We are heading into our final week(s) here in Grenada. Everyday we have been working on the boat and finishing up final tasks to prepare her for the passage. We have also been trying to get online for the past week but every time something has thwarted our attempts, so we will keep trying and will be posting as we catch any internet signals! We are heading south west hitting La Blanquila, Los Roques, the ABC Islands (Aruba, Bonaire, and Curacao) and eventually to Cartegena, Colombia.

Roger's Bar on Hog Island

While we spend most of the daylight hours working on the boat and occasionally jumping off the side to cool off we have been hanging out on the beach at night listening to the stories of other world travelers and cruisers. What makes travel by boat so unique than any other form is that each boat is its’ own little universe, and the people on them always have such distinct and fascinating stories. Take for example this Italian woman we have met anchored off the beach of Hog Island. She lived in Germany before the wall fell, got drafted in to the “social improvement” plans of the era and ended up being taught how to screen print. “I got out of having to do photography, but eye, they got me and I loved it!” Her and her boyfriend at the time ended up opening a print shop and specialized in the punk-rock scene of Berlin at the time. By the time the wall fell her store was doing well and by the time the tourist showed up her store was doing extremely well. They ended up buying an old tug boat (?) from a nickel-and-dime style magazine on a whim that took them to North Africa on several occasions. One thing led to another, and she ended up selling the business, raising a daughter in England, and ended up in Carique (The Island north of Grenada). Here she ran a beach bar for a little while until all those “lazy people’ who n‘ever buy nothing stay all day” made her sell the bar. While walking around town she happened across this adorable building and fell in love with it. She bought it on site without even going inside and with another Italian friend decided to open a pizzeria. “I learn’t how to cook the day we opened, but the hype was there, the place we made so nice, that we ended up being the best pizzeria in the Caribbean! And I found out I can cook.” This conversation took place on the beach over a course of a couple of beers and I am sure there are many more up her sleeve.

Yesterday John and I went over to the next bay for a English Fish and Chips meal. There were about a dozen or so other sailors from around the world there as well. While we got our plate filled with battered Mahi Mahi, coleslaw, and chips (French fries for us Americans) we settled into a table with our new friends. There is Tony (lady) and Joe, a German and Portuguese couple who own this amazing 94 year old Nova Scotian fishing boat that has been re-rigged to be a sailboat. They are very friendly and are quite hilarious. Between the two of them we figured that they spoke about ten languages! They speak great English but modestly tell us English is their worst one. There was also a Celtic/Welch gentleman at our table called Mich. He is quite the ‘ol salt with a range of stories going back to the second world war. Being a rugged sailor type his stories are both fantastic and colorfully decked out as well. By the end of the evening with the bar’s speakers playing Irish music he got his 67 year old body out of his chair and gulping down the rest of his beer began to dance the jig!

These encounters and swapping of stories is what I love about traveling and meeting new people. One day I hope that the stories that John and I bring back will ignite that spark of imagination and wonderlust into someone else.

There are all types of people anchored near us.

Neil and Rusty

Though we only have a little more time left here I think we will have our hands full just trying to scratch the surface of potential friends and stories.

Next blog I will write about our extremely cheap and exciting tour of the Island using just the local bus systems! I’ll show you how you too can tour the island, have a large lunch, and a few beers by the beach for only $40. Stay tuned!

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“What would you like to eat for your goodbye dinner party?”

“I want to eat stuff that a Japanese mom would make on an average Wednesday night!”

Normally this would be an absurd answer. Luckily it was accepted as only slightly absurd in this crowd. First of all, I suspect that they are always half expecting me to blurt out absurd and random comments, and secondly they were all Japanese and were quick to figure out what I meant. I wanted a good ‘ole home style cooking that I had grown up with as my “last meal” with them.

To summarize how I got to that conversation in the first place will be another story. Let’s just say that to summarize I grew up in Japan, left at twelve, went to college where I happened to become roommates with a Japanese girl, found out I was somehow still fluent in Japanese, graduated, got a job at a Japanese company where the majority of the people I interact with were Japanese, and have been there for a year and a half before I announced my plans to leave to travel. Phew! That took me years of practice to gain the skill to summarize life! Yes and when looked at this way, I do notice a common thread through my life as well.

That is how I found myself gorging blissfully on the best home cooked Japanese food east of the Pacific one Saturday afternoon. It was a little get together of all of my Japanese co-workers where we ate, sang karaoke, and had a great time. Everyone even gave a little speech of what they thought of me and wishing me good luck. Luckily what they had to say was very flattering! But the funny thing is that though I learned how they see me, I also learned more about their character better as each had a distinctly different style. They even caught me by complete surprise when they presented me with a Fossil watch! It even has a bright orange wrist band—sooo my style ! Thank you everyone for everything you’ve done. I hope to see you all again soon!

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