They're Baaaa-aaack!!!

November 13 - 30, 2013
Clarke's Court Bay, Grenada
Woo hoo! Deana and Troy have finally come back to us! Okay, so they've REALLY come back to their beloved home on the water, Storyville. Still, having last seen them in St. Martin eight months ago, we've been suffering from some major separation anxiety! We hopped into a taxi with Dave and Lisa to play "welcome wagon" for Deana and Troy as they got off the plane, and Lisa even thought to bring a cooler with a few cold Stag beers for them. (She's such a great hostess!) We shared big hugs and a few tears as we finally got to welcome our friends to Grenada, and it took Miss Luna all of two minutes to remember us and give us slobbery kisses. Deana and Troy had some serious work ahead to get Storyville back into cruising shape after being closed up on a mooring ball for so long, but they managed to get over to our neighborhood just in time for the Thanksgiving festivities.

Before celebrating Turkey Day, however, we had a more "local" offering to celebrate: RUM! We attended the 4th Annual Caribbean Rum & Beer Festival, which was held on the 22nd & 23rd of November in Grand Anse. The festival showcased beers and rums from all over the Caribbean and included beverage tastings, cooking-with-rum demonstrations/tastings, recipes, cocktail-making contests, a steel pan band, and a live Soca band to round out the evening.
We apparently missed the beer tasting on Friday, but thoroughly enjoyed the rum and food sampling on Saturday afternoon. We had an opportunity to try rums from Grenada, Barbados, Guyana, Dominica, Jamaica, Suriname, and the US, and were hard-pressed to choose a favorite. We had such a fantastic time that we ended up closing down the festival. Our taxi driver seemed a bit impatient, but we sure had fun. Who knows? We may have to stick around for next year's festival! Interested? Save the dates: November 21st & 22nd, 2014.

As if November hadn't been a crazy month already, we still had American Thanksgiving to celebrate. (Why "American" Thanksgiving? Because both Grenadian and Canadian Thanksgivings were celebrated here in October.) Clarke's Court Bay Marina hosted a beautiful Thanksgiving dinner, transforming our normally-casual cruiser bar into a lovely spot with tablecloths, candles, and floral centerpieces. They provided turkeys, stuffing, and gravy for a small fee, and 60-70 cruisers brought mouth-watering salads, veggies, breads, starches, and desserts to share. We were full to bursting by 3pm, and couldn't think of eating another bite till the next morning. One thing's for sure: we cruisers can cook!

Our second Thanksgiving feast was held the following Saturday, when we made a huge turkey and ham dinner - complete with 16 sides and desserts - for our Grenadian family.
Eslyn graciously offered her home and downstairs apartment, where we filled two ovens and half a dozen stovetops with turkeys, crescent rolls, soups, veggies, and casseroles for four solid hours. We began serving around 6pm, and the get-together lasted well into the night. Troy even brought out his guitar to entertain the last of the group, and we ended up spending the night at Eslyn's. We had some serious clean-up to do... :-)

December is shaping up to be yet another busy month, with concerts, island tours, hashes, Christmas and New Year's celebrations, and get-togethers we don't even know about yet. Rumor has it the family is planning another oildown on the beach, and Lisa is organizing a movie and ice cream day out with the kids once they're out of school. We'll definitely stay in Grenada through New Year's, and will begin slowly moving north at our first weather window in January. Til next time...

Thanks again to Lisa & Deana for sharing their pictures with us!

Please enjoy more photos here.