8/2/2018 : Grenada grand tour

We rented a car today to tour the island, the usual suspects for us but all new to Jon and Hannah. We kicked off at the Belmont Estate chocolate plantation after a pleasant drive up the windward side of the island. Even though it was our fifth visit in the last seven years we still enjoyed it and could answer all the questions!  Everything was very lush and green, especially after all the rain in January. Hannah jumped onto the trays to turn the drying beans, still done manually every thirty minutes by shuffling them with bare feet.

We continued north to the very top of the island for lunch at a small restaurant, set out on a terrace overlooking the stretch of water between Grenada and Carriacou.  Stunning.

After a very enjoyable lunch we wound our way to River Antoine rum distillery, dating back to 1765 and still using the same processes. Very labour intensive but good to be traditional. We sampled the runs ... or maybe that should be firewater and not rum!  Just about cauterized our throats but Paul manfully finished his .... and mine ... and Jon's!

Our return trip took us over the central mountain range (climbing to 1915ft) to see the Grand Etang caldera and lake (beautiful) before dropping down the west side and stopping to see Annandale waterfall.

Nearly nine hours later we returned to Tumi tired but we'd all thoroughly enjoyed our day.