Carriacou | Stefanie & Tyler

June 4, 2012

Vacation in Carriacou – Part 3

So when first researching this trip, we learned that we could take a day-long snorkeling trip on a ship that was used in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies up through the Grenadines and the Tobago Cays. If you know me just a little, this was quite possibly the greatest news I could have received. So we immediately started looking into it and lucky for us, we got on a trip. As you know from the story in Part 2, we were weathered out from our scheduled day buy found out that there was room on a different trip scheduled for Friday.

So we made the arrangements again and got ourselves up early, sunscreened to perfection, and made our way to the other side of the Island. Fortunately for us, our speed boat driver Rameez was already there waiting for us. Challenge one was at least overcome.

The weather was better, but certainly not storm free. Upon getting into the speedboat and taking off to meet the ship in international waters to avoid the hassel and time of going through customs and immigrations (afterall we were never really going to step foot on land so we thought), I immediately began to regret this decision. It was probably the most terrifying thing I have ever done. The waves and the rain and Rameez’s “need for speed” had me terrified and in a panic. Tyler eventually asked him to take it a little easier on the waves and that helped, but I was praising God for bringing me safely to the dock of Union Island.

So we ended up on Union Island safe thankfully, only to be informed that due to overcrowding on the tiny 8 seat plane, we would need to wait for the rest of the passengers to arrive. So we were given instructions to explore the island. We instantly wished we had our passports because now we had time for customs and we both really wanted our stamp! But alas, we were illegal immigrants wandering around the cute little island that is part of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. It was actually an adorable little town and we had a ton of fun exploring it.

On the dock - only a little worse for the wear.

Our boat floating off shore - Capt. Jack would be proud.

After exploring Union Island we met up with the captain and he took us aboard the Satori (our ship). We got there before anyone else so we enjoyed walking about and had some delicious breakfast snacks on board. Then as a giant rainstorm rolled in we went below deck with the crew. It was cool to see all inside. They fit 3 full-size bedrooms on the thing! The crew were actually really cool and we had some fun hanging out with them before setting sail. We set-off a little late, but it was still so worth it.

Once we met our fellow mates, we set sail for Mayreau which was our first stop. This island is inhabited, but not by very many people. There is only one village with about 300 people. The captain said they just had electricity brought in like 10 years ago.

Then we set sail for the Cays. The Cays are known to grow a special grass that apparently is like crack to sea turtles and it is supposed to be the best place to see them. Boy are they right! I could not believe how many there were. When we first walked into the water and put our head down, we saw about 8 of them all around us. We basically startled them by walking in. We would swim with one or two we saw, and when they got too fast, we would just wait a minute or so and another one would swim up. It was incredible! And to top it all off, they filmed some of the Pirates movies in the Grenadines and we were able to see the island that Jack Sparrow was marooned on in the films. So awesome! Our nerdy hearts were filled to the brim. After swimming with turtled for a while we headed to the reefs to see what kinds of fish and other sea life we might spot and then headed back to the Satori for lunch. A yummy Grenadian lunch with lots of rum punch to go around followed by rum cake and of course, coffee and rum! The rum is never gone down here.

After that we made on last stop to a resort island called Palm Island. It is one of those islands that all it is is a resort and people pay like upwards of 600 dollars a night to stay there. In fact, we found it a little boring. But I guess it was cool to see. Not sure what is worth all that money since the beaches were were staying at seemed just as nice. But, oh hey. Our speedboat guy came and met us at Palm and we jumped in his little black boat and headed back to our little Carriacou. The trip back was a little less terrifying and I think I enjoyed it more. Our night ended with a delicious fresh fish meal cooked by the wife of the guy who owned the house we stayed at. We figured after all that swimming in the sea, we would want nothing more than to eat the deliciousness inside it.

And sadly all good things come to an end so we unfortunately had to fly out on Friday. So we headed to the airport, were the only ones there, went through the most pathetic excuse for airline security, and boarded our tiny little plane. We were the only 2 passengers – what a great deal! We were able to catch some sweet air shots of Carriacou as we took off. And that was the end of quite possible the best vacation ever. I suppose we will likely top it eventually, but whenever we travel together we always make the best adventure out of it. That is why I love Tyler, he makes everything a million times more fun. 🙂

The hillside we stayed in - look for the blue house!

Article

June 4, 2012

by Stefanie Paulson

Vacation in Carriacou – Part 2

After a fun day on Sandy Island, Tyler and I decided that checking off another island from our list was a must do. So we booked a ferry ride to Petite Martinique, the third Island of Grenada’s tri-island state. It is significantly smaller than even Carriacou and only about 700 people live there. We basically took the ferry from the docks of Carriacou, got off at PM, at lunch and walked the main beach, then took the ferry back. And that was the highlight of the island. But we did decide to take some cool pics with our Toms flag as we figured this was one of the best far-corners-of-the-map kind of places we could take it to.

We were pretty exhausted after a couple days of Island hoping. We ended up decided to lay low and hang around the little inn we were staying in more the next couple days. We even made some delicious homemade pizza on Tuesday night to enjoy with our anniversary wine. I was given a wonderful bottle of wine at my bachelorette party and Tyler and I, since we couldn’t eat a piece of cake from the big day (or what we decided would be a cupcake from the same bakery) we settled for opening the bottle. So not only did we shlep the bottle all the way to Grenada, but we packed it up and flew it with us to Carriacou. Amazingly it made all of the trips fine and it was delicious! Happy 1 year to us!!

Wednesday we were planning on going on this epic pirate ship boat ride (more on that later), but the weather just did not cooperate. I have decided that we left for Carriacou and it was dry season and came back during wet season. After 3 days of picture perfect Caribbean weather, the skies decided that a least 2 days or fairly consistent torrential rain was in order. However, we were never informed that the weather would hinder the boat trip so despite the fact that the weather was awful, I put on my adventure face and got ready for a day of sailing and snorkeling. We arranged the taxi driver who was just barely able to make it up the road to where we were staying thanks to the mud, and hiked up the muddy driveway he couldn’t make it down to meet him. We proceeded to have him drive us half-way around the island to the north where we were supposed to meet a guy who would take us by speedboat to meet up with the ship moored outside Union Island, only he didn’t show. After we stood out in the pouring rain for a good half-hour, we called the lady who organized the trip who found out for us that the speedboat driver was waiting for a break in the weather (did I ever mention that Grenadians hate rain??) that never came. We were pretty certain we would not meet up with the boat in time, so, quite wet and disappointed we headed back to our side of the Island.

We spent some time walking through downtown Hillsborough, the only real main city in Carriacou. And even found the most adorable little family of puppies that Tyler wouldn’t let me pet for fear I might try and smuggle one home. And to top off the day, we had to walk the lovely dirt road back up to the place we were staying at. We had mud stuck to our shoes no lie about 6 inches thick. It was quite a feat. I decided that we should have just stayed in bed, it would have saved us the heartache. But we did our best to redeem the night by playing endless hours of monopoly, watching movies, and eating pesto pasta. That almost made up for the mud – but not quite.

Here are some pictures from a little exploring we did on Tuesday…

Enjoying the view from the top of the jetty we hiked to.

…And some more pictures of the town.

Close-up of an awesome hand carved wooden statue from the museum

Article

June 2, 2012

by Stefanie Paulson

Vacation in Carriacou – Part 1

There is no better way to celebrate finishing the first year of medical school and a one year wedding anniversary than travelling to a small, quiet and remote Caribbean island for sand, sun, and fun. However, since we live on a small Caribbean island we decided to travel to an even smaller one!

Tyler and I spent a week in Carriacou at the end of May. Carriacou is part of Grenada and is not too far off of the northern shores. We decided to fly because we were hoping that our adorable little 8 seater plane would allow us to get some great overhead views of Grenada and the other small, uninhabited islands as we flew over.

Look at how little our yellow plane is compared to that big Delta jet!

Tyler and I found this little place to stay at that was way up in the hills and away from everything! It was basically someone’s house that used the bottom level as a little inn. We actually met the guy at the dentist who owns the place a while back, and it was funny that we ended up coming to stay with him afterall. Our room had a balcony that overlooked the water with a terrific view of some of Carriacou’s cays and then you could even see the southern-most part of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Union Island.

We arrived into Carriacou early on Saturday morning. It is only a 20 minute flight from Grenada and the airport is smaller than small, so we were walking along the private white sand beaches of where we were staying less than 2 hours after take-off. Our first day we spent mostly exploring Paradise Beach and napping – my favorite pastime really. Oh, and reading. Feels so good to read fun books again!

On day two we headed out in a random guys little power fishing boat out to a little tiny island that was maybe a mile off of the coast of Carriacou. We were staring at it from our balcony and decided that we should go there. We were the only people on the island for the whole day. So we snorkled, at a picnic lunch, and enjoyed marooning ourselves on a private island for a day. It was such a blast!