Grenada

Monday, April 9, 2001

012-0.000 N
061-46.200 W

I've decided to leave the boat in Grenada for the summer as my options where here or Trinidad. My insurance requires that I'm past 12 degrees latitude, and Prickly Bay is *just* at 12 degrees.

The marina here is nice and the people seem competent and friendly, so I'm going to have BlueJacket hauled, the hull repainted a slightly brighter blue, the bottom repainted and have some minor fiberglass work done. I must admit that I'm having boat withdrawal symptoms, and I haven't even left yet! My other boating friends will have to take pity on me this summer and make me a galley slave! :-)

Anyhow, Grenada is an interesting place. You know that you're not in Kansas anymore when you're sitting in the immigration office getting a visitation extension and there's a photo of Castro and Maurice Bishop glued to the wall stating "Hail Fidel Castro! Hail Maurice Bishop!" You may remember back in 1979 when Bishop (a big fan of Castro) led a coup down here and eventually the US came in and restored democracy. Things are much more settled now, but I'm sure that politics are interesting.

There is a clear dichotomy between the haves and the have-nots. There are multi-million dollar homes going up all over the island, but many people living in ramshackle houses in the hills. Like most islands down here, education is not mandatory, so you can only assume that the education level is fairly low.

The government seems to get a lot of money from some interesting sources. Taiwan appears to be funding the construction of a large number of schools and Kuwait is funding the rebuilding of the roads. Believe me, the roads need rebuilding! Where they haven't been rebuilt it's a constant minefield of huge potholes.

One thing that they don't have is street signs. I mean none. Zip, zero, zilch. Nothing is named or numbered and it's extremely rare to find any signs at intersections. On top of that I don't think that most people down here have seen a map or know how to read one. This makes terrestrial navigation difficult.

After getting completely lost trying to find Grenada Marine by car (by sea was no problem), I pulled up my marine charts on the computer. These, believe it or not, have all of the roads and even houses marked on them. I got the Lat/Long coordinates of the intersections and used those to find it!

Today, Sunday, will be spent exploring the interior of the island and tomorrow will be spent getting the boat ready for storage...sigh...Unless you respond by Monday morning I'll be off the air until I'm back in the States.

Log ID: 285