Seems hard to believe that just last week we plus John Nurse were basking in lovely temperatures in the Grenadines and staring at my very favourite shade of turquoise water, everywhere around us.
Managed to get to the majority of the best Grenadines Islands in our 9 days - St Vincent, Bequia, Mayreau, the Tobago Cays, Petit Tabac, Palm Island, Union Island, Happy Island, Canouan, Petit St Vincent, Mopion, Carriacou and Sandy Island – I think that was the lot.
Ranged from biggish busy islands like St Vincent, through to a self-built island (man had actually built Happy Island from reclaimed rubbish and conch shells, now runs a bar there where he can fit up to 300 people on the concrete itself and 'another 300 in the water').
Mopion was the smallest and was really stunning – about 30 metres of pure sand with just a battered sun shelter umbrella on it.
Petit Tabac was where Pirates of the Caribbean was partly filmed, a strip of about 200m, 20 metres wide with coconut trees on it and not much else. Petit St Vincent had the most idyllic hotel as its beaches were just gorgeous and the service was good (not a whole lot of that in the Caribbean..) And the Tobago Cays, a set of lovely islands including a turtle sanctuary were just lovely – stand on deck and in ten minutes you'd see at least 5 little turtle heads popping up for some balmy air. Plus the sting rays and box fish, so nice.
And some amusing bars en route – such as the Whaleboner here, where all the seats are made from whale tail bones. Good for a quick straddle but not for a whole evening's boozing… Slightly lacking in bounce.
Boys very happy though fiddling about with the boat and charts, as well as cooking up lobster mac n cheese for supper. Given that the shops didn't even have a pack of ham to buy, thank god for the fishy stuff on offer. usually to be bought when a man appears at the side of the road and blows his conch shell – yes really – or more often from the little boats plying the catamarans for trade.
Bit of a pisser that I managed to lose my phone travelling from there via Trinidad to New York, where it was definitely colder. Hopefully be up and running on text again by tomorrow. Couple of pix on NY to follow.
Still, it's always really nice to get home, despite the chill. Straight back into a day of chemo on Tues topped off with a frustrating trip to Carphone Warehouse. Did I say it was good to be back??
Hope to catch up with you all in the next few weeks. It's nearly Christmas – drinkies??
x