Mayreau

Trip Start Mar 31, 2007
1
9
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Trip End May 03, 2007


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Where I stayed

Flag of Grenadines/St Vincent  ,
Wednesday, April 11, 2007

I spent my afternoon on St Vincent driving around with Jimmy, a champion of a Vincy bloke who showed me all around the island. We drove up the east coast, drinking coconut water, stopping off for beers and saltfish cakes, and hiking up through the volcanic highlands. We met a few Rastas, who were nice enough, although a bit suspicious of anyone who refuses a spliff (like me). Understandable though, I don't know how they keep the cops from finding their MASSIVE weed crops on such a small island. After that, Jimmy and I went to a local pub/nightclub, where he enlightened me in the finer points of trying to pick up Vincy girls. He made it look ridiculously easy, as he was using me as bait to get them in, and chatting them up while I staved them off (they were, in my humble opinion, quite rough).

The next morning I took the 10 minute flight down to Union Island, where I took a water taxi up to the island of Mayreau Tobago Cays
Tobago Cays
 . This is a tiny island in the Grenadines that I stayed for two days, and I walked across the whole island in 15 minutes. It was a relaxing time, and I met lots of travellers. One American couple from New Hampshire that I met in Bequia, Eric and Julie, were there. Eric was quite fond of the rum, so we had something in common. A German girl, Ani, also got into the rum fun and we had some good chats with Dennis, the owner of our hotel 'Dennis' Hideaway'. He was a funny bloke, quite determined to talk himself up 24 hours a day. He was about 50 years old, divorced, and always had an open shirt with massive bling gold chains hanging down. Caribbean pimp... As Mayreau isn't far from the Tobago Cays, I thought I'd ask Dennis if it was possible to paddle out there in his sea kayak:

"Oh no you can't paddle that far... I mean, I could paddle that far I am a good paddler, but I don't think you could make it, the waves are too big"

I almost believed him, but I thought I'd have a go anyway. I'm glad I did, because the Caribbean definition of 'big waves' and the Aussie definition differ vastly. It did take about 2 hours continuous paddle to get out there, because I was against the current and it was a fair distance. All the Rastas in their red and gold speedboats thought I was insane, they're so used to fat lazy old Euro-tourists who take taxis everywhere. All the people in their massive yachts were giving me funny looks, but I got talking to some Dutch folks and went parasailing with their gear, and did some snorkelling. It only took 30 minutes to paddle back to Mayreau with the current, and Dennis was suitably impressed to make me a 'Dennis Special' cocktail, involving 3 kinds of juice and 3 kinds of rum. Nasty...
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