Dod Yuval!

Dod is hebrew for uncle. there you go. who said you don't learn new things every day...
Dod Yuval is Oren's brother, who lives in Haifa, Israel. On one of their phone calls, Oren asked Yuval if there's any chance he'll hop a flight and come visit us down in Grenada. Knowing we're going to be in Grenada for a while we've said that to a few people before, but Yuval was the first one to say, 'why not?'...
And so it was! Dod Yuval came down all the way from Israel to visit us for a whole week! he was only liveaboard guest so far, and we have prepared the boat for him, shifting kids around and hoping he will feel comfortable in our little home.
The kids were so excited towards his visit and kept counting the days to his arrival.
When he arrived we were still anchored in Prickly Bay, and had plans to show him all there is to see on the island.
One of the gifts he brought with him was a floating Origami book, the very next morning we tried building a catamaran and yes! it floated!

Most cruisers take a tour of the island upon arrival, but we waited with us for Yuval and 2 days after he got here took a grand tour of the island, getting to see all parts of the island, waterfalls, a rum factory, the chocolate farm, a spice farm and rest of this beautiful island.

The next day we sailed the boat up to St, Georges anchorage and visited the busy city. Yuval has been taking sailing lessons lately and was put to work raising sails and helping our with the boat.

The next day we went to Grenada's underwater sculpture park,  spotted with submerged sculptured about 15feet under the water you snorkel around looking for the surprising sculptures. we really liked it!

The only picture I took before my battery died...

Yuval's visit went by so quickly and it was time to head back to our anchorage in Prickly bay where he was to take off for his flight the next day. on the way back we tried fishing and this time got a big Baracuda! in this side of the world you can actually eat the baracuda, and it was turned into a great curry dinner!

By catching and eating the fish we have offered Yuval our entire repertuare and he was ready to get back to civilization, packed with a lot of suveniers and good memories from his visit in Grenada.

Mika summed the visit up nicely  in her journal (in Hebrew...)

Thank you for coming Yuval! it was fun!

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Boarded....

After Johan and Vicky left we headed straight down to Grenada.
All our friends were already there, Endless Pleaseure and Perry who have been there for over a month and Lucky 7 and Bendecida who got there 10 days earlier.
They all told us how great it was in Camp
Grenada.

For us Grenada was the promised land. Safely south enough to be out of the Huricane zone it became the final destination of the season for oh so manny cruisers and was planned to be our final destination of the trip. We arrived the day before Gur's birthday, on august 13th and when we saw the coastline clearing in front of us we all felt excited like never before in the trip. WE Made it! We though and took pictures of our promised land. 

When we were close enough to the enchorage of st. George we radioed our friends on Bendecida we invited us over to celebrate the reunion. 

Perry were kind enough to offer to host Gur's birthday party the next evening were we were to reunite with all four boats. We were loving Grenada!

That night we fell asleep happy until at 4:30 Arbel woke us for a water refill. I went to check on him and saw our boat door open. Our boat is always closed at night with a padlock holding it closed and yet the boat was open. I instinctively calle Oren and first checked that the kids were safe. 

It was clear that we were boarded. Someone has been inside our home. The question was what did he take with him...

We found a laptop and our iPhones were missing. Oren recalled hearing something and looking out the window to see a local fishing boat rowing away with 2 men inside. He thought it strange that fishermen were not using their engines but was really worried about our anchor dragging and went to sleep once he was sure we state at the same spot. 

2 hours later we joined the cruisers net, a daily VHF transmission where cruisers update each other on daily events. 

We learned that 4 boats were boarded that same night. All had electronics stolen from them. 

Needless to say we felt violated and our initial happiness of finally arriving to grenada turned into a suspicious anger. 

Our day was spent with the coast guard and police investigators but before that we had a kid who just turned 6!!!!

Gur got his gifts in the morning and in the afternoon in a historic reunion we celebrated with Perry Bendecida, Lucky 7 and endless pleasure!!!! It was a gret ending to an otherwise bad day. 

I love you my sweet Gur!

Thank you so much Perry for hosting! 

This was birthday number 3 we celebrated with Bendecida and Lucky 7!

By the way. Till this day we still didn't get the police report.

Stay safe, lock your doors, and keep your radio on...
Darya

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I AM the BLOG!

Hello hello,
I have a great back log (or back blog...) of posts I've been meaning to write and didn't.
I think the next post will explain why (teaser, yes, why not). Turns out that I do find the chronological order of events important so I'll start from where we left off.

Back to August,
Remember John and Vicky? our friends from Boston who came to visit us in Viequese in January. The original plan back then  was to have them stay on land and we were to pick them out on 'daily charters' taking them around. We didn't plan on wracking our boat, and ended up staying with them on land. It was still a lot of fun.
Well John and Vicky did it again! they have decided to come meet us again in the beginning of August, and we've set the destination at Union Island. Union Island is one of the Grenadines of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and a good base for visits to other small islands in the area.
We were real excited to have our first guests (except for The Malatrasis of course). The plan was for them to stay in a nice place on land, and for us to meet them each morning and sail around. same plan as in January, only this time we actually had a floating boat! never underestimate that!

The reunion was great! the kids and us were really happy to see them again.
John, who used to work with Oren, told us people back home kept asking him if he reads this blog, his negative answer was followed by a statement "I don't need to read the blog, I come here to see with my own eyes! I AM the blog!!!" well, for a week there, you were right!

John "I AM the blog" 

Vicky Getting a ride to the beach

We had a great time with them, and tried to show them as much of the Grenadines as we could. it rained almost every day, but we got enough sun shine and great weather too.

Part of the itenerary was a trip to the Tobago keys where John and I got to snorkel with a lot of turtles. Such a great experience!

John went in the water before it did and the rough weather prevented me from finding him (it was pouring rain and there were high waves). But I really wanted a picture with a turtle... So there. I give you my dirt ever selfy with a turtle ;)

John and Vicky  have been engaged for almost 3 years, and we talked a lot about actually tying the knot, and were very very very very happy and excited to hear that a month later the have spontaneously went ahead and did it!! Mazal Tov!!

Gur's birthday was teo days after they were supposed to leave and not to miss it, they have decided to take us out to dinner and celebrate an early birthday.
Birthday boy was happy as they get, with Pizza and cake you just can't go wrong :)
Happy early birthday my child!

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Frozen – The Musical!

A few weeks ago, Mika and Catherine from the S/V Bendecida came up with the idea to rehearse some of the songs from the excellent Disney movie “Frozen”. That idea expanded to include a few other kids, and very quickly became a bay-wide event with kids from neighboring boat taking place. Darya volunteered to help produce and the kids started working on a script, costumes, and songs. The Premiere was announced on the Net for anyone interested to come and watch.

For those of you who have not been living on a boat in Grenada – the Net is a “morning briefing” using a predefined VHF radio channel (number 66). Every morning, the weather is announced, as well as any social activities, special offerings to the cruising community, and general information and help regarding anything from shopping buses to engine parts. This goes on every morning at 7.30 and is a backbone of what we have come to call “Camp Grenada”. I guess it is the equivalent of listening to the morning show in the morning rush hour traffic on the way to work…

The Cast

Back to the production – The production was a great success! It was great seeing how well the kids got along and initiated this play out of thin air within a very short amount of time.

Olaf, Anna, and Elsa in Act I

As an Encore, Darya and the other moms decided to put on their own version of “Do you want to build a snowman” named “Do you want to build a burger”.

Listening to the words just now, I realize how meaningless and surreal they must seem to anyone that has not been spending time in Prickly Bay, Grenada. So for the sake of clarity, I hereby provide you with a partial urban marine dictionary to “Camp Grenada”. This should give some better insight into the day-to-day life down here. It is tough, but someone’s gotta do it...

• Build-a-burger – Every Friday, the bakery at the Port Louis marina offers discounted burgers where you get a fresh baked bun, pick your toppings, get your burger, and munch away. The line often stretches way back and it has become a weekly get-together event.
• Shopping buses – Organized buses go out from various bays to take you grocery shopping.
• “Darren at the Bar” – The owner of the Tiki Bar at Prickly bay, which has become a community center for activities ranging from Domino’s, Chess, Yoga, Live music, and more.
• “Back to 68” – The VHF has replaced the use of the conventional home phone. A special channel (68) is designated to hail other neighboring boats, and conversations then usually Switch to a different channel (i.e. "Okay, Switch").

Cool rainbow in the bay. Just for the heck of it.

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