Nous sommes le 29 octobre. Toujours en préparation du départ, nous avons passé trois jours à la marina de Clarkes Court Bay pour faire l’entretien du dessalinisateur. Ça tombait bien puisqu’il y avait des vents de plus de 20n et j’en ai profité pour terminer le pare-soleil avant. Il reste l’antenne VHF. JP en a conclu que l’on doit changer le câble entre la radio et l’antenne pour un plus gros. Pour ce faire, JP doit remonter au mât et nous décidons donc d’explorer une dernière baie plus à l’Est : Calivigny Harbor. Pour y aller, la mer est légèr [View Full Entry]

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My earlier blog was on a trip to the volcano on St Vincent, the largest of this group of islands. The nearest island to St Vincent is Bequia a very beautiful island, population 5000, about one hour by ferry from St Vincent. I went there a couple of times, just for the day. There is a lovely beach, good snorkeling, an interesting turtle preservation sanctuary and nice restaurants. [View Full Entry]

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I spent a week-end On Union Islands and the Tobago Cays in March 09. We flew from St Vincent via Canouan Island to Union Island where we stayed the night in a chalet by the sea. The high point was a days on a catamaran touring the Tobago Cays a chain of five tiny islands. These islands are the typical 'tropical paradise' with beautiful quiet sandy palm fringed beaches. the snorkeling is amazing. [View Full Entry]

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What a relief… to be south of the hurricane belt and back in the Grenadines, some of the most beautiful islands in the world. We love the Grenadines and have spent a lot of time here. But surprisingly, have not seen it all. So once we rested up for a couple of days and recovered from our sail down it was time to kick back, relax, and explore. We spent a couple of weeks touring the Grenadines. Of course we had to stop at some of our favorite anchorages, including Bequia and Union Island and the Tobago Cays and Mopion and [View Full Entry]

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On Saturday 4 April 2009 my colleague and I did one of the popular excursions on St Vincent. We hired a guide and accompanied by the daughters of a local friend who asked to join us, we walked to the crater of the famous La Soufriere volcano 4048 feet. We were lucky with the weather. It was a fine day with fantastic visibility all the way. It was quite hard going in places for non-climbers but well worth it. One of the things I like about the island is the abundance of tropical vegetation without the usual 'nasties' like poisonous snakes. [View Full Entry]

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Jammin’ Day 5 and reggae is playing on the car stereo as we swing around the winding roads up the Windwards coast of St Vincent. We wind our way between the banana trees along a bumpy track and up the hill, passing a lush array of trees including breadfruit, guava, cashew and passion fruit, before arriving at a shining building painted in the green and blue colours of the FAIRTRADE Mark.. This is Montaque, in St Vincent, it’s the brand name of a range of jams, jellies and juices, but for the banana farmers of St Lucia, Dominica and St Vincent [View Full Entry]

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When you pick up a bag of Fairtrade bananas costing £1.29 in Asda today, it’s hard to imagine the work that has gone into putting it together. Gideon Gilbert is the chair of the Mesopotamia Fair Trade banana farmers’ group. His day on the farm often starts before 6am, before the day gets too hot, and his hard work on the farm is evident in the lush, green leaves of the healthy banana plants that cling to the steep hillside. It’s tough and back breaking work, there’s watergrass and other weeds to clear, leaves to prune, old banana plant debris to [View Full Entry]

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1st June marks the official start of the hurricane season in St Vincent, and almost like clockwork the rain is hammering on the roof of the reception centre at Langley Park, where the farmers are bringing their fruit for weighing, checking and shipment. Nearby, grey and copper coloured waves crash to the shores, and the coconut palms bend in the wind that gives these islands their name. Nioka Abbott was up early working through the downpour to cut and pack the twenty 18 kilogram boxes of bananas she’s promised for this week’s Asda and Sainsbury shipment. As she says, ‘her [View Full Entry]

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At the modest offices of the St Vincent National Fair Trade Organisation, there is a busy flow of farmers coming in to collect the bags they will need for the next harvest. Some of them are collecting Asda branded bags, some plain ones, as their bananas are also sold loose and as Caribbean smalls into Sainsbury’s. The Fair Trade Organisation is running a tight operation, everything is receipted, signed and stamped in duplicate, along with a constant friendly banter between the farmers as they come and grow. However today, the farmers and the Fair Trade Organisation have got a lot on [View Full Entry]

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Arriving in St Vincent is quite spectacular - the twin prop plane sails low in the sky heading towards the setting sun and then sharply banks to the right. We pass over the roofs of some beautiful villas, and then skim the rocky shore, hugging the shoreline with the waves crashing against the rocks literally a few metres below us. Just as it seems we're destined to either clip the rocks with the wings, or land in the water, the ground flattens, a runway appears, and within a couple of seconds we've bounced onto it. The air stewardess says, Welcome to [View Full Entry]

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