Goodbye Grenada, hello St Vincent and the Grenadines

Clifton Harbour is the main town, but is not really more than a large village. Here we had to complete our ‘check in’ to the new country. We had already completed four forms on line and emailed documents, including vaccination proof and PCR test results. So, following the local protocol, things were reasonably straight forward: anchor, dinghy ashore, find the local agent, hand over the paperwork, pay and wait. The agent then took our information to customs and immigration (about 5 minutes walk along the street!) to get check in completed. Simple? Not too bad, although we did have to wait in the bar until the agent had sorted everything. Took about 90 minutes and two beers. Such a hardship!

Another short dinghy ride took us to the village of Ashton. From here we walked up and over the hill to the other side of the island. The views of Richmond Bay, Sparrow’s Beach and the more northern islands of Mayreau and Tobago Cays were stunning. Not a good place to anchor though – too many reefs to navigate and no protection from the N/NE wind and swell.

Our favourite anchorage on Union Island was Chatham Bay. This is a large, curving bay with a long beach and good protection from the wind and swell. There is a very rough track down to the beach, but it is more like an old river bed, so there is no provisioning here. Instead the long beach is littered with  half a dozen bars. These are mainly wooden huts with fridges, but they do make great places to sit and watch the sun set.

One of the original beach bars here is Shark Attack run by Mr Sharkie. Like most of the local bars the menu is limited: BBQ lobster, chicken or fish with rice and salad washed down with beer or rum punch. Here we had a great evening catching up with some friends, new and old. Good food, great company and even a beach bonfire.

Mr Sharkie is a great character who has been running his bar here for over 25 years. One of our ARC+ friends mentioned him to her mum and was informed that she had been there too – 17 years ago and, at that time, she had to bring her own cutlery!

The next island north in the Grenadines is Mayreau. Some people do not stop here, preferring to head straight to the neighbouring Tobago Cays. However, we made a stop for a couple of nights at Saline Bay.

While at Saline, we had the chance to snorkel and walk. Walking up through the village, the locals all called out to us to come into their bars. We chose ‘Righteous and de Youths’: a colourful place run by local Rastafarian, Bob. He insisted that we went up to the VIP lounge. We were a little dubious, as the way was through some very narrow and dark stairways, but the view from the terrace was excellent. Bob rustled up a couple of cocktails and then entertained us with stories of how he had built the bar himself, adding a bit more each year. He was also a singer and drummer and insisted that we join him in a couple of very unique songs. One was about his mum complaining that he never answered the mobile to her!!