And We're Off - The Official Start to Carnival

Grenada Spicemas has been going on for weeks with events and competitions, but this morning was the official kickoff with J'Ouvert - Opening Day.

We were all up early with the pounding Soca and Calypso beats that never really stopped all night, but 4:30am found us all out on the street in our oldest t-shirts and shorts and all ready for the what the morning would bring.

The beer trucks, the soap truck, thousands of revellers all crammed into the main street along the bay, starting right outside the marina.  The music blared, the beat was infectious and as the sun slowly rose, all was revealed.

Street dancing and lots of opportunity for a dry hump with anyone going by.

Pretty soon the paint and old motor oil made an appearance.

Skin glistens as the oiling begins.

Look carefully and you will see a piece of salt fish clenched in his teeth.  The oil was originally used to disguise the appearance of the reveller and salt fish is used in the national dish of "Oil Down".

The most frenzied groups drag chains through the street - representing the broken bond of slavery.

Costumes of all sorts - taking a page from the French masquerade.

As the sun rose higher and hotter, the party became more and more colourful as paint was shared indiscriminately among all.

Mike & Rebecca

Codey, Marie, Allen, Kim, Kathy - med students in the making but embracing Carnival today!

Sue's colour is definitely lime green.

Gotcha Dave!

Quick, stop the beer truck, we're thirsty.

Oh, you want us to turn around for a photo op - we're busy!

Lookin' good Dave & Andy with a new friend.

Not sure why, but this looked particularly fun.  Grease up the inside of the tire, two sticks and off you go!

Then I noticed the similarity to the activity - notice the 'street dancing' (called Wining) going on to the left?  Basically the same position.

The crowd was starting to get hungry so the food stalls were dishing up a fast trade.

Fried chicken almost ready.  Given this flaming pot of oil was right by the sidewalk with party-goers covered in oil, not sure what the safety folks would say back home.

Finally, we turned back to where The Merry Baker knew just what we wanted - Build A Burger Breakfast!

Gwen & Guillaume, painted like tropical birds but Guillaume's still not taking his eyes off his breakfast.

Andy, Nigel, Dave, Sue, Malcolm, Jeff, Catherine, Judy, Alex & Gwen.

Now we have everyone together but too many to name!

The Port Louis Marina laid on a hose and soap for us to shower down - it became a communal scrub-down which definitely saved the bathrooms and boats from a huge mess.  Now, off to rest up for the parade tonight.

Prep for Spicemas

Grenada Carnival, or Spicemas, is upon us so we have taken up a front row seat in Port Louis Marina where we moved Mowzer on Friday.  This means that we are sitting almost in the heart of St. George's where all the frenzied activity takes place.

Mowzer and friends on the dock - all ready for the party!

How are we prepping for the party?

Well, now that we've gathered in the marina with at least a dozen other boats that we know, we have enjoyed a few happy hours at the marina bar...

Is this another form of Grenadian Train?

We went off to St. George's downtown for a little excursion with Andy and Judy from Jacob's Ladder and enjoyed a few refreshments along the way.  Did I mention it is super hot and it rains every night and morning now so the humidity feels like about 150% at times.  Beer is now considered an essential!

Cold Stags on the sidewalk ;-)

Saturday night we gathered up three bus-loads of cruisers to take in Panorama - the national steel pan carnival competition.  Unfortunately, the huge venue of the National Cricket Stadium and some pretty poor logistics meant that we were sitting way too far away to enjoy any acoustics and it took about 40 minutes for each band to change their equipment on stage for a 10 minute performance.  In typical Caribbean style we arrived for the advertised event at 8pm, were told it would start 'promptly' at 9pm, got underway at 9:30pm and when we finally left just before midnight only three of the nine bands competing had completed their sets.  So glad we got to see the Comancheros perform the other night so we had a real feel for these incredible musicians.

The cruising crowd - made up most of the small audience.

One of the bands getting ready to wheel their drums onto stage across plywood laid on the muddy soft cricket pitch.

Much too far away to get engaged and only a few hardy souls braved the muddy infield and rain to get close.

Nothing daunted, the ladies of Port Louis Marina all got together this morning to spice things up all ready for the parades tomorrow.  We gathered all our Grenadian colours (red, yellow, green) and many others for a great way to while away a super rainy morning.

Base coats of yellow followed by red and green decoration to match the Grenadian flag.

Too bad we might need to wear our sneakers for the parade tomorrow but we'll know we're decked out right down to our toes.

... and there'll be no boat work this afternoon to be done by these ladies!

Monday and Tuesday are national holidays here with the real party starting Sunday night, carrying right on into Jouvet in the wee early hours of Monday morning, followed by Pretty Mas and the Parade of Lights later in the day.  Tuesday will be the official judged parade but by then we might all just be sitting by the pool in recovery.

Qua(ck) Qua(ck) - Like A Duck

Steve (Slow Flight), John & Ashley (Baby Blue), Allison (boat sitting on Cavu) and us (the Mowzers) set off bright and early on Tuesday morning for a hike in the Grand Etang Forest Reserve.  Grand Etang is a little lake that fills an old volcano crater next to Mt. Qua Qua in the central region of Grenada, and the plan was to take the bus all the way up to the visitor centre and then hike down to the east coast following the Concord River to the falls.  Sounded good to us, although to be fair we really didn’t have much of an idea of what this would really entail.  We’re now learning that hiking in Grenada means that you will be covered in mud, soaked right through and will need at least a few recovery beers to set you on your way.

We hopped on a #1 bus into St. George’s, where we changed over to the big #6 bus that would carry us up high into the mountains.  By the time we arrived at the top the temperature was distinctly cooler and we were surrounded by a thick mist.  The stall-keeper where we picked up a few snacks corrected me when I commented on, “if we get wet…” to “WHEN you get wet…” and by then we had an inkling of what we were in for.  We wrapped up the camera in a towel and waterproof bag and got ready for what the mountain would dish up.

Here’s a map-view of what we ended up doing for the day - green is bus, purple is hike and by the end of the day we had walked 20 very hilly kilometres (12.5 miles).

We started off heading towards the peak of Mt. Qua Qua where occasionally the mist parted and we were treated to a tempting but fleeting glimpse of the lake at Grand Etang.  

Ashley, John, Allison, Steve - on the ridge leading to Mt. Qua Qua.

Grand Etang lake peeking through the mist.

We followed along the ridge until the trail picked up the source trickle of the Concord River and from there we proceeded downwards, criss-crossing the river at regular intervals.  We quickly gave up any attempt to keep our feet clear of the mud and as it started to rain any sense of dryness also evaporated.  Much of the trail slipped along the side of the mountain, sometimes with footholds carved into the muddy banks, sometimes with actual steps but at other times we used trees and vines to get ourselves down the slopes.  

Footprints leading the way.

This is what the bus drivers don't want to see!

Picture the picture - mountain orchid in bloom

So convenient of the Liana vines to be just here.

As the rain came down harder and harder the river started to swell until our last crossing where we tossed our backpacks across the water and used a bamboo pole to hang onto as we were chest-deep in the rushing water.  Knowing that we couldn’t cross the river again, we admired the falls and then got ourselves out of the valley before the water got much higher.

This was as close as we could get to the upper falls as more and more rain fell.

Looks like it's beautiful up there.

Wet but happy.

John & Ashley clambering over the boulders.

The final part of our trail disappeared on the other side of the river, but conveniently enough a local guy who knew his way through the plantations led us out to the top of the road, right beside the beer and gift shacks at the lower falls.  

John and Ashley, who had visited the falls earlier, told us that they had been able to clean up with a swim in the pool at the bottom of the falls, but today was a different matter with all the water rushing down from the slopes above.

The bus driver pulled out a big garbage bag for us to put all our wet bums upon and hopefully save the next passenger from a soaked behind, and by the time we arrived back in St. George’s at about 5:30 in the afternoon we were quite ready for dinner.

Made it back to the bus station in St. George's

There's a tunnel in the middle of town - doubt there's any ventilation and it's about 500 meters long, but it short cuts through the hill. 

A beautiful view over the Carenage Harbour, from the Nutmeg Restaurant.

The sun goes down as we make our way around the Carenage.

The Nutmeg restaurant served up a delicious rum punch and roti and once satisfied we set off again for an evening stroll along the bay until we finally cried “uncle” for our feet and took the bus back to the roundabout, which is the closest drop point to Mt. Hartman Bay.  Conveniently though, the West Indies Brew Pub is located a little way into the rest of the walk so we stopped for just one more refreshment before dragging our very tired, and very muddy feet back to our boats in the bay.

Our Home In Mt. Hartman Bay

We sit nestled down in Mt. Hartman Bay, one of the deep bays on the south shore of Grenada.  Other than a sojourn on the dock next week so we can party it up for the Spicemas Carnival we will pretty much call this home for the next few months through hurricane season.

Secret Harbour Marina sits at the top of the bay and provides us with services such as laundry, garbage collection, an open-air bar/restaurant, a beautiful beach volleyball court and also as the meeting point for numerous shopping buses, taxis and organized outings.  Just over the hill about a 20-minute walk away is one of the other cruiser hangouts in Prickly Bay, and a 20-minute dinghy ride in the other direction brings us to other cruiser anchorages in Hog Island and Clarks Court / Woburn Bay.

We're started to get settled in but still have lots to figure out, but much of it will have to wait until after Carnival since Grenada, like all other islands, pretty much goes on hold until the end of the festivities.  Add to that, today is a holiday for Emancipation Day so there are two long weekends at the beginning of August.

Here's what the view looks like for our little spot in the bay:

Looking south - towards Trinidad

Looking east - over the hills but no city lights!

Looking north - little Secret Harbour Marina with boats at the dock.  Its a nice easy ride to the dinghy dock for us.

Looking west - I love this little resort almost built into the hill, and look - there's a wedding on the dock today.

We had pretty good seats!

Every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday there is volleyball for whoever shows up.  The games are usually played six-on-six at the moment but later in the season there will be a four-on-four tournament for the more experienced (competitive?) players.

Wendy serves up a ball.  Lovely fluffy sand and new nets for this year!

Each day from Tuesday to Saturday there is a shopping bus that does pickups at Secret Harbour and Prickly Bay, and takes us round to the bank, Budget Marine (like Home Depot for sailors only more expensive), Ace Hardware, the IGA and the mall, the organic market and the bulk-supply store.  As the bus does the rounds and people and purchases are loaded in, it gets pretty chummy as you might be resting your feet on your neighbour's beer or cradling their veggies while they climb in the back of the bus.

Arriving back at the dock and loading up the 'car' with our purchases.

Each Saturday is Hash.  We lost our Hash Virginity last Saturday at Hash #890 of the Grenada Hash House Harriers, who advertise themselves as "drinkers with a running problem".  This hash was held in Boca on the outskirts of St. George and we set off for the approx. 1-hour run / scramble up the steep plantation hills, through mud to the ankles, swinging down slopes from tree to tree almost like a monkey to arrive exhausted but exultant and ready for a cold beer and BBQ dinner.

Everyone gathering to sign in and get the BBQ started.

If you dare to show up in new shoes, you have to drink a beer out of them.

Here's a happy group post hash - check out the mud up the legs and on the shoes.

We had three bus-loads of cruisers head up to the hash, each bus holding about 14 people.  On the way home our bus requested another beer stop which the driver happily satisfied, but as we picked up our beer he headed off with a friend to test-drive a motorcycle.  No worries, just order another beer I guess.

The local watering establishment in Tempe, a little suburb of St. George.

There's actually a full calendar of activities and events going on down here and it is no wonder that it is known as Camp Grenada - yoga, Grenadian Train dominos, hikes, information sessions, and of course lots of pot-luck.

Time for a quiet day on the boat today though and a few odd boat-jobs beckon.  Oops, sorry Mowzer, we have a date for pizza dinner with Slow Waltz, Kool-Kat and Glen & Dalynn (previously of Amoray).  Guess the boat jobs will have to wait.