We are back in Grenada. WOW!! The heat. It is over 31 everyday. We returned to our boat to find everything in order (We thought).
We had a great summer with many mountain hikes including Shadow Lake (where Sharen tried to burn down our cabin - she left a towel on a burner. It burnt. I think that is smoke coming from the cabin in the picture). We also did Skoki back country resort in Banff, Parker's Ridge and a hike of The Iceline Trail in Yoho. We were able to visit our family in Nova Scotia in the spring after we returned from the south and then again in September. While in NS the last time we took a side trip to NYC where we met up with our son Richie and his girlfriend Ashleigh to do all the typical Joe tourist stuff. Wow. What a city. We did the Empire State Building, Rockefeller Square, listened to the Oprah Show live in Central Park, toured Carnegie Hall, walked the Brooklyn Bridge & spent an enjoyable hour talking to a nice young NY couple, Anna & Mike, while lined up under the bridge for the famous Grimaldi Pizza. We also saw the musical West Side Story and the new play Wicked. We happily walked the the streets of New York until our feet were sore. Wonderful fun.
While in Nova Scotia we were invited to stay with sailing friends Pat & Larry Pringle from Pasha at their beautiful summer home in Chester. We met them in Tres Saintes last season. We truly enjoyed their company.
We stopped in Barbados on the way down and attended the Oestens Fish Market Friday Night Jump Up. This is the beer drinking, food tasting wildest dance event of their week. It was a hoot but we tired out from flying overnight and carrying too many bags filled with boat stuff. We taxied back to our hotel for an early night.
We were met in Grenada by Snag from the Spice Isle Marine Yard where our boat was stored on the hard for the summer. We cleaned, repaired, had the bottom painted and finally polished the exterior and topsides to get Slow Dancing ready for a fun filled season.
We had investigated the possibility of heading west along the Venezuela/Columbia coast and on to Cartegena but have been convinced by the stories of occasional night boardings and high winds to remain in the Caribbean again and visit the islands we missed last year. My sister Sally & husband Bob have flown down to join us again for the first few weeks. Their third visit. We do enjoy their company. Sally with her great boat recipes and Bob always with a funny quip. We have had many wonderful days and look forward to them being with us to the middle of Nov. We sailed the boat around to Post Louis Marina in St Georges Bay. A beautiful spot. We met Michel & Linda, a nice couple who crew the 82 ft Sundowner, an Oyster. This is one of the creme de la creme's of the sailboat world. It was beautiful but on returning to Slow Dancing we felt this suited us better. Sharen & I took a quick run out around the headlands to a beach area about 2 miles away to fill my scuba tank and had the dinghy motor quit on us. A seadoo pulled us to shore and we negotiated a tow back to the marina on a fast fish boat. I discovered I had loosened the spark plugs in the spring. One was completely out and the other ready to fall out. I moved myself up a little higher on the "now that was dumb" scale.
We took a tour to Fort St George where Prime Minister Maurice Bishop was shot by the socialist (aided by the Cubans) in 1983.
We sailed around the south end of the island to quiet Clark's Court Bay Marina where we could finish repairs to our solar array and install our new Skymate full time satellite internet. It is wonderful. We get full time email connection but without attachments. Our new onboard email address is slowdancing-at-skymate.com. (please change the -at- to @). A"Wow! that was even dumber" prize was won by me when I connected the boat to 220 power and fried the charger and a resister in the AC. We lucked into Peter who was able to rectify all and promise not to tell anyone. I was able to get away with a slight embarassment and a little lighter sailing kitty purse.
I was invited to join Kevin and son Caleb (11) from Salonge and Simon with his son (11) from Nathniel for a scuba dive. Caleb was on a 40 ft air hose to a tank in a blowup mini kayak. It was fun to watch the boys. They found a lobster and Kevin skewered it with his spear.
On halloween we joined a party at Le Flare Bleu, a marina we dinghied to. Lots of fun and great costumes. Sharen and Sally wanted to dress up. Bob resisted and I refused.
We are off today for Grand Anse Beach on the east side of Grenada. A few more repairs and we are off tomorrow for the Grenadines. The weather forecast looks great.