Merry Christmas!

Our wish for you is good health, happiness, and a prosperous New Year!

19 December 2008 - Friday

Christmas Lights in Grenada!

As we were coming home last night, we came upon this fantastic display of lights! I don't know exactly what this building is (there are about 5 in this complex), but apparently they've been setting up this display for the past 10 years. People can walk through this whole thing... it's amazing! Keep in mind... we calculated that electricity costs down here are about 3.5 times more than what we were paying in the US!

16 December 2008 - Tuesday

Christmas is coming!

We've been pretty busy over the past few weeks. Since Thanksgiving was so much fun we've had a few more friends over for lunch dates! Jimmy is an older Scottish fellow who lives nearby... he brought me some mint plants for my garden. Tony & Gisela retired here from Houston (although he's a Brit & she's German)... they've been extremely helpful to us over the past few years. And Tommy (another Brit) opened his home to Scott when he came down to buy us a vehicle. Mike & Jackie brought us a few more herb plants from their garden as well. They're the British couple that managed our property for us, and were our lifeline to Grenada! He's a fantastic gardener and always has goodies to share from the garden!

I finally got a hammock for the veranda! I'd been waiting about a month for the store to get them in. Apparently they were arriving here by sailboat & the rainy weather held them up. It's a wonderful place to "hang out" now!

We were on the go every day last weekend! On Friday night we attended a special dinner & cabaret show put on by the Grenada Hashers, then Saturday was their Christmas Hash... we were told to wear something red so I got out our Santa hats. Although this was one of the shortest hashes we've done, it was almost all hiking through a dry river bed... very rocky, with lots of trees & shrubs! Most of the time we had to duck under the fallen trees. (In the photo of Scott, you can see a pile of shredded paper near his feet... that is how they mark the trail we are to follow.) Afterward, we stopped at a roadside bar on the way back. Scott & I have stopped here (Runaway Bar) before so we invited the others to join us!

On Sunday we were supposed to attend a 5:00 rum punch party... invitation was for everyone who participated in the Thursday Quiz nights. We had all intentions of going, but got a call in the morning with an invite to a small party on a sailboat! Tony knows this guy who is captain of a sailboat that's available for charter. He said he was looking for some photos of the boat, so I offered to do it for him. It's a beautiful sailboat! We didn't sail out anywhere... just hung out because he had some repairs that need to be done on it. (Nothing you could see in the photos.) So we had an enjoyable afternoon (& evening)... and never made it to the rum punch party!

I've been working on making curtains for what we still call the "pink" room... our guest bedroom. I know... we've painted over the pink, but that's what it'll be called forever! I chose to make balloon shades because we could pull them up above the open window & don't have to worry about them getting dirty from the screens. I'll show more photos of that room later.


That's all for now! I'll try to make another report in a day or two!


Oh... here's a shot of the pink room before we painted it! ......

27 November 2008 - Thanksgiving Day!

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is our first holiday away from home. A month or so ago, we wondered how we would be spending this American holiday in Grenada... obviously just a normal day in the Caribbean! But amazingly, in the short time we've been here, we've become acquainted with a few other Americans... who were also looking for a way to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday.

So we hosted a group of 9 people... some we just met today... for a traditional Thanksgiving dinner here at our home in Bay Gardens! I'll name them in the order they appear in the photo... from left to right. Dave & Barb are originally from Maine and work at the medical university. (She is a neuropsychologist; Dave is teaching a business course there.) Bill & Debbie are from Alabama and Florida, and are living on their boat... a trawler... for the past 5 years. They are wintering here in Grenada, waiting for hurricane season to pass. By January, they'll be ready to move north again. Then it's Scott at the head of the table. Next to him is Amy & her husband, Ed who both work at the university. I didn't get much chance to talk to Amy to find out what her position is at the university, but I know Ed is a librarian there. Cindy, from Conshohocken, PA, is on the far right & she is here visiting Amy & Ed. This is her first visit to Grenada... and she was not expecting to have a traditional Thanksgiving dinner while on vacation!

Everyone chipped in & helped with the dinner. Debbie was a huge help in the kitchen! (Having lived on the boat for 5 years, I think she's been missing working in a "real" kitchen!) The menu was as follows: Crab stuffed mushrooms (appetizer), Turkey & stuffing, gravy & mashed potatoes, squash casserole, peas, cranberry sauce, pumpkin pie, key lime pie, coconut brownies, and wine, wine, and more wine! Barbara also brought some really good olives stuffed with almonds, pickles, and some kind of Caribbean chow-chow. Although we were missing our families today, it was a fabulous meal, with some really fun conversation! We've decided that we should get together more regularly... maybe have a game night!

Scott & I had been working around the house all week in preparation of the big dinner. I finally got my living room curtains done... and hung. And on Tuesday, we spent some time finally getting some of my photographs hung on the walls. Scott made a temporary table... with a 4'x8' sheet of plywood on top. And we had plenty of chairs. I love having all this space! This house is so much better for entertaining than our Mount Joy home!

We are now talking about getting together for Christmas... probably the day after, which is Boxing Day here (another holiday day off). Scott & I "think" we've been invited to Christmas dinner with one of our neighbors. I say "think" because I have a hard time understanding her! Guess I have a few more weeks to clarify that!

Well, we hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday! I'll probably be reporting more after the next hash... it's here at Bay Gardens this Saturday! It'll be a good chance to get out to REALLY see the neighborhood!

18 November 2008 - Tuesday

RAIN!!!

Today was Day 4 of a rainy spell we're in at the moment. This stretch of rain began on Saturday... as a matter of fact, we skipped the hash this weekend because of it. Last night it blew so hard during the rain storm that I was awakened by the sprinkles hitting me (from the open window across the room)! Until today, we've been cooped up looking for indoor projects.

I was scheduled to go to town this morning to pick up my new "cruiser" friend, Debbie. We made a plan to test out a recipe for pie dough today, and wouldn't let the rain stop us! Because of all the rain, I came across a number of land slides along the way... many of them closing down at least half of the roadway. I've included a few photos with this entry. The one that covers the whole road was on the way back to my house (the back road to town). When we came upon it, there was no where to turn around, so I ended up backing quite a distance down the hill before I came to a driveway that I could turn around in. Since I'm not very familiar with some of the other back roads, plus the thought that I might run into more land slides on the smaller roads... I chose to go nearly back to town to get on the main road home.

By the way, we've heard a new term here... apparently their word for land slide is: land slip. Well, let me tell you... I'm sure the road workers are very busy right now trying to keep after all the land slips! We actually heard that someone's pool slipped down the hill!

Debbie brought the Thanksgiving turkey with her today, along with some other supplies for our upcoming dinner. She doesn't have a car here, so she's become very experienced at getting around on the bus system here. Instead of driving her back to her boat, she had me take her to town to catch a bus the rest of the way. So I took a route I don't normally take to get her to the bus station in St. George's... that's the photo with the cruise ship in the background. Woo-eeee! Is that street ever steep!!! I was a little nervous driving down the hill, thinking I was going to start slipping! But I had no trouble at all. There were 3 cruise ships in today. I felt bad for the passengers because of all the rain. I don't know that this is normal for this time of year.

Well, I'm back to working on my living room curtains! Looks like I'll still have at least one more rainy day to fill... they say the sun isn't expected to come out before Thursday! Speaking of that, you'll notice a gray pipe on the left side of one of the photos here... that's the water line. I noticed today that we no longer have warm water coming out of the kitchen spigot... because the sun hasn't been out to warm it! (We don't have a hot water heater.) And for those of you that are envious of us being able to wear shorts and sandals year round... I've been wearing long pants for the past day or two because it's chilly!

Enjoy the photos! Now, go back up to the top of the page and check out the new poll I've added on the right column! Tell me what you want to hear more about!

9 November 2008 - Sunday

Hashing...

Yesterday was another "hash" day... a special one because they usually only do them every other week, and we just had the Halloween Hash last Saturday. Yesterday's hash trail was set because a local guy (Jah-wah) wanted to set it for his birthday. I tried (unsuccessfully) to talk Scott out of going. I didn't want to go because it was raining in the morning, and I'm still having trouble with the shoes I wear for these things. Here's the problem... I have a great pair of hiking boots that I wore to our first hash (in the mud, remember?). But since your feet and ankles swell down here, they've become too small and cause severe blisters on my heels. (I didn't think about that when I bought them back in PA!) So the only other pair of shoes that I can "sacrifice" to the mud trails are a pair of old sneaks that I used for mowing grass... they're not very good at gripping on hillside mud trails. So I knew that the rain in the morning would cause a muddy trail and figured I'd end up on my rear end at some point along the way!

Well, after a few graceful splits, and another near splat... I actually made it through with only a little mud on my hands (from catching myself during one of those splits)! There was one point in this trek where I had to use my hands to help climb an extremely steep road. It was a concrete road (with grooves cut in for traction) that was so steep I couldn't stand on it! My shoes were slippery and wouldn't grip on the wet road very well. When I peered back over my shoulder, I envisioned myself skidding all the way back down to the bottom! And THAT would have been the end of my hashing! I'm thinking... this is a ROAD that someone actually drives up???!!!

The photos show some of the reasons we enjoy doing these hikes... the views are spectacular, and the people who live along the way are so friendly! (Notice the Christmas tree on the porch!) There were a few times when we failed to notice the trail marks (because we were talking) and started on a wrong path... the people in the homes nearby would set us straight & help us along! On this hike, when the locals realized we were American (and not Brits), they would smile and yell "Obama"!

Anyway, I had the most fun on this hash because we met some more fun people!

1 November 2008 - Saturday

Happy Halloween!

Another month is over and we're now in the final few days before the historic presidential election. We'll be watching closely, along with a majority of the local Grenadians!

Today we attended our 3rd hash. Since Halloween was yesterday, we were told it was "mandatory" that we come in "fancy dress" (costume). So we both threw together a costume, with items we had in our closets. I found a pair of Scott's camoflaged army pants and a camo "do-rag", so I decided to try to build a costume around that. End result was... I was Rambo-ette and Scott was a lumberjack. The hash started at Grand Anse Beach (the tourist beach) and took us nearly 2 hours to finish! That first hill was so steep... and long... that I thought we were hiking all the way to heaven!!! It was actually a road, but I can't imagine actually trying to drive a car up that hill! The locals don't really celebrate Halloween like we do in the states, so we got quite a few questionable looks as we passed by their homes along the way! Nevertheless, we were greeted with numerous smiles when they realized we were in costume (and not just a bunch of wierdos)! At the end of the evening, they awarded prizes to the best costumes and Scott & I both won a bottle of rum each! It was loads of fun! We also met a few more people that we may spend some more time with in the coming weeks. One girl (Debbie) is from Florida, but has been living on a boat with her boyfriend for the past 5 years! She was dressed as a pirate. I was happy to meet another American... there are so few of them here! Most of the Americans we run into here are students at the medical university.

It looks like the cruise ship season has begun! During the month of October there were only a total of 5 ships that stopped here. But Friday began a run of at least 3 straight days when there was a cruise ship docked at the pier. During the month of November Grenada is expecting nearly 40,000 cruise ship passengers to visit... a very welcome time of year for the locals.

On another note... tonight those of you in the states will be turning your clocks back an hour. Here in the Caribbean, there is no need to use daylight savings time... since we're closer to the equator, we have nearly 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness year round. So there is no need to change the clocks. So starting tomorrow, we'll be an hour ahead of the east coast.

That's all for now!