Day 4 - What the hell is a soursop?

Day 4

Another azure ceiling to a punishingly hot day. We drove to the capital – Roseau – today. It took a couple of hours, and the driving in the city was cutthroat. Though the locals are quite tolerant drivers, giving and answering honks always in a friendly context with smiles, you must be prepared to brave straddling a raingutter with your axle to accommodate oncoming lorries in lieu of a car parked in one lane of a 1.5 lane road. To add to the excitement, children and adults dart between and from behind parked and moving vehicles, each with his or her own agenda, and none in a hurry to get out of anyone’s way. Such is island life. In some places in the city, formed concrete drainage culverts slope through the jungle into the town, and continue defiantly right over the road into the ocean. This means that in addition to the speed humps which punctuate the beginning, middle and end of residential areas, there are the inverted cousins of these obstacles – the culvert – a foot deep and the length of the suzuki’s wheelbase, to add to the fun. The pavement simply takes on the form of its concrete neighbour in these places. A stop in the populated and tourist driven Anchorage led us to check the local dive shop to see about snorkeling gear. We picked up a snorkel, flippers and a mask and proceeded to drive the 15 minutes down the road to the aptly named champagne beach. I explored shorebound boulders which were teeming with coral and other undersea life. Like it’s terranean counterpart, this underwater jungle was steeped in competition and interdependence. Thousands of species could be spotted in one short hour of swimming. Sea urchins, beautiful and strangely shaped fish, sponges and coral abound here. A short distance up the coast I encountered first one, and then many streams of bubbles rushing out of fissures in the rock. Along with the omnipotent and eerie sound of underwater ‘cooking’ surrounding me, the shimmer of hot water near the holes in the sea floor were a sure sign that I had found the underwater sea vents that give champagne its name. Simply an incredible thing to witness. On the way home we hauled ass, learning to drive more like locals. Enjoying the show the villagers provide of the most unsafe and daring passes in traffic of all time. Jousting head on with huge Mercedes trucks while speeding up hill and around cliff lined corners. We arrived at Calibishi after sunset. This evening I had the pleasure of eating the strangest fruit I have ever tasted: the soursop. The Soursop is an oblong fruit, the size of a large nerf football. It has a green, soft-thorn covered skin, which when ripe feels so soft as to appear rotten. This softness is indicative of the inside of the fruit. A disorganized, white gluey flesh, which is messy and sticky, the consistency of snot, with seeds seemingly randomly distributed around a more slightly solid, less gluey core. The fruit smells like a kiwi, and tastes vaguely like a pineapple mixed with kiwi and strawberries. The tart flavour is reminiscent of the most artificial sour apple candy you have ever tried, and produces a sweet and sour froth in the mouth as the flesh looses its consistency that gives the impression that one has just eaten one too many sour peach slices. It was a curious adventure into the world of strange fruits, and despite its almost comically offensive appearance, (which we have determined must be its international popularity handicap), it was absolutely delicious. The Soursop tastes like it should be unhealthy.