Sunday Greetings in Greens
Little winter mole squints in the big bright light!
March is ugly in Maine. It’s still mostly cold and damp. Sure, we get the occasional sunny day that brings just enough warmth to force green crocus shoots to the surface and drop your shoulders from your ears, but it’s always chased by another snow - a wet, sloppy slushy one. It’s a sucker punch, March. But mostly the signature of March in Maine is mud.
In a delightful twist of fate, all of our crew for the next two weeks (save Richie, our Skipper, a Brit living in Portugal) are from Maine. And so we pasty lot have made our way south to the warming shores of Grenada. It’s nearly blinding us, this tropic sun, and though my soul needs it, I feel like a little mole or vole or something that lives in a dark damp hole who has finally clawed my way through the mud to the light of day.
I’m squinting a lot. But I can feel my muscles relaxing in the heat of this place. I’m acclimating.
We landed Friday night and as usual hit the ground running on Saturday morning. Saturdays on SwimVacation are filled with provisioning and paperwork and pre-solving potential problems and making everything just right for the gang of guests headed our way. We like to catch everyone where they are when they get here, and make them feel at home, like they belong.
Miriam texted me with the news that one delayed flight meant she’d miss the next, and she’d be a day late arriving. No problem! We’ve got a plan and people to help make it work! So after retrieving our other 4 guests - Celine, Samantha, Kendra and Janet, we climbed aboard our yacht home and made our way up the coast. Shortly after we got there, Zack jumped in the dingy to pick up Miriam who was delivered to a rendezvous point well north of the marina, and she made a fitting grand entrance via sea, having missed nothing but a short sail. Miriam is on her 11th trip with us, so she is a pro when it comes to knowing what, when and how we do what we do. She knows all of our crew and most of our other guests, so getting her aboard today was a perfect period on our sentence of arrivals.
Welcome to Greens, everyone (Greens is what the locals call Grenada)!
We digested a fantastic lunch Chef Ali prepared of salads and fruit and jumped in for a swim. Janet is our only first timer this trip, and she opted for an easy breezy start of simply floating by the boat for a while, cooling off and easing into an active week.
My fellow guides Alina and Simon and I guided our seasoned alums on a casual lap around Grand Mal Bay. We swam through an eerie fog of silt caused by runoff from some local construction. Diving just 3 feet down was like descending from a cloud into crystal clear water. The visual stratification was unique and intriguing, but of course we know how damaging this kind of runoff event can be for the marine ecosystem. We are hoping it won’t be a lasting situation in this beautiful bay.
Along our swim we saw two exquisite spotted moray eels and tons of teeming fish, some swimming in small packs just beneath us. What impressed me most was our swimmers simply being happy and relaxed in the water, just relieved to be in the sea, no matter what the visibility was. Celine said it, bobbing there in the beautiful afternoon light: “I’ve never been to Grenada, but somehow I feel like I’ve come home.”
As my shoulders relax and my little winter mole eyes adjust to the soul warming light of this topical place, I feel at home again here too. Greens has caught us all where we are, and I have a feeling we are all on our way to better.
Goodnight from Greens,
Heather
A pink sky evening set the scene for easy conversation, delicious charcuterie board and Grenadian Sparklers for happy hour. Sam is documenting her entire trip on her instagram feed this week! Dinner was a fantastic fish soup, glazed carrots and Grenada spice cake for dessert. Ali is embracing the spice of the island in her meals right out of the gate. Spicy dreams for all tonight.
