A walk through Grand Anse

Today Megan and I took a stroll down to the Grand Anse beach (the town we live in) hoping to see a bunch of sail boats that came in for some sort of celebration yesterday, but they were already gone by the time we got down there, oh well. Anyhow below are some photos of the beach where we were walking, it's amazing, truly crystal clear water, warm, and very inviting. It's hard to believe that less than an hour ago I was walking down that beach...

As most of you know I grew up on a ranch where "weed whacking" or brush clearing was a constant seasonal battle. There was always talk about possibly getting a goat but the unknown always caused hesitation and inevitably my self or someone would be out there with the weed whacker taking down all the brush. In Grenada they FULLY embrace the usefulness of both goats and cows. Get your self a got and a rope and your problem's solved. As you can see in the picture below this is a perfect example which we passed on the way to the beach. This goat was VERY happily munching away and "baahh"ing at us. It's pretty common to see HUGE cows (much larger then the cattle I normally see in CA) tied up in the same manor, and occasionally to see the cow with the rope just wandering around as the rope isn't tied to anything.


At this point in the journey we're heading down to "Spiceland Mall" which is advertised as Grenada's only fully covered indoor mall. Before I get off on the details of this mall below is a shot of the side walk we take to get there... Notice anything funny about it?

Let's take a closer look at that first step up onto the side walk... Not all the side walks are like this, in fact most are not. But of course the ones we happen to travel the most are. What your looking at is large "I" shaped blocks of concrete which are sitting on two parallel curbs (more or less) which house a drainage ditch. Please excuse me while I go off on my technical engineering tangent... I presume the "I" shape is used to let water drain through the side walk and into the ditch below, if not that then they are surely there to ensure all foreigners trip over them to give the locals a good laugh. Besides the precarious look the design isn't too bad except for at the ends. As you can see in both the photo above and below the end blocks are out of place and no one really seems to care. These happen to sit at the end of a bus pull out area apparently the buses don't always turn while exiting the pull out.

If you look further up the sidewalk you can see a slightly lighter grey on the right side where they have cemented the pieces together. This does a pretty good job of keeping the side walk stable. We're told that this hole thing is ripped up at least once a year to be cleaned out. During this time is about like walking across a jigsaw puzzle.

Above - this is just a little ways further down the road towards the Spiceland Mall. As you can see the sidewalk is a bit more stable down here. We still have to pay attention not to trip as it's bumpy as can be but at least this section doesn't move when you walk on it.

What your looking at above is us approaching the roundabout in Grand Anse. Technically there is probably more then one but this is the big one everyone references since there are no street names or addresses here. Way in the background is the red roof of Spiceland Mall.

As much as you might think that looks like a periscope on a CRV it's simply an extra mirror. I love cars and all the little oddities of cars here I find quite fascinating. Honda CRV's are extremely popular along with all the little Suzuki Samurai style jeep things. Many many of the cars around here have this funny looking extra mirrors on them. First you have to remember that they drive on the wrong .. err i mean Left side, of the road as apposed to the right side in the US. It seems odd to me these things haven't caught on here if they are as helpful as Grenadians seem to think they are...

This one's for all you Ford truck fans. Above is a Ford Ranger... yes a 4 door ranger with about a 5 foot bed. With the popularity of this style truck in the US I always wondered why Ford didn't make there own. Now I think it's even crazier to know they DO, they just don't bother to sell it in the US. Also along this train of thought, in the US 4 door trucks are a new and popular thing. Here the Toyota Hilux has been around since the early 90s (if not before that), which is simply a 4 door Tacoma. All these (except for the Ford pictured) come standard also with a metal roll bar like looking thing designed to keep your load from hurting the cab of the truck. So many little differences...

For a country with so much poverty and lack of development there are also surprises like the one above, a 20ft by 10 ft digital billboard. Random ...

Ahh Spiceland Mall. For all the students this is like heaven in Grenada, primarily due to IGA which is a grocery store in the mall. It has about 75% of the US brands and things we are looking for. There is also a large "Hardware" store in the mall, I think they called it a hardware store because a "Random stuff you can't find anywhere else store" was already taken or didn't fit on the store front. Don't get me wrong it's a great store, it's just funny to find kitchen utensils, camping stoves, and dishes next to pluming supplies.

By the way this large grass field is often being used to play Soccer or Cricket (a strange British version of baseball that I TOTALLY do not understand).

Today's post is just a bit about our daily lives here. :) I hope you enjoyed.