Wednesday, November 30, 2022

Back to da Islands

 

Motoring into the marina at St. Georges, Grenada to put Aspen back together again.

Grand Anse Beach, Grenada.  Ahhhh.

Aspen at the dock in the marina, with lots and lots of work getting her ready for sailing again.

Aspen getting ready to touch the Caribbean Sea.

Spice Island Boat Yard in Grenada.  Yes, it rains a lot!
 

S/Y Aspen – November 30, 2022 – Log #185

Aspen Position: 12 degrees 02’ N, 61 degrees 44’ W

St. Georges, Grenada, Caribbean

 

Back to da Islands

 

Coming back to da islands, from snowy and cold Colorado, is always interesting. 

 

The usual run-for-the-next-flight at the airport seems to be normal these days, especially when connecting in Miami for points south.

 

Covid protocols in da islands are just memories, thank goodness.  So no more endless forms, tests or quarantine centers are needed.  Masks are optional as well, and that is all great news.

 

Seeing Aspen sitting on land is exciting, when we arrive.  She is upright and looks sparkling in the warm and endless tropical rain that seems to fall during November, way down south in Grenada.

 

Grenada, yes, the scene of Steve’s attack and accident with the vicious pit bull guard dog.  Maria still has flashbacks from that horrific day, seeing Steve lying on the concrete walkway in a pool of blood outside our little apartment.  Steve, well, not so much as his mind was pretty cloudy at the time, ha ha.

 

But once Aspen touched the warm Caribbean Sea a few days ago, all seemed right in the world again.

 

Layers of dirt and dust are being stripped from Aspen, thanks to good water pressure here in the marina.  Of course, there are a few problems, since Aspen was in storage for so long.

 

Batteries, who need those?  We certainly do since electricity is essential to living off the grid.  Our batteries just happened to be at Zero volts when we arrived.  Ouch.

 

New batteries were ordered, from Miami of course, and we can see the large shipping container at the port here in Grenada where they sit in the sun. 

 

Sit, sit and more sitting, since unloading cargo seems to be a low priority and on extremely slow island time.  Maybe, hopefully, we will see our precious batteries sometime soon?

 

Also, transitioning from donning winter coats, gloves and stocking hats to wearing next to nothing in the tropical heat takes a lot of adjustment.  Sweat takes on a whole new meaning, especially since we are not acclimated to the heat just yet.  Oh, that too will come, along with our change in color to a more sun-friendly brown skin as the days pass.

 

Islands to the north call us, and as soon as we get our batteries you can follow our track this sailing season.

 

Sail on, sail on Aspen…

 

Steve and Maria

PS - More pictures can be found at:  http://syaspen.blogspot.com/

1.     You can follow Aspen’s route here, once we start sailing again: https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/SV_Aspen

2.     Aspen will also have a Garmin tracker working so you can follow along:  https://share.garmin.com/SYAspen