Grenada was a pleasant surprise. We felt comfortable here, not at all like strangers. People were friendly and helpful, with no hassle. The island is about 20 miles long, a once British diminutive independent state of about 100,000 people. At the end of the rainy season it was looking green and lush. The forest-covered mountains encouraged the clouds to linger and shower. The island is a series of short steep hills with narrow winding roads and houses clinging to the edges on stilts, much like Tobago. There was much recent rebuilding following the destruction of hurricane Ivan in 2004. In the quieter spots around the bays on the south coast were beautiful houses built into the hills with balustraded balconies and stairways, owned by ex-pats from England. Lyn could see herself living here.

We arrived on the south coast, where there are successions of deep inlets that make ideal yacht harbours – once one has penetrated through the outlying reefs, on which the swells broke menacingly. We made first for Prickly Bay, the easiest of access, and registered with Customs & Immigration right by the anchorage.

Our chart was ancient: a masterpiece of C19th engraving with hatched hills and views of island approaches. It didn’t quite say “Here be dragons”, but in one corner was a picture of a square-rigger approaching the island under full sail. It had a longitude discrepancy of a third of a mile compared with GPS, and none of the modern shore features or lights matched, but the hills and rocks seemed to be in the same places. On the plus side, it was a superbly detailed survey compared with modern charts, and we were able to use it to try all sorts of tucked away anchorages in the southern inlets. We even used it for a hike, to trace an old and long forgotten mule trail through the hills until it came down into a modern development.

At the top end of Clarkes Court Bay we found a small marina that the owner, Bob, seemed to be managing and repairing single handedly. A French yacht and ourselves were his only visitors. We stayed a couple of nights at this pleasant spot sitting in the bar being served by Bob, while Andrew played the French guy at pool. During the day, a short row across the bay took us to a village where we caught the bus to St George’s, the pretty capital of Grenada, about five miles away.

Yachts are well catered for in Grenada, with yards and chandleries now recovered from hurricane Ivan. While we were in Prickly Bay, we had Mr Fixit, the local Perkins man, come and look at our Perkins engine, as it was not always going into gear. We told him there might be too much oil in the gearbox. “There’s too much oil in your gearbox”, he said, “and it’s probably the wrong type”. We spent the best part of a day searching the island for the oil he had recommended, after we looked it up for him in our service manual. Eventually a kindly garage-man told us this grade hadn’t been available for years, and found its replacement for us. Mr Fixit also offered but failed to get two frozen bolts out of the Aries self-steering. For these services we were charged £30. So much for Mr Fixit.

The little beach-bars by the popular anchorages were a magnet for yachties around sunset. One night we went to a hog-roast and another to a beach barbeque on Hog Island. But the time had come to move on, so we headed northwards along the western, leeward coast of the island. There are not many good stopping places here. St George’s large harbour does have an area for yachts, but it looked dirty and we heard the holding was bad. A little further north was Halifax Bay. This would have been a divine spot in a rugged setting, except that the island’s rubbish tip was nearby and no sooner had we anchored than we were swamped with black flies. So we continued to the Grenadines.

Saltwhistle Bay, Mayreau Island, Grenadines.

A tourist-savvy Mona monkey in Grenada's national park.

The Grenadines are a string of 50 or so islets to the north of Grenada, of which nine are inhabited, including Mustique, probably the most exclusive resort island in the world. They are beautiful, but over-hyped, and as a result both over-crowded and over-priced. This is charter-yacht territory. Both Moorings and Sunsail have major bases here, and for the first time the charter yachts - mostly dumpy French catamarans - way outnumbered us liveaboard yachts. All the popular anchorages were stuffed full, yet this was still well out of season. Tobago Cays (nothing to do with Tobago) in the middle of the group is often described as the most beautiful anchorage in the world, and I can well believe it would be if you had it to yourself. Shared with a hundred other yachts jostling for position, with the boat-boys’ pirogues buzzing around like mosquitoes as they try to sell souvenir T-shirts, the effect is rather lost.

Prices seem to rise steadily as you go north. For example, a bottle of local beer had typically cost 40p in the Brazil beach bars and 80p in Tobago and Grenada. Here we were asked about £1.60. In Martinique it would be around £2.20, and even more by the time we reached the British Virgin Islands. Then crossing to the US Virgins, prices come down again. But while the beach bars of Tobago and Grenada had been crowded in the early evening, here they were empty. No relaxed evening socializing with other yachties, so instead of staying on for a meal we would row back to the yacht for a tinned steak and kidney pudding with creamed semolina desert (specially for Andrew!).

One evening we chatted with Lisa, a pleasant girl from near Birmingham, who had just given up everything to run away to Canouan Island and work for a pittance as a dive instructor, after attending a crash course. She had been there a week, and we wished her luck. There were many like her, such as the young men and their girlfriends working as skipper and skivvy on the chartered catamarans.

On Bequia, the largest island in the chain, we stopped at Friendship Bay, and so crossed our route with that of our voyage in 1996-7. It had changed. We remembered it as a palm-fringed golden strand backed by lushly wooded steep hills, with a beautiful coral reef on which to snorkel. The hills were now covered in houses, and when we dived, the coral was mostly dead and green with slime. It is killed by raw sewage. The once memorable beach bar had become an upmarket restaurant attached to a hotel. Inside we found the prospectus for a major further development of bijou chalet houses “a minimum investment of $500,000 is required” that would remove the last of the woods and the few remaining fishermen’s huts.

But Bequia remains a comfortable laid-back spot, and throughout the Grenadines it was still possible to find beautiful deserted anchorages, spectacular scenery and golden beaches, tucked behind exposed windward reefs that are out of bounds to the charter-boats. There is no question that this area is superlative cruising.

Sentinel beating into Admiralty Bay, Bequia.