Toodles: In Waiting

Unfortunately, international money transfers are not instantaneous. Neither are they overnight, or even 24 hours. A money transfer from NZ takes 48 hours. We were expecting to be able to move onto the boat today, but alas it won’t be until tomorrow now, once the funds transfer is complete. So we have had a day of adventuring.

We had discovered the old main street last week. It is a narrow street, with old style buildings towering either side of the cobbled road. Tall arched wooden doors greet you at every store, in all the colours of the Caribbean. The colours of the Caribbean are bright and vibrant, blue, green, yellow, pink and purple. It seems that the paint store only has one shade of each of these colours and every building is painted with two or three.

The spice store stands next to our favourite coffee shop on old Main Street. As the soon to be chef of the boat, I have been considering my lack of expertise and limited repertoire. Although I have mastered scrambled eggs, porridge and baked beans, I am uncertain whether this will meet the demands of the hungry Captain. Spices seem to be the answer. The store is small with shelves covering the walls from top to bottom displaying the array of spices and other goodies. Each spice has a card with a wine-like description boasting a “hint” of this and a “bouquet” of that. I took one of the beautiful wicker baskets from the front of the store and, after carefully examining every jar, began to fill it with spices, tea and jam. I will update you on our experiences. (Website of spice store: http://www.sunnycaribbee.com/)

After managing to get through two books a week, we decided to again raid the little book store on old main street called Serendipity. This has to be my favourite bookstore in the world. Each book appears to have been thoughtfully chosen by an expert book reviewer. The store is filled with bestsellers, Nobel Prize winners and such. Gary, however, not the avid reader that I am, was more amused by the more unusual book choices. See pictures below...


only in the Caribbean...

The lady of the store is a wealth of knowledge, having read just about every book within the store’s four walls. We discuss South American authors, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, novels about apartheid South Africa, as well as the sumptuous pate pastries from the local bakery. She tells me of the time she was traveling through the Amazon reading a series of books with tissue thin pages, and after she had read a few pages, she would “use” a few pages! I buy six books and feel like I have discovered a hidden treasure.

We jump back in Plod and drive up a road that has caught our curiosity on a number of occasions. We wind up the one lane road, enclosed into a tunnel by trees with bright green leaves that remind me of a gecko. The road narrows as we venture further. We get glimpses of impressive houses down long driveways. At the top we are met with a breathtaking view of the bay.