Grenada

Grand Cayman and Grenada are still trying to recover from the hurricanes that swept through the Caribbean, but other islands are already putting out the welcome mat for tourists. Before you book a visit to an island, try to find out the extent of any damage. Reliable information can be hard to come by in the tourist-dependent Carib-bean. Hotel Web sites are often not reliable. If possible, talk to someone with direct knowledge of an island's or a resort's conditions -- someone who has just been there, for example.

My wife, Sally, and I live in Eldersburg. We took a 10-night cruise on the Emerald Princess in early April. We had beautiful weather every day and visited Aruba, Bonaire, Grenada, Dominica, St. Thomas and Princess Cays. I took this shot at sunset from the ship docked at St. George's, Grenada. I would recommend this cruise ship and itinerary to anybody. The Baltimore Sun welcomes submissions for "My Best Shot." Photos should be accompanied by a description of when and where you took the picture and your name, address and phone number.

Believe it or not, island-lovers, plenty of people are not in a hurry to go to the Caribbean.After a couple days of ooh-ing over palm-fringed beauty and feeling pretty smart to have escaped -- however temporarily -- the hustle-bustle at home, they get desperate for something to do.More accurately, something to see. This breed of tourist craves sightseeing and would rather get a great photo than a great tan.With a few exceptions, tourist sites aren't the...

Oct. 25 1983 A U.S.-led force invaded Grenada at the order of President Reagan, who said the action was needed to protect U.S. citizens there.

TRUE BLUE POINT, Grenada - It was a tiny, offshore medical school thrust into the middle of the Cold War when U.S. troops stormed this island nation in 1983 for what the Reagan administration billed as a rescue of American students from the threat of an unstable government. Back then, St. George's Medical School was little more than a cluster of trailer-style buildings tucked into a lush tropical hillside, a haven for aspiring American doctors who couldn't get into a stateside program.

GRENVILLE, Grenada - For half a millennium, the aromatic little seed of the Myristica fragrans tree is said to have cured everything from boils and backaches to strokes and the plague. Arabs and Indians swear it's an aphrodisiac. Malcolm X smoked it in jail when he ran out of marijuana. Wars were fought over it - including one that rendered the obscure New World island of Manhattan to the British. Today it's in toothpaste, perfume, sausages and soap - not to mention countless cups of eggnog.

It's the cable that's supposed to go through the roof, not the rate.Bill wants the armed forces to be ready for two wars simultaneously, one against Grenada and the other with Nauru.

Oct. 25 1983 A U.S.-led force invaded Grenada at the order of President Reagan, who said the action was needed to protect U.S. citizens there.

My wife, Sally, and I live in Eldersburg. We took a 10-night cruise on the Emerald Princess in early April. We had beautiful weather every day and visited Aruba, Bonaire, Grenada, Dominica, St. Thomas and Princess Cays. I took this shot at sunset from the ship docked at St. George's, Grenada. I would recommend this cruise ship and itinerary to anybody. The Baltimore Sun welcomes submissions for "My Best Shot." Photos should be accompanied by a description of when and where you took the picture and your name, address and phone number.

Two Coast Guard petty officers from Boston and a former Grenada police officer were charged in a federal complaint made public yesterday with conspiracy to import cocaine. Authorities identified the two Coast Guard officers as Wendy Bens, 25, an electrician's mate, and Jonathan Louis DeCarlo, 23, a gunner's mate, both assigned to the Coast Guard cutter Spencer. The third defendant was identified as Alison Cletus Isaac Alexander, 35, a former drug task force officer in Grenada now living in Yorktown, Va. According to the complaint filed in U.S. District Court, authorities seized 4 pounds of cocaine from a suitcase belonging to Alexander after he arrived at Baltimore-Washington International Airport on Jan. 27. Customs agents replaced the cocaine with powder, then followed Alexander to a hotel, where they said the suitcase was picked up by Bens and DeCarlo.

Grand Cayman and Grenada are still trying to recover from the hurricanes that swept through the Caribbean, but other islands are already putting out the welcome mat for tourists. Before you book a visit to an island, try to find out the extent of any damage. Reliable information can be hard to come by in the tourist-dependent Carib-bean. Hotel Web sites are often not reliable. If possible, talk to someone with direct knowledge of an island's or a resort's conditions -- someone who has just been there, for example.

As a child, Anthony Greenidge of Randallstown would listen in awe to his grandparents' horrific tales of Hurricane Janet, the storm that thrashed his tiny Caribbean island homeland of Grenada in 1955. Enduring days without food or water, his grandparents said the family only barely survived. Greenidge's birth, just a month after the storm hit, was a miracle, according to family lore. Today, no one in his family expected a storm as wicked as Janet to strike again. But it did. "Ivan is 10 times worse," he said.

IF I'VE HEARD it once since President Reagan died, I've heard it a dozen times. "Reagan didn't do anything for black people." Since Reagan was elected president of all Americans, you have to wonder from whence came the notion that he, or any other American president, should do anything "for" one particular ethnic or racial group. Still, the argument can be made that Reagan did for black people what he did for Americans of every other race and ethnicity: He tried his best to disabuse us of the notion that the federal government is our mommy and daddy.

Two Coast Guard petty officers from Boston and a former Grenada police officer were charged in a federal complaint made public yesterday with conspiracy to import cocaine. Authorities identified the two Coast Guard officers as Wendy Bens, 25, an electrician's mate, and Jonathan Louis DeCarlo, 23, a gunner's mate, both assigned to the Coast Guard cutter Spencer. The third defendant was identified as Alison Cletus Isaac Alexander, 35, a former drug task force officer in Grenada now living in Yorktown, Va. According to the complaint filed in U.S. District Court, authorities seized 4 pounds of cocaine from a suitcase belonging to Alexander after he arrived at Baltimore-Washington International Airport on Jan. 27. Customs agents replaced the cocaine with powder, then followed Alexander to a hotel, where they said the suitcase was picked up by Bens and DeCarlo.

Oct. 25, 1983 - 20 years ago to the day. Can you remember what you were doing? Randallstown resident Don Rojas can. He was on the run, trying to elude patrols that had been ordered to shoot him on sight. This all-too-real drama took place in the tiny nation of Grenada, which lies near the end of a long chain of eastern Caribbean islands. Rojas had returned to his native Grenada in 1979 to serve in the government of his schoolmate Prime Minister Maurice Bishop (both had attended Presentation Brothers College, a high school in St. George's, Grenada's capital)

GRENVILLE, Grenada - For half a millennium, the aromatic little seed of the Myristica fragrans tree is said to have cured everything from boils and backaches to strokes and the plague. Arabs and Indians swear it's an aphrodisiac. Malcolm X smoked it in jail when he ran out of marijuana. Wars were fought over it - including one that rendered the obscure New World island of Manhattan to the British. Today it's in toothpaste, perfume, sausages and soap - not to mention countless cups of eggnog.

Sir Eric Gairy,75, widely regarded as an eccentric and authoritarian leader during his 12-year term as Grenada's prime minister, died Saturday at his home in Grand Anse in southern Grenada, said Jerry Romain, a leader of Gairy's political party. The cause of death wasn't disclosed. Mr. Gairy suffered a stroke last year and he had diabetes and glaucoma.Mr. Gairy dominated politics on this Caribbean island for three decades and became Grenada's first prime minister after independence from Britain in 1974.

TRUE BLUE POINT, Grenada - It was a tiny, offshore medical school thrust into the middle of the Cold War when U.S. troops stormed this island nation in 1983 for what the Reagan administration billed as a rescue of American students from the threat of an unstable government. Back then, St. George's Medical School was little more than a cluster of trailer-style buildings tucked into a lush tropical hillside, a haven for aspiring American doctors who couldn't get into a stateside program.