Rain over Bequia

It is the rainy season here in SVG, and we have seen (and shared via posts) some rain over in St. Vincent. Well, yesterday rain finally arrived in Bequia.

 The rain begins to creep over the island

Then starts to hammer the bay. You can notice the rain line on the water.

Then it reaches us and pelts the pool

10 minutes later.

The Orange Girls

While on the ferry, we noticed a few young ladies outfitted in Orange dresses. We started guessing: nurses? flight attendents? -- we couldn't figure it out -- so we asked.

They are in college on St. Vincent.

The SVG school system is modeled on the British, which gets a little odd around Junior/Senior high school area. -- which are called sixth and form -- some form levels are also called College.

So these girls are in the last year of school prior to University.

On SVG, all the school kids are in uniform and the different schools have different school colors; black and white, Khaki and white, etc.. It is actually quite interesting to see all the kids walking around in uniform.. and they do not seem to be into the ubiquitous phone/text/gaming thing. They actually talk to each other.

Hello

This guy is the resident parrot at Dive Bequia, the local scuba place.

He clearly says "Hello", but keeps repeating it non-stop.

Jack's

Jack's is a restaurant that is located on Princess Margaret beach, a short drive down the road from us. It is actually a little hard to get to, though, down a single lane rough road (not that unusual here in Bequia) and a walk through the trees to the beach.

Well, we wanted to find it so on a return trip from town, we drove in. A very nice place on the beach.

We meet Ken, the chef, -- chatted up some and had a couple of laughs. We told him that we would be back sometime and I asked if he would at that time, "cook up something interesting" - Sure!

Alicia was very impressed, so we went back at 1:30 for lunch. It's the off season here, so it was not so crowded. I walked into the kitchen, met up again with Ken and told him to "make us something for lunch" - Okay he says.

In Ken's kitchen at Jack's (owned by people from Sweden)

We ordered up some margarita's and they were made my Arion, who noted that they were "the best in the west"

We enjoyed the drinks

Then we enjoyed Ken's choice: "a real island meal" - BBQ Chicken with Curry Spice Sauce, Potato Salad with Egg and Corn, Sauteed Callaloo (a local plant, kind of like chard). Everything was great; we especially liked the Callaloo. We asked Ken what was in it ... garlic, coconut cream, heavy cream butter ... no wonder it was so good!

 Jack's as seen from Ravenala -- right on the beach at the far left end, behind the sailboats.

How to make a margarita

1. Step outside and pick 4 limes off the lime tree -- 10 ft from the kitchen

2. Squeeze the limes
3. Add appropriate other liquids

4. Enjoy.

Gingerbread

Gingerbread is a cafe/restaurant on what is known as the Belmont Walkway - a sidewalk on right on the shore in Admiralty Bay. We had lunch there, --- on off season, island time -- which means that lunch ( a fish sandwich - likely tuna) took 1/2 hour to see the food.

You can also get a Starbucks coffee latte here if you want -- or you can buy Starbucks coffee beans at Doris's for about $40 lb US and make your own.

We just sat and watched the bay and enjoyed island time.

Under the Frangipani tree

Too sunny and hot to sit in the (uncomfortable) adirondack chairs.

It gets dark early.

It was surprising to find that it gets dark in Bequia at about 6:30PM - as it is far south and very east in the timezone -- that it currently shares with the states (except when you factor in DST - it's complicated).

Of course, that also means that the sun rises early as well.

Although there is TV, we are not watching much (other than NCIS) so bedtime is early.

Anyway, a full-moon, night time view of Bequia and Lower Bay area... "downtown" is on the left.