Grenada

December 2017

Wednesday December 13th – Grenada

Captain’s Log: “The journey from St Lucia to St Georges required an overnight speed of eleven knots as Azura steamed a series of Southerly courses on her way to Grenada and as Azura travelled South, she passed the island of St Vincent on her Port side. Azura was berthed Port Side to quayside, making fast all lines and having gangways rigged and ready for first guests to go ashore.”

Th P&O Blurb said: “The aroma of nutmeg, cinnamon, cocoa and mace hangs in the warm breeze that blows over the hillsides, tropical rainforest and beaches on this ‘Isle of Spice’. Grenada is a popular holiday spot with plenty of beaches, coves, volcanic mountains and shops to explore.”

The ‘picture-perfect’ island of Grenada is the most southerly of the Windward Islands. Lying 90 miles north of Trinidad and 68 miles south-west of St Vincent, twenty-one miles long by twelve miles wide, it is smaller than the Isle of Wight. Grenada is a lush, green island with extensive forests on its mountainous slopes and apparently, its qualities of “simplicity and natural beauty” (P&O) make it one of the most attractive islands of the windward group. In 2004 Hurricane Ivan devastated the island and many of the island’s landmarks still bear scars of this event.

Columbus named the island Conception but did not land. The British arrived in 1609 but they were driven off the island by the hostile ‘Caribs’. The French tried as well and had to retreat, came back, tricked the Caribs into ‘selling’ the island and then when the Caribs revolted had to kill them off. The British and French fought over the island until 1783 when the British took control. It became independent in 1974.

The first thing that struck me as we approached Grenada was how attractive St George’s looked. There were rows of low level buildings decorated with beautiful pastel colours that were lined around the cliffs. There was not a high rise building in sight. It was certainly the prettiest port we saw on our cruise. As we departed the ship and walked along the pier, we were greeted by dancing local women in traditional Grenadian attire yellow, green and red blankets and head wear over a white smock). At the tourist office (open – take note Martinique) when I enquired about renting a car, she said she would call them (Grenada Car Rental with the motto “….there you go!”) and they would come to us! (take note Guadeloupe and Martinique).

Sure enough, a youth called Duane arrived and took us to the police station so that I could purchase a Visitor Drivers (Temporary) Licence for 60 Eastern Caribbean Dollars The police woman wrote on it in red “Private Vehicles Only!!” What did she me to rent? A large truck? Then we were taken to Duane’s father’s office. Cuthbert greeted us and filled out the paperwork. Duane had driven us in the car we’d be using, but Cuthbert decided the other one outside the office was better. He also gave a mobile phone and told us to call him when we were close to return.

St George’s, the capital with a population of around 30,000 is in the south-west of the island and has an almost land-locked harbour that is really a double harbour; the Carenage and the Lagoon, one of the largest yacht marinas in the Caribbean. The Carenage hugs the waterfront at the foot of a steep ridge, filled with colourful Carriacou sloops, fishing vessels and tourist boats. Rimming this harbour is Wharf Road lined with shops and restaurants. Behind this ridge (through which a tunnel was cut in 1985) lies the City Centre. Centred around the horseshoe shaped harbour, St George’s is said to be the most picturesque city in the Caribbean.

Established in 1795 by French settlers, much of its charm comes from a blend of two colonial cultures, typical 18th century houses intermingling with many fine examples of English Georgian architecture. The colour of the town itself adds to the effect, with the pastel facades of the old houses, built with subtly-tinted European bricks and distinctive roofs covered in red tiles that were brought as ballast by the colonists. The houses were set against a backdrop of green tropical vegetation and blue sky. The narrow streets and steep alleyways were ablaze with hibiscus and bougainvillaea. Facing the Carenage are the exquisite Georgian style Houses of Parliament and three of the city’s prominent churches still roofless after Hurricane Ivan. The old town is dominated by Fort George (built in 1706 by the French) perched above the colonial warehouses of Carenage Harbour. Its cannons are pointed out to sea

Driving in Grenada was on the left side of the road. We had only just left town and stopped to get some fuel when the mobile phone rang. It was Cuthbert. Wendy had left her bag in the other car (thinking we were using that one). Duane drove out to the garage with her bag in 10 minutes. Talk about service.

The twisty but flat coastal road was uneven and potholed. The kerbs, telegraph poles and shacks would often be painted with the Rastafarian colours of yellow, green and red which made the surroundings very colourful. We passed a couple of large pelicans standing on a small boat floating in the sea. There were lots of curved bays along the way. En route we saw a sign for the Underwater Sculpture Park but we wouldn’t be able to fit it all in and decided we could do on our return. There was also a sign erected by the Youth Emergency Action Committee proclaiming “During An Earthquake – Drop, Cover, Hold!” with pictures of someone climbing under a table.

Some 12 miles north of St George’s was the nutmeg capital of Gouyave, a small town which still displayed evidence of its colonial past. The town was surrounded by thick forests overgrown with varieties of jungle fern. When we stopped to ask a local where the factory was, he greeted us like an old friend and politely gave us detailed directions. When we found it, an old woman told us where to park and when we got out, she introduced herself as Dorothy. “You go and enjoy the factory and when you come out, perhaps you’d like to look at my home-grown spices.” Nutmeg trees grow wild throughout the island but it is not the only spice. Mace, bird pepper, sapote, tonka bean, clove, cinnamon, ginger, turmeric, all spice and black pepper are all grown on Grenada

The tour only cost $1 US. Half a dozen of us were taken round by a young woman who explained the process. I will www.appropedia.org to describe what we saw. “The fruits are opened by hand and the scarlet aril (mace) surrounding the nut is removed. This is removed by cutting with a small pointed knife the attachment of the mace to the base of the nut (nutmeg). Care needs to be taken to avoid damage to the nut. Another option is to soak the nuts in water for four to twelve hours and then squeezed between the thumb and forefinger until the nut pops out. (I can’t remember which method was used – ed)

The separated mace is flattened by hand and dried on mats in the sun. This takes between two and four hours. Grenadian mace is cured by storage in the dark for four months. This produces a brittle, pale yellow mace that attracts a premium price and is graded according to size, the bigger the mace, the better the premium. After grading the mace can be classified and bagged. The mace will also need to be fumigated.

The nutmegs are dried in their shells in the sun and are turned each day to prevent fermentation. The nuts are sufficiently dry when they rattle. This takes about one week. Sometimes artificial dryers are used. To produce shelled nutmegs, they should be cracked by tapping the end of the nuts with a small wooden mallet. If the nuts are tapped on the side, there is a possibility that the kernel may be bruised. Once dried the nuts can be stored for a considerable time.

Cracking the shell is often done by machine. Often machines are of the centrifugal type in which the rotary motion of the machine forces the nut to be thrown at high speed against the inside of a drum. Once the cracking has been completed, the nuts are sorted. Whole kernels will be separated from the broken pieces of kernel.

Floatation in water is used to remove unsound kernels, as these kernels are lighter than water and float to the surface. They can then be easily removed. The sound kernels can then be sorted based on their quality and size. Good quality whole kernels are separated from the lower quality and broken kernels. Sizing can be carried out using different mesh sized sieves. Sorted kernels are then bagged and labelled appropriately. For export, the bagged nutmeg is fumigated with methyl bromide.” Simples.

What we saw were groups of women doing various things to the nutmegs or mace and sacks of nutmeg everywhere. I doubt there were 50 workers there including the men humping stuff around and operating machines. It was a real SME. There was a sign saying “Workers! Bring God’s peace inside. And leave the Devil’s noise outside.”

In the small souvenir shop we bought a jar of nutmeg jam before finding Dorothy. She was holding a couple of spice baskets made of woven bamboo containing samples of the island’s spices in powdered form. $5 for a basket seemed a very low price.

From Gouyave, we headed inland in a south east direction along a hilly twisting road through the rain forest, passing the Belvedere Estate and crossing a river where you can go tubing in the right season. There were no real road signs in Grenada and you had to follow your nose.

Grenville, founded by the French in the 1760s is the main town on the eastern coast and is another nutmeg centre with a spice factory – not that we saw any signs for it. We headed north on a hunt for the Grenada Chocolate Company. We drove through quiet picturesque villages with vividly coloured flowers and shrubs.

As we passed the handsome Belmont Estate, I looked at he map and thought that the chocolate company is just up the road. But we saw no signs and were half way to Sauteurs on the north coast before I turned around. Asking a local he said it was on a road opposite a police station. We looked again on the way back and still saw nothing not even a police station. Back at the Belmont Estate, I stopped to have a look in a guidebook to see what it was. A man walking down the road, thought we’d stopped for him and jumped in. He introduced himself as Errol and said he was grateful for the lift to Grenville. When he saw me looking at the guidebook, he asked what we were looking for – the Chocolate Company. “I can take you there, it’s just up the road.” At a junction we saw what looked like a house with a ‘Police Station’ sign. No wonder we didn’t see it on the way back. Turning left we went down a narrow road. The ‘Factory’ looked like a normal house.

Errol took us in and introduced us. He knew the staff. They didn’t have any tours today but we could try the merchandise. They made 5 types flavoured organic black chocolate with differing strengths of cocoa. We bought a couple of bars with 60% and 70% cocoa. Talk about rich chocolate.

On the way, Errol had told us that he was the site manager for the Belmont Estate and had worked there for over 20 years. Belmont Estate was primarily a cocoa plantation where you could get a glimpse of traditional Grenadian plantation life at this estate of 400 acres dating back to the late 1600s. Originally coffee plantation, the estate had changed crops over the years; today primarily cocoa and nutmeg are grown here.

Errol said that he would give us a quick tour. We learnt the traditional processing of a cocoa bean, from its start as a pod on a tree to fermenting to drying on wooden trays in the sun and sampled some delicious cocoa tea. They also made their own chocolate used to make the cocoa tea and we bought some of that as well.

Our big impression of Grenada was that everyone was so friendly, I mean, really friendly. They were not jaded by tourists. It almost appeared as if they were not used to them and wanted to present their island in the best possible light. We were falling in love with Grenada and already knew that we would return to see it properly.

After dropping a grateful Errol at Grenville who told us to come and see him when we came back, we headed back inland retracing the route we had taken and then headed south through the centre of the island. We had two more sights to see. Inland, in the cooler highlands, is the lush rainforest reserve of Grand Etang, centred on a deep green Grand Etang Lake cupped in the centre of a long dead volcano. There was a sign for this along an unmade road to the lake. It was overcast and windy by now and after a couple of photos we moved on.

On a tumbling river not far from this lake are the Annandale Falls. Supposedly. We never found them. There were no signs and when we stopped to ask three schoolboys and they gave us directions with their smiling faces, we still never found the waterfalls. Next time, when we have more time.

We had a drive around St George and took in the Lagoon and Carenage which looked beautiful in the late afternoon sun. We couldn’t find the place where Duane had told us to park and found a car park down by the Azora. We called with the mobile and Duane was there within 15 minutes.

Grenada was definitely our favourite island of the cruise and I rated it up with Tobago. It was a beautiful place, relaxed, plenty to see and do and the people made it special. We vowed to come back and spend a week here in the future.

Back on board, there was a ‘Caribbean’ night. You only had one choice – to go to the temporary setup on the 17th floor and see what you fancied from the selection of dishes. The food was ok, but the backing ‘Reggae’ band near the swimming pool was problematic. Firstly, it was really loud, loud enough to stop you talking. Compounding this was the second problem – they couldn’t sing in tune, so we were deafened by tone deaf singers. It was the quickest meal we had just trying to get away to our room for some peace and quiet.

Later that evening we went to see Rudi West do another set. The Manhatten Bar was packed this time. Word had got around about his previous performance. This set was enjoyable as well. Not asgood and more slapstick rather than observational stuff but it was better than the Reggae band.

Captain’s Log: “After a day ashore enjoying the delights of Grenada, Azura’s guests were all back on board safely and the local authorities gave the ship clearance to depart the berth. The gangways were struck and the mooring lines were released, allowing Captain Hoyt to thrust the vessel off the berth. Once clear of the berth, Azura was positioned to head out into open water. The Captain then set the engines ahead and brought the ship clear of the coast.”