Around The Island...Again

Last term, I went on an "around the island" tour with the SO's.  You can read about my last tour here, here, here, and here.  So last Thursday, I set out to take my family around the island as well.  It takes all day to do it, but there is no better way to see all of the island.

We started up the Eastern side and our first stop was Belmont Estate.  We took the tour of the chocolate making process and saw many of the animals (goats, birds, tortoises) including the monkeys which I somehow missed the last time I was there.

 

This is new! They no longer let you "walk" the beans.  They have this covering now as shelter from the rain.

Where the cocoa beans ferment.  So smelly.

Such a beautiful estate.

He really wanted my coke bottle.

You can't see it, but then he really wanted my watch.

We ate lunch in their beautiful open air restaurant and we all enjoyed the local cuisine, including the guava icecream!

A trip to Belmont wouldn't be complete without buying some of the fabulous chocolate bars and bon bons.  Of course, the bon bons melted in the car.  Bummer.  But the chocolate bars made it home intact.

What shall we get?

 After spending quite a large part of our day at Belmont Estate, we headed North toward Bathway Beach and Levera Beach.

If you remember correctly, Levera Beach was the location of the infamous bag stealing incident on my birthday in October.  I was glad to return and create some happier memories, though we kept all of our things with us.  I'm sure I had some pictures that looked quite similar to these on the camera that was stolen. :(

Our last stop on this island tour was Carib's Leap on the very Northern tip of Grenada.

We headed for home and after a very long day of driving, arrived back on the Southern tip of the island.  I think Mom and Dad really enjoyed seeing the whole island, but I don't know that I personally will be making that drive again.  Although I'd be happy to ride along!

Around the Island Tour: Belmont Estate

Up next on the island tour was Belmont Estate in St. Patrick.  In my opinion, this was the highlight of the trip.  Maybe it's because we finally got to eat lunch! :)

  
Belmont Estate is a 300-year-old cocoa plantation in Grenada that is still fully functioning.  They have a restaurant with Grenadian cusine ( not my favorite due to bones, bones, and more bones in the meat), a tour of how chocolate is made, an animal area, gift shop and lots more. 

We ate lunch and then spent some time exploring the 400 acre estate.  They had some of the most beautiful birds.

And a bell that they used long ago to call the slaves in at the end of the day.

 Then we went on a tour of how the cocoa beans are processed.  It still amazes me that somehow you can turn this...

Cocoa pod

Into this.


Grenadian chocolate bar

After the beans are fermented in these shed-like things, they are then placed on these large tables to dry out for about 8 days.

The roofs are on wheels and if it rains, they can quickly be rolled over the beans to protect them.  The beans must be "walked" every half an hour while they are drying out.  And what better way to have them turned, than to have the tourists do the work for you!

Walking the beans!

It was actually pretty fun.  Although I don't know if I would want to do it every half hour in the hot Grenadian sunshine.  Even my sun-worshiper self wouldn't enjoy that.

Walking creates fun designs in the beans!

Kelsey and I in the beans.

I loved Belmont Estate and I want to go back soon.  Anybody up for a second trip?!?