Other than going with Sarah and Nigel to the music jam, we had a lazy week, only popping ashore for a showers, beers, and the internet so we thought we had better start taking advantage of the taxis and tours here and to have a look at Grenada!!
Although the anchorages and marinas are not far from the shops etc they are slightly off the beaten track so arrangements have been made with the local taxi drivers to pick up yachties from the different areas and take them to the supermarkets on a regular basis. It costs EC$15 (about £4.50) but as they call at the bank on the way and at a number of different outlets it is worth it. There is a mini-mart in the marina complex (quite limited and inevitably a bit expensive!) where we had bought a few things and also a French butcher which sells really good local organic meat and has a delicatessen with French cheeses etc but on Friday we went with 3/4 others from Prickly Bay on the shopping bus. The supermarket was really pretty well stocked and we were able to get everything that we wanted.
Although the anchorages and marinas are not far from the shops etc they are slightly off the beaten track so arrangements have been made with the local taxi drivers to pick up yachties from the different areas and take them to the supermarkets on a regular basis. It costs EC$15 (about £4.50) but as they call at the bank on the way and at a number of different outlets it is worth it. There is a mini-mart in the marina complex (quite limited and inevitably a bit expensive!) where we had bought a few things and also a French butcher which sells really good local organic meat and has a delicatessen with French cheeses etc but on Friday we went with 3/4 others from Prickly Bay on the shopping bus. The supermarket was really pretty well stocked and we were able to get everything that we wanted.
On Wednesday we had booked to go on the round island trip, going up into the rain forest, visiting a chocolate factory, rum factory and we had HOPED to visit the nutmeg processing plant. Grenada is the biggest supplier of nutmegs in the world!!!
About 12 of us were picked from Prickly Bay and Secret Harbour by Cutty and off we went. It was a brilliant day but unfortunately Cutty changed our route slightly and we missed the nutmeg factory! He did point out many nutmeg trees and also picked one to show us which I was able to keep. He was amazing- he kept stopping, picking leaves and fruits and showing us the different plants: nutmegs, of course, coffee beans, cinnamon bark, tumeric roots, cocoa beans, tangerine leaves and many many more. Grenada suffered a hurricane in 2004 and this decimated their coffee plantations and nutmegs trees so it was with great pleasure he was able to show us how the nutmeg trees and coffee bushes are slowly coming back to health.
The route took us up and along the spine of Grenada where you could see the Caribbean Sea out of our left hand window and the Atrlantic Ocean out of the right. We overlooked St George, the capital city and went past old forts the French had positioned here for the 360* view - to ensure they were not caught napping as the British had been when the French invaded. It was a centruy and a halh before the island was finally awarded to the British in 1783. It is now an independent country having been given independence 43 years ago on 7th February 1974.
We travelled into the centre of the island visiting the Annandale Falls, through the Grand Etang Forest Reserve and calling in briefly to the house of a retired official of Grenada whose garden designs had won prizes at the Chelsea Flower Show, had met the Queen and Prince Charles on a number of occasions, had been awarded an OBE AND who had developed Nut-Med -using nutmeg as an ingredient in sprays, creams and oils for pain relief!! (And it works!!!); on to the outskirts of Grenville on the east coast before turning back inland to visit the chocolate factory.
I think we were all surprise by the chocolate factory- it was a small house that you would completely overlook if you passed by! The cocoa beans were taken there and sorted and transferred to a short way down the road to a small complex where the chocolate was later sold and here the beans were dried and then returned to the factory to be made into chocolate. The only additions being sugar and vanilla- no milk or dairy products here! We were able to try the various "strengths" - our favourites were the 60% with nibletts (tiny pieces of cocoa) and the 71% with salt added! Strangely this didn't taste of salt but brought out the sweetness! The 100% was definitely NOT to our taste and we needed a another taster of the 60% to take the taste away!! Yes we did buy some!
Off again this time towards the rum factory but with lunch first thankfully! The restaurant was in a lovely setting with a great view and served a simple but very good buffet with a soda for EC$35 (£10).
The sugar cane is crushed by machinery worked by an old water wheel, the juice is transferred along white plastic pipes (looking very much like ordinary plumbing pipes!) to 5 great vats where it is boiled down and then passed through to the fermentation chamber. These are now made of concrete rather than the old wooden containers of old. That’s it! This rum is not aged but then bottled and sold.
The MINIMUM proof of their rum is 75%!!!!! The percentage depends purely on the sugar in the canes - in the dry season it tends to be "weaker" but still no less than 75%. To enable people to take the rum on aeroplanes they do sell one that they have diluted with distilled water to 69%!! We sampled the undiluted rum which tasted like pure alcohol and the 69% - not much better! The factory also bottles the rum as a rum punch, rum and sorrel and a chocolate liquor - much better. Here, however, we did not buy!
Our tour finished by returning through Grenville and travelling along the east and then south coast to La Sagesse beach, a typical Caribbean beach, where we had a quick stroll, A lovely end to a great day.