July-August- Grenada Part 3

Grenada -- Part 3: July 26-August 5, 2007

Click on the above thumbnail for a map during this time period

We were enjoying Grenada so much that we just could not pull ourselves away. It's nice to be settled for a while and get into a routine. We attended exercise class every morning, after which Chuck ran; some days Barb took a water color class; and we took a bus into the big city of St. Georges to shop a few times a week. One evening we took a taxi in with four other couples to see the movie Ratatouie -- followed by dinner. We attended the weekly Saturday evening pot luck & karaoke night at Clarke's Court Marina and attended the Sunday afternoon beach party at Hog Island-- which is about 300 yards from our anchored boat. We enjoyed many sundowners with other cruisers and often were invited over or had folks over for dinner. Life is good!

A while back we each had experiences with Grenada medical establishments. We won't be in Savannah to honor our regular teeth-cleaning appointments, and so we asked around and scheduled appointments with a local dentist. Turned out to be a middle-aged man originally from Syria, where he received his training. He came to Grenada a number of years ago on vacation, and decided to stay and set up a practice. He did the cleaning himself and charged Barb $EC 90 (about $35 USA), but gave Chuck a $EC 10 discount, because his teeth required so little cleaning. Or so he said. Chuck suspected the real reason was because they had such a fascinating discussion of political philosophies and systems. Chuck's cleaning actually took longer than Barb's, because the dentist kept asking questions that required that he stop his work and remove his instruments so that Chuck could answer.

And then Barb had occasion to go see a local doctor, when something in the air caused some kind of allergy to flare up, giving her a sinus infection. She went to see a doctor that gets on the cruisers' VHF net every morning and announces his availability to cruisers -- even offering to do "boat calls" if necessary. She was quite taken with the guy, and was quite surprised to learn that he is 72 year's old! His charge was $EC 100 per visit or $38 US.

Neither doctor nor dentist required any paperwork, by the way. No forms to fill out at all, let alone long medical histories.

By mid July we finally decided it was time to get our mail forwarded -- we hadn't gotten any since Barb's sister Audrey brought it with her when she visited us in April! We learned it was going to cost $105 to have our mail sent to us, so we instead had it sent to daughter Danielle. She discovered that our boat documentation had expired at the end of June and our renewal form had been sitting in our mail bin for months. Our documentation paper was still valid when we checked into Grenada but would need to be renewed before we check into Trinidad and Tobago. Fortunately, she was able to send in the form with the late fee and our mailing service (St. Brendan's Isle) in Green Cove Springs sent it on to Trinidad for us. We also discovered that one of the services St. Brendan's Isle provides is to watch out for the documentation renewal letter and to send it in for us We quickly asked them to handle it for us in future years.

One evening we attended a first-time dinner party at a new marina/resort called La Phare Bleu where after dinner we were entertained by the Tivoli Drummers, a local group of drummers and dancers. The venue was a large vessel that had originally been a Swedish Lighthouse boat -- it was towed all the way to Grenada by the Austrian couple that are opening the resort.

We now own yet another wi-fi antenna. We continue to hear about and be seduced by the promise of better wi-fi connectivity. We first purchased a Radio Labs marine/RV antenna that worked a bit better than the internal wi-fi card in Barb's laptop and a lot better than Chuck's, but it stopped working after sx weeks and now has to be sent back for repair. We purchased a C-Crane USB wi-fi antenna that does not work as well as the internal card in Barb's PC but better than Chuck's. So we -- along with five other cruisers -- broke down and bought another antenna: a Port Networks MWB-200. We are promised that this one will give us great reception. Unfortunately, there is no wi-fi connectivity near our anchorage off Hog Island, and so we haven't been able to test it yet. The other cruisers are quite happy with theirs, however, so we are hopeful.

As this is written, we have left our beloved Hog Island, and are heading to Tobago. We have been cruising since 9 pm; twelve hours later we are just two hours out from Scarborough, Tobago, where new adventures await us. But for that account, dear readers, you must await the next exciting edition of "Chuck and Barb go cruising."