On the 26th, we took a 20 minute dinghy ride from Port Egmont to Mt. Hartman Bay so that we could take a sightseeing tour with five other cruisers. Unlike our trip in St. Lucia (see CruiseNews 24), this time we got a real tour guide, named Elvis. We had seven passengers in a van with 14 seats, so we had room to spread out and enjoy ourselves.
St. George, Grenada has a Mediterranean flavor
Elvis first took
us on an overlook of the capitol of Grenada, St. Georges, and then north
along the west coast. We passed a settlement of small identical weathered
wooden shacks, which Elvis called "Janet houses", and so named because
they were built by the Grenadine government after hurricane Janet destroyed
much of the housing on the island.Swimming in the pool at Concord Falls
Our first stop
was at the Concord waterfall, where we changed into our swimming suits
and plunged into the 40-foot-deep pool at the base of the falls.
Much refreshed by the cool fresh water, we climbed back into the bus and
rode through the lush Grenadine countryside.Nutmeg, cocoa, bay leaves, cinnamon, calabash, and loofas are laid out for our inspection
Our next few stops
were an excellent example of why Grenada is called The Spice Island.
We stopped at a small spice farm and factory, where we were given a tour
by one of the workers. The "factory" itself is no more than a wooden
shed raised up off the ground several feet. Outside the shed on one
side were large wheeled drying trays, perhaps 15 feet square, which were
situated on rails so that they could be pushed under the shed when it rained,
thus keeping the spices dry. Inside the shed, we were shown how nutmeg
looks in its various stages: a small peach-like fruit which splits
open and allows the nut to drop to the ground; the red stringy covering
of the nut which is peeled off, sorted by quality, and which dries to yield
the yellow spice called mace; and the dark brown nut which is dried before
shipping, which is later cracked open and the nut ground for nutmeg.
Pushing in the drying racks for a passing shower
We also saw cloves,
which come from the bush looking like fire-engine-red candy corns.
As they dry they become the shape we are familiar with. We saw cocoa,
which begins as a red or yellow fruit filled with a sticky, gooey white
pulp. Inside the pulp are the cocoa beans, which are removed and
dried. We saw branches of a cinnamon tree's outer bark stripped off
and discarded, and how the inner bark is peeled off and saved. We
saw and smelled fresh bay leaves before they were dried. The spice
farm also grows loofas, which are not an aquatic sponge as we had always
thought.
From there we went on to one of the nutmeg co-ops, where nutmeg is dried, sorted for size, cracked, graded and packaged in large burlap sacks. We also saw a cocoa factory, which takes the cocoa bean (the fruit and pulp having been discarded by the growers), dries it, polishes the outer shell, then sorts and grades it before again packing it away in burlap bags. We stopped at a bamboo goods shop, where bamboo is made into knickknacks for tourists from more traditional baskets, brooms, and chairs to lampshades and models of jet airplanes. By then we were all hungry, and were glad to stop for lunch at a local restaurant.
Water-powered sugar mill
After lunch, we
toured a rum factory. Unlike the one we saw in Martinique, this rum
factory used much the same methods as when rum was first made here.
The original water wheel and crushing machinery made in 1785 are still
used to crush the cane. The cane is fed into the crusher by hand.
The juices run into evaporation vats, which are heated by cane furnaces
stoked by hand. After fermenting, the juice runs into a distiller
heated by a wood fire. Bottling is perhaps the most "modern" part of the
process: The distillate (150 proof rum) is poured through a T-shirt
filter into several plastic coolers where workers use the spigot at the
bottom to fill the bottles. Twelve days after being crushed from
sugar cane, the bottled rum is "ready to drink", though our rum tasting
at the end of the tour leaves that contention somewhat a matter of opinion.
On the way back, we had a quick stop at a national park before returning to the marina. Since we had a 20-minute dinghy ride through unmarked reefs, we had to leave before dark in order to make it back to the boat.
Not much else has been going on here. We went to a beach barbecue on Hog Island last night ($4 for a chicken dinner) where they had a nice steel band playing. Today we are going into town to see if we can find some ground beef, hot dogs, and maybe watermelon to celebrate the 4th of July tomorrow. In the next week or so we plan to head to Trinidad, where we hope to find parts for the boat that have not been available in the rest of the islands. Happy Independence Day to all!
Smooth Sailing,
Jim and Cathy