Sunday, 3rd June. Our third full day in the west of Grenada, and there’s not much to do. We have three full days left on the island and despite not having done most of what’s written on our cat-scratched paper itinerary, ambitiously prepared before we really got the hang of Caribbean pace of life, we still had today down for “fuck all. Everything is closed.”
Not quite everything, tbh. A very lazy morning with a brief dip in the apparently cold and invigorating sea was followed by a few chores - washing up, take the rubbish out, etc - and I consulted numerous guides for how to reach the West Indies Beer Conpany by bus.
Basically you don’t. No buses, except for university shuttles, go particularly near the bit of L’anse aux Épines (“lance-a-peens”). That’s fine, we’ll get the 1 to the big roundabout and walk down.
Hang on. Where are the buses? Why aren’t we being hailed? Much to our surprise, even with moderately busy traffic there were precious few buses. We expected it to die down in late afternoon, but not at 1:35pm.
Eventually one hails us. There’s no conductor and only a handful of people. Sunday service? Just past the roundabout a bloke taps on the window to request our stop because like an idiot I didn’t think of doing that myself, and we’re off, 6EC lighter (3EC each).
As is now a depressing norm, I’ve underestimated the length of walk to our destination. Sigh. Past the Carib brewery, some fancy apartments, a big church and the US consulate - I convince Helen not to go and “have a word about their president, and while I’m at it, the gun laws” - and hello, brewery.
There’s a table of four adults and two sausage dogs, and a guy at the bar, and that’s it. Ace. No aircon because it’s all open. The barman gives us a friendly “happy Sunday!” welcome and you know what, let’s have beer..
I’m on the Grumpy Pete stout - “today, it’s happy Pete” - while Helen opts for pomegranate cider. They’re both great. We sit on a table by the path, up on the stage. It’s good here.
That hatch over the way is where you order food, so I order food. Brisket pizza and fish & chips please.
We’re now getting table service. “How you doing?” “Not so good - this is empty”; along comes a watermelon cider, and Old Mongoose porter. They are of course great.
A small taste of two other cider flavours leads Helen toward making her third glass be the ginger, while I go for a tasting paddle. We are both very pleased with ourselves.
Mind you none of the beers are as nice as the first two. In fact one, their flagship “Windward”, is way too hoppy. But the other 3 are nice enough, and I make my 3rd full drink a mason jar of Drunken Goat.
Quite pissed now. The place is still mostly empty, and the barman is really disappointed we’re leaving. Can we get some bottles to take though? We buy, of course, 3 different beers for the road, and settle up while chatting to the Londoner who tells us he’s banned from one of the beers because he’s told it makes him a right cunt.
So long, West Indies Beer Company. You are excellent and I wish you were closer to Sea Glass.
On the goat strewn road walk down here earlier we’d seen just one bus, and the barman actually told us we’d need to go back up to the roundabout. So, of course, almost as soon as we’re on the road a driver going the wrong way hails us and pulls a u-turn - there’s no one else in his bus, and he’s obviously off-piste anyway.
Mistakenly, because I’m pissed, I originally tell him we want to go to Captain Harris’s. We don’t, we want the Spiceland Mall, but my mistake gives him the chance to tell us he’s related to the Captain.
Another 3EC each (totally making me think of wrestler EC3) and we’re at the supermarket door. Inside we buy copious amounts of chocolate from three of the islands chocolate companies, because it’s so much cheaper to get this in the supermarket than the House of Chocolate, and we don’t think we’ll be getting to any visits to the companies ourselves.
Also more cheap lager and cheese. Outside, a bus with several passengers already inside hails us inside the car park, excellent. Our third ride of the day costs the same as the others, though we’re not sure who to pay because there’s a young lad seemingly on “big brother is letting me be conductor” duty - but he refuses the cash and we pay the driver, dropping us back at Sea Glass.
Staring through the mozzie guard we debate whether to eat out or just stick with crap lager and cheese sandwiches on the deck. Hmm, decisions decisions.
We opt for the latter and I open the Spiced Wheat beer bottle, which is so lively it goes everywhere and we lose about half of it. What remains tastes good though.
I’m as drunk as I’ve been all trip, but not rowdy or daft (says me), it’s just really pleasant. Catching the owner on his way back up from the beach we get instructions on how to do laundry, which is good because our filth sack is very full and very filthy.
Eventually, after hanging our newly clean clothes up outside on the line, we go to bed, with Helen researching the boat to Carriacou a bit more and finding loads of reviews saying the crossing is rough and everyone throws up. Seems like she’s trying to put me off, but she’s also not going to agree to take the tiny (like, 4 seater or so) SVG Air plane.
With a podcast on that angers me by taking over 20 minutes to reach any real content, Helen falls asleep and I play Threes on my iPad. Magic happens.
Yes! I get a 3072 square for the first time in my 5 or so years of addiction to this game! I'm so happy I think about ruining it by waking Helen up to share in my good news, which absolutely will piss her right off. So I don't. Frankly, this is a suitable end to a great Sunday. Just hope I’m not too hungover for the vomit express in t'morning.