We and our two buddy boats motored to the Tobago Cays on June 2nd. On the 3rd, we swam ashore and climbed to the top of the little hill by the anchorage. No matter where we looked, the views were stunning!

Here are our three boats at anchor in the channel: Seahike is farthest back, Wingo is in the middle, and Deuces Wild is at the front.

We took the dinghy to Baradal on the 4th to snorkel. We saw two rays and three turtles. We climbed the small hill after snorkeling and again saw nothing but beauty!

The turtle pictures are courtesy of our friends, Cathie and Greg. Thank you!

We had BBQ ashore that evening.

We chilled on the 5th. We went to the tiny little beach area to our port side and chatted with our boat buddies. There are so many conch shells!

Conch “graveyard” on the beach:

It was time to check out of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. We sailed to Clifton Harbor on Union Island to do so.

The sky had been hazy for some time. We learned that it was Saharan dust. Yep, all the way from a desert in Africa!

Buddy boats!

We left Union as soon as we’d checked out and sailed to Tyrell Bay on Carriacou to check into Grenada. We sailed most of the way to Carriacou, going from 3.9 kts to 5.5 kts. It was a lazy, comfortable sail.

It took us three tries to find a spot to anchor in Tyrell Bay. We couldn’t find a sandy spot with enough room. But we found a great spot on the third try.

Greg and Cathie arrived first and Greg had already checked them in. Michael and I picked up Tina in our dinghy and we went ashore to check in. We stopped at the restaurant right next to Customs and Immigration for a beverage. Tina and I had painkillers and Michael had a Pina Colada.

Then it was time to take the dinghy to the other side of the bay so we could buy groceries. There are two good grocery stores in the bay and a fresh fruit and veggie stand as well. Really nice!

We enjoyed yet another pretty sunset that evening.

June 7th was a lazy day. The “usual” six of us, plus Kevin (another sailor) and Lola (you know, Lola the Dog), went out for lunch at The Gallery Bistro. The food was wonderful! It is owned and run by a married couple.

We all stopped at the fresh fruit and veggie “booth” (it was pretty small, but had a nice variety) on the way to lunch. Afterwards, Kevin and I walked to the grocery store to buy yet more groceries. Then we all took our respective dinghies back to our respective boats.

Cathie, Tina and I walked into town the next day so Tina could get a temporary Grenada driver’s license. We saw some of the damage inflicted by Beryl. Some of the buildings have been repaired, but not all.

You see these words painted in various spots. This particular venue is a sports field.

There are some adorable homes on the island!

There is a LOT of greenery. If it was damaged by Beryl, it has certainly recovered.

And these pretty pink flowers are everywhere:

We tried to find a restaurant on the beach that was listed on Facebook as “open.” It wasn’t:

Cool fence paintings:

You might recall that we told you a story of the man and his grandmother who hid in a bathroom for five hours while Beryl stormed around them. I think I understand why they chose the bathroom. We saw this many times: the house is gone, but most of the bathroom is still standing:

The sky is still hazy:

There are mangroves near the anchorage in Tyrell Bay. We took all three dinghies through them on the 9th. The mangroves were thought to be a safe place when Beryl hit, so there were numerous boats at anchor there. It turned out to be extremely unsafe. Many boats sunk and others were damaged.

One, in particular, has received quite a bit of notoriety. “Spear It Animal” has posted about their experience. In short, a catamaran that was moored in the mangroves was tipped over during Beryl. They purchased the upside-down catamaran for a bit over $110,000, with the agreement that it was on their dime to turn it over and fix it up. You can see their story here (there story hasn’t ended, as far as I know): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYoHDHydm6E

I raised that issue primarily because we saw the exact spot where the upside-down catamaran was located. The detritus has been removed, so all that remains is a flattened section of the mangrove. Here are some still shots from the YouTube video linked above in case you don’t want to watch the whole thing (although it is worth watching).

In the lefthand picture below, the new owners are standing on top of, well the bottom of, their “new” boat. In the righthand picture below you can see that the boat next to theirs burned to almost nothing. That was most likely caused by the lithium batteries.

The new owners spent 49 days cleaning the heck out of the inside of the catamaran. It was their hope that they would flip her over and she would be almost like new. Okay, maybe not new, but with a clean interior, at least.

A large ship with a crane was brought in to try to right the boat. It didn’t work. Now the catamaran was upside down in the water.

So now the goal was to turn her right-side up from within the water. I won’t go into details, but they tried various methods that didn’t work before getting the job done. First they got one hull out of the water, then figured out how to pull the side in the water up and out.

She was still partially in the water by the end of the video, but she was upright. And they had removed the lithium batteries to prevent the risk of fire.

And now, here are pictures of the mangrove. As I mentioned, it still hasn’t recovered, but there are definitely signs of recovery and regrowth. All evidence of the damaged and sunken boats has been removed.

Below is a close up picture of the flattened section where the catamaran was lying.

This boat is moored to the dock where we park our dinghy when we go grocery shopping. Be sure to check out the name on the port side. Ha ha!

Mother Nature never disappoints:

The only source of excitement for us on June 10th (when all six of us chilled on our respective boats) was when a boat broke loose of its mooring and was randomly floating all over the mooring field. Five or six folks got in their dinghies (including Greg and Michael) to steer the boat away from other boats. Deuces Wild (one of our buddy boats) definitely would have been hit if it were not for the dinghies. This was true of other boats as well.

The Coast Guard never responded to calls for help, but the owner finally came with another person in a fishing boat. The owner boarded his (unmoored) boat and they tied a line from it to the fishing boat. Five dinghies stayed with the boat and helped guide it in the right direction.

Here’s a picture of the unmoored boat (the one with the rainbow) being towed, and the helpful dinghy captains keeping it on track. You can hardly see the little fishing boat that is towing it, as it is mostly aft of the bigger red and white boat.

They towed the unmoored boat (which clearly has no working engine) around the port side of the red boat and farther into the bay. I later saw the “rainbow” boat moored closer to shore. I hope it is tied well this time.