The Blur

So after a few hours of sleep, the morning arrived....and I slept through it. HAHA I think plain exhaustion from 2 days of stressful travel after 2 weeks of frantic rushing after 2 months of hectic planning got the best of me. The kids had been warned that if they woke me, they would not live to tell about the wrath that I would unleash...and they had their special xmas gift: an iPad so I was left well enough alone, until the phone started ringing. The first day wasn't very fun... unpacking, unpacking, a grocery run with the taxi and two boys in tow. But the first day ended very well, when after his own set of delays and dilemmas, Gavin flew in and got to the house just before midnight.

When I was here scoping things out in October, we visited and talked with several schools and one in particular stood out as being the most likely (and maybe only) school that would accept the boys. I had a mental note that school would begin after xmas holidays on the Wednesday after we arrived. Except, I was wrong. They had to be at school Tuesday. At 8am. We still had no car, very little understanding of the lay of the land, and nothing to make a bag lunch with. --but come on, wouldn't be my life if it wasn't a challenge! So I called our handy dandy taxi man and he had us to the school 1/2hr early! 2 hrs later, we had the boys set for the day, with a selection of snacks and buns for lunch (thank goodness they barely eat during the day!!)

They are the ONLY non-native kids in their class, and in the gr 4-6 building. In fact, the only other caucasian kids (there's 2) are in high school. Their day was overwhelming as they struggled to understand the varying accents with varying thicknesses but every day since has been a tiny bit easier.

I promised you more about Grenada this post, and I am hoping that as I learn, I can continue to share about this amazing (yet tiny) little place that I accidentally discovered. **SHOUT TO CESAR-- THANK YOU FOR MAKING ME REMEMBER TO LOOK OUTSIDE THE BOX, I always do better there!** So...Geography wise, the island is only 12 miles wide and 21 miles long. There are (ancient) volcanic mountainous rain forests covering the interior of the island and some of the most beautiful beaches in the world along a very calm coastline. One of the biggest differences I have noticed about the ocean in general here is how much more calm the waters are compared to, for example: either the West or East Coasts of Canada and Hawaii.

They claim that Grenada has two seasons, 'wet' and 'dry' but the temperature seems to average year-round at 25-ish celsius. The days so far have ranged exactly around that-- 24-30 degrees and have been mostly a mix of sun and cloud, rainy bouts and a few blasts of scorching sun rays. According to the locals (and my brief research) Grenada is usually spared the wrath of the hurricanes that hit many other parts of the Caribbean, due to its southerly location. It seems that yacht and sailboat owners like to throw anchor here and fly home, since the island is one of the safest places both weather and society wise in all of the Caribbean. Sometimes hurricanes do hit, like hurricane Ivan in 2004, which left the entire island in devastation which is still very evident in abandoned homes and other buildings with no roof, or missing walls. You can also see their attempts to prevent such catastrophic damage in the future such as a new larger sea wall to block storm-sized waves from wiping out roads, homes and businesses that are literally on the water's edge. It seems hurricanes here are very far and few between, and hopefully will completely skip the 3 years that we will call the island home.

Day two also included renting a car. I have continued to be amazed at how hard it was to try to do things from Canada, but that are fairly easy once here and the car (which I had been searching for since November) was no exception to that-- easy as punch now that we are here.

So now we have "Baymax" as the kids have named him and he's rough as can be but he is a real trooper on these crazy Grenada roads...And that is where I will leave you until next time! Oh, by the way....here is where I am eating my lunch today