the storm. As we got to the lee of St. Vincent the swells decreased to 2′–3′ with no wind and now we were only doing 4 knots. We finally arrived safe & sound, totally dry, at 1540 in Admiralty Bay, Bequia and anchored in about 14′ of water and thought that was it for the night. We had happy hour at 1700 out in the cockpit to celebrate another safe passage. After dinner went to bed and were out like a light when around 2400 we both awoke to the pounding on the hull hearing “Sweet Caroline, Sweet Caroline” in anxious voices. We thought now what is the matter. We stuck our heads out to see what the commotion was about. The people from the boat behind us were in their dinghy and yelling at us that we were dragging down on their boat and getting closer and closer by the minute. It was pitch black out with no moon to light up the area. John told me he was going to pull the anchor, move the boat, which is even hard sometimes in daylight. We don’t have one of those systems that all you do is push a button and up comes the anchor. Ours you have to hand crank the wench (manual windless) to get the anchor up. We probably had about 100′ of chain out and this takes awhile to get it in. I (Carol) was supposed to steer the boat to a new location in the pitch black and not hit any boats in the process. To make matters worse I didn’t have time to put my contact lens in so it was blind leading the blind. We thankfully made it by two sailboats and John started to drop the anchor and it caught inside the chain pipe and wouldn’t go down. “Not to worry he said” and proceded to lower the other anchor we had up on the rollers on the bow sprint. After he got that anchor set he worked on the other anchor with a long screw driver and hammer and finally after an hour got it worked loose so it would go down. We moved the boat up a little and put that anchor out also and I think we finally got them set good so we wouldn’t drag. It was now 0130 and neither one of us was ready to hit the sack. We stayed up a couple more hours just to see what the boat would do and then finally went to bed. When we awoke the next morning I started reading the Doyles Cruising Guide about Bequia and noticed that there were two sunken boats in the anchorage. When John set the anchor for the second time he noted our GPS coordinates and I had written them down. We were at 13?00.67 N, 61?14.47 W and the two wrecks were according to the guide book 13?00.6 N, 61?14.0 W. Pretty close I thought! We looked down but didn’t see anything and because we were holding good and had not hit anything yet we decided to do nothing. We went into customs around 1500 and had to pay overtime because it was Sunday. Total customs/immigration was $53.20 US. After clearing customs we walked around town for awhile but being Sunday not much was open. Bequia is an island of sailors and boats and linked to the outside world by sea. Boats are built here on the beach with everything from little two bow fishing boats to grand schooners, built by eye and using only simple hand tools.
We departed the next day at 0945 and headed for Carriacou. The sail was pretty uneventful with seas 4′-5′ with the Jib and Main Sail up. We arrived in Hillsborough, Carriacou at 1645 and saw only one other boat in the harbor. I got a little nervous but around 1730 more sailboats started arriving so I started feeling better about the anchorage. The next morning we took the dinghy and cleared customs/immigration as soon as they opened. To enter Granada which we would do later in the day, you either had to clear here in Hillsborough, Carriacou or St. Gerorges in Granada and this was due to the H1N1 virus. The customs/immigration fee was only $50EC or $20US and I thought this was pretty reasonable. We pulled the anchor as soon as we returned to the boat and were on our way at 0915 with 34.5 nm to Granada. We were moving right along with the Jib and Main Sail up and had the starboard rail almost in the water most of the way. We decided to pull into St. Georges lagoon in Granada instead of going to the south side of the island at this point in time. The approach to the lagoon was well marked with buoy markers so it was an easy entrance. We arrived in the lagoon at 1700 and a dinghy came by and asked us if we wanted to take a mooring. We asked the cost and figured for our size boat it would be $40EC or $16US. We said OK and he helped us pick up a mooring. This was a good decision because we wouldn’t have to worry about dragging, at least not that night. Tomorrow we would check with the local boaters around us and see if we could anchor and where the best place for us to do this.
Stay tuned for more adventures from John & Carol aboard the S/V Sweet Caroline.