Photos and Final Reflections on Grenada Marine

 Here is the cats' ladder, the heavy twisted line, with it now having been raised a couple of inches so the heavy braided part runs from below the water line to the top of the swim platform. We think Alphie is both smart and strong enough to climb in. Whitty, however????  The blue and white line is the dinhy's painter, running from its bow in the lower left to the boat and back in a temporary manner while the photo was being taken. Normally it is tied to a cleat at the top of the stern of the boat.

 Since we are talking about Grenada Marine, here (top center) is a pic of the newly built cabinet to replace the old microwave. They took off the door shown in lower left to use as a model for the new door and the match is better than we had hoped for.

 Telephoto view of Roger, 60 to 65 feet above sea level, sitting in the bosun's chair while taking down the fixture in which we inserted LED navigation and anchor lights. Lene and the electric winch, pulled him up.

 A view from the top on Roger's return trip to the top of the mast to reinstall the lights. Here are other boats in the anchorage and Prickly Bay marina in the upper left corner, on the east side of the bay. Those condos to the right are not renting so well yet.

Also from the top, looking north to Da Big Fish restaurant and Spice Island Marina. The rock cliffs to the right provide the sound of surf all night.  Lots of room for other boats to anchor in this bay. One more shot from the top, the best -- straight down,  is in our next post, written by Ilene.
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     So what about the much maligned Grenada Marine?  Expensive, yes. Not all of the jobs were done, or completed as requested. Slow. But consider Mark's job as Scheduler of let's say 20 jobs per boat on 100 boats! An administrative ability that I could surely never hope to aspire to.  The place is located remote from everywhere else so that weekly taxi runs are scheduled for the boaters to obtain provisions.  The ground is swampy, though they dumped a load of gravel behind ILENE to provide a bit better footing at the base of the ladder they provided. The electrical lines and water hoses lie in the mud.   Security guards are are on duty 24/7.  No one seems to be in overall charge of the operation, though Raquel, the office manager, plays a key role. The owner is reputedly a Grenadian, though if we ever met him or her, we did not know it.
Storage is charged by the day, so they have a financial conflict of interest to keep boats a bit longer than anticipated, though they were refilling the yard when we left: our cradle and the one next to us with a big Danish trawler on it were refilled with other boats while we on the mooring in St. David's Bay.
     I loved the crew and it of them I sing. Perhaps 150 black men, mostly young, that all go about their business, roughly divided into specialist crews, though they seem to overlap somewhat in skills. There is the crew that operates the big lift that carries the boats from the water to the cradles and jack stands, power washes the bottoms of the boats and carefully braces the boats and straps them down to anchors embedded in the mud designed to prevent tipping over and takes them back to sea. A safety mandated howler roars throuth the yard whenever this crane is moving, which is a lot of the time. Then we have painters, fiberglass workers, polishers, carpentry/cabinetry makers, metal workers, engine repair people and electronics and electrical teams.  And all their work is billed to your account except the sail loft and the chandlery which bill separately. They are male with the exceptions of the rest room cleaners, the office workers, the lady who runs the chandlery and the snack bar crew which is gender integrated. The snack bar, except on special musical nights designed to promote drinking, has a daily menu of one (possibly 2) entrees that are served at both lunch and dinner; not a big menu choice like at the Harlem Yacht Club.
     The yard crew all wear royal blue tee shirts imprinted in white with the company's logo and slogan: "We love boats".  They wear them with pride and yell at each other rather than speak to each other, across the open space, in a dialect that I could not hope to understand.  I learned to ignore the yelling, realizing that it was not directed to me and not said in anger.  They all have cell phones and many have portable music devices and sing along with their radios, loudly and lustily. They seem cheerful and are quite willing to talk to boat owners and offer helpful suggestions.  In a nation enmeshed in an economic depression, they are pleased with their year-round jobs and seem proud of their work. They seem quite cheerful, though a few have expressed the reality that in a nation with only two boatyards, if they lose their jobs they have no other place to employ their specialized skills.
One of the several bus lines that traverse the island, runs along a main road from which the road down to Grenada Marine twists and winds for the last two miles. So to get to work involves a long walk, unless they have private wheels or take taxis.  The buses are vans with a capacity of about 15 persons, run by a two man crew: the driver drives and the other man collects fares. They stop anywhere along their routes to pick up or drop off passengers and the fare is only $2.50 EC, slightly less than one  dollar US, per person.  But these buses stop running at about 6 pm and do not run on Sundays so workers with overtime can have transportation problems.
      I will probably never set foot in Grenada marine again but salute their cheerful, hardworking skillful crew.