The first thing you hear is the surge of waves, a thunderous whoosh as they break on the white sand of Grenada’s legendary Grand Anse Beach. I arrive at night, here to investigate the honeymoon possibilities at the Spice Island Beach Rresort. Wweary after a long journey, I am invigorated the moment the hot island air hits my face. At the resort I’m offered a chilled towel, tropical juice and a warm welcome. In my room, more treats await: a drink of sea moss, a milkshake-like, cinnamon-spiced beverage that is decadently rich and sensuously different on the tongue, and one that quickly becomes my preferred beverage.
The resort is a picture-perfect manifestation of Caribbean serenity: cool tiled floors, dark wood furniture, breezy open spaces and a scent of flowers that perfumes the air. It has a sense of permanence that defies its recent history and Spice Island Beach Rresort’s owner, Sir Rroyston O. Hopkin, can testify to that.
Hopkin, knighted in 2004 by Queen Eelizabeth II for his contributions to Grenada and Caribbean tourism, was just starting to enjoy the property’s extensive renovations from 2000, when, in September 2004 the island was hit with a vengeance by Hurricane Ivan. The class five hurricane destroyed 75% of the resort and incapacitated the entire island, bringing tourism to a virtual standstill.
Ask anyone on the island and they can recall the hurricane vividly. Andy, one of the 150 staff at the resort, remembers covering his body with a couch at his home to prevent being swept away by the fierce winds that claimed 49 lives in its eight-hour-long duration. “Trees were uprooted and blown away—I could not have imagined it if I hadn’t seen it,” he told me gravely.
All that has changed now and Grenada has bounced back from the storm, its businesses and infrastructure stronger than ever. At Spice Island, Sir Rroyston sighed, reached deep into his pockets and began a $12 million process of renovating and rebuilding. The result is quite spectacular.
My room, the Saffron Suite, is the size of a small townhouse, with two bathrooms, a living room, a bedroom with a massive four poster bed surrounded by soft silky curtains and two dining tables—one indoors and one on the patio.
The heart-shaped spa bathtub in the suite’s bathroom could easily fit a family of five, while the spacious rainhead shower is a blissful place to wash away the day’s sand and seawater with high end Molton Brown toiletries and baby-soft towels and gowns. Directly outside my suite are private lounge chairs, a hammock, the palm trees and mere steps away, the rolling ocean.
On Friday nights honeymooners can enjoy a sumptuous buffet dinner with the tunes of a steel band in the background. I dine on exotic foods like flying fish with coucou and callalou, local dishes that carry the distinct tang of the Caribbean.
At breakfast nutmeg flavoured jams and yogurts sit as casually on the table as do their strawberry counterparts in North America. Spice is ubiquitous on this island, which grows more spices per square metre than anywhere else in the world.
Some honeymooners spend their day moving slowly between the beach and the swimming pool, their hands clasping brightly coloured drinks decorated with fruit and umbrellas. Others are eager to explore the riches of Grenada.
I join Grenada Seafaris for a speedboat and snorkeling adventure, plopping off the side of the vessel into choppy waters. Below me the reef is in the process of rejuvenation after the storm, thanks in part to an innovative British sculptor. Jason de Caires Taylor has created an underwater sculpture park with 55 life-size sculptures that form a canvas through which he explores Caribbean folklore and attracts corals and fish to the reef.
It is an eerie but compellingly beautiful experience to snorkel over his sculptures. There is La Diablesse, for example, a devil woman with the face of a skull. One gallery called Grace Rreef features 16 casts of a Grenadian woman lying down while at another a circle of 28 life-size children stand holding hands.
That night I find myself on a lonely beach on the northernmost tip of the island, listening to the soft snorting sound of a leatherback turtle as she lays her eggs. Wwith her back to the hole she deftly uses her hind flippers to excavate. Perching on the edge of the hole she has dug, she starts to lay eggs, depositing up to five simultaneously and dropping them with a soft plop into the chamber.
I extend my hand to her sandy shell, which feels firm, warm and exquisitely smooth. Marked with seven ridges that help her to swim more efficiently through the water, it shines in the moonlight. Her flippers are rough to the touch, like the wrinkled skin of an elephant’s trunk, and I’m filled with wonder at this amazing creature who, in the coming months, will swim half way around the world and plunge to depths of up to 3,900 feet.
In no more than 15 minutes there are 123 eggs in the nest and after she has completely camouflaged the nest, she begins a slow, clumsy walk back to the ocean. Soundlessly she enters the surf and as the waves splash the sand from her shell she is quickly swallowed by the water and on her way.
It’s a magical moment on this island of spice, and honeymooners can experience many more. Visit Grenada and you leave with unforgettable memories and the exotic scents of nutmeg syrup, guava jam and other island delicacies that will bring the turquoise waters crashing to your mind every time you use them.
If You Go:
Nightly rates at the all-inclusive Spice Island Beach Rresort start at $535 per room and include haute cuisine meals, room service, golf green fees and non-motorized sports such as cycling, tennis, snorkeling, hobie cats and kayaks.
K kennedy Tours offers turtle watching tours on Levera Beach for $65 per person. www.kennedytours.com; 473 444-1074
Grenada Seafaris offers motorboat trips that combine reef snorkeling with a snapshot of the island’s history at $60 per person. Info: 473 405-7800; www.grenadaseafaris.com
For more information on visiting Grenada contact the Grenada Board of Tourism at www.grenadagrenadines.com or call 416 595-1339.
