A miracle – theft reversed!  26/07/2021

Amazingly, today I got my dinghy and electric engine back! Thanks to a Canadian couple, who found it beached on Sandy Island, Carriacou, about 2 miles from where I lost it. 

It appears that whoever stole it concluded quite quickly that they didn’t want it – probably because the engine is electric. They would have had no way of starting it, because I had the magnetic starter disc that must be placed on a specific spot. Possibly they didn’t want something uncommon either – a German-made Torqeedo engine would be difficult to dispose of without raising questions. They are not a common sight in this part of the world. 

So the thieves seem to have simply dumped the dinghy. And incredibly it floated 2 miles to Sandy Island, which is about 600 metres long – instead of going out to sea. Daryll and Lynn saw it on the morning of Sunday 18th – they said when it was still there a few hours later, with no sign of an owner, they investigated. It was full of water because waves were breaking over it. They emptied it and took it back to their boat, moored just off the island. 

Their detective work started. Posting on the Carriacou Cruisers forum on Facebook brought no useful result (I didn’t look at it) – they laugh and say that a couple of people contacted them claiming it, but disappeared quickly when they asked them to describe both dinghy and engine! So they went online and looked up Torqeedo, and realised this must be somebody from Europe. They emailed Torqeedo. A guy at HQ in Germany replied rapidly and they say enthusiastically, asking them for the serial number on the engine. They then got a call from the UK distributor that I had bought it from: he had my email and phone number. So I got a call on Friday afternoon from Mark in Great Yarmouth – who really went above and beyond, given he was calling from home at 6pm on a Friday evening. He put me in touch with Daryll and Lynn, who it turned out were coming back to Port Louis marina in Grenada – exactly where I am. 

So, I now have a spare dinghy, which I can easily deflate and store. And two engines, one electric, one petrol. The petrol engine can be backup for the electric, given that the electric charges simply, cost-free and pollution-free from my solar panels.

Having taken the loss of dinghy and electric engine philosophically, I am left really scratching my head at their miraculous return… At this point it appears that the world is definitely working as it should! I wonder how long that will last…

Oh, and I have really been enjoying Grenada. Stunning scenery inland, incredibly steep and winding roads taken at full speed in minibus taxis, mountainous tropical rain forest. I’ve been to a few waterfalls deep in the jungle, swimming in cool pools of silky-smooth fresh water. Up there you get 150 inches (4,000 millimetres) of rain a year. The most common snake is a 6-foot boa – which happily is nocturnal and spends the days 30-50 feet up in the trees… 

Plus there’s a wonderful 2-mile beach about half an hour’s walk from the marina, where the water is crystal clear. And St George’s, the capital, just across the lagoon, is interesting – a lot of historic Victorian buildings, steep, narrow streets, with the ruined Fort George sitting above it all. It’s a change to find a nice capital city – St John’s in Antigua is a dump, as is Castries in St Lucia.