"We cater to families so we tend to be a lot more relaxed than the brand-name hotels," says manager Julia Moore, whose mother built the Gem Holiday Beach Resort in 1987. Moore always makes it a point to buy arriving guests a drink at the bar of the hotel's Sur Le Mer restaurant, an open-air affair no more than ten paces from the sea. This is more than just the usual "welcome drink" gimmick, since it typically turns into another drink or two and then a plate of appetizers arrives - papaya, pineapple, cheese - while Moore offers insider tips on the best way to see her native island.

I follow Moore's suggestion to arrive early - by 7 a.m. - at the market that's the bustling heart and soul of St. George's. Founded in 1700 by French settlers, the city is perched around one of the Caribbean's most charming harbors, and the market, with its warrens of plywood vendor stalls and canvas tents, occupies a football-field-size habitat atop a hill in the center of town. Six days a week (the market is closed on Sundays) farmers and fishermen arrive before dawn to spread out their wares - mounds of mangoes and bananas, vast piles of snapper and mackerel. There are also the ubiquitous "spice ladies," who are often relentless in their pursuit of customers. Dickering is part of the deal here. For about $10, you can buy enough nutmeg, cinammon, cloves, and other spices to last a lifetime. And aromatic spice necklaces, strung on fishing line, are about $3 after the bargaining is done.

Breakfast, at one of the many unnamed cafes, is coffee with fish 'n bake (chunks of salted cod in a crispy hot muffin) for about $2. But for a sit-down meal, one can hardly do better than Deyna's (on Melville Street along the Esplanade, 473/440-6795) where Diana Hercules, one of the island's finest traditional chefs, holds court starting with breakfast at 7:30 a.m., through a busy lunch, and serving dinner until 10 p.m. Her "sampler dinner" of Grenadan specialties, which changes daily and can feature anything from marinated kingfish and callalloo soup to curried lambi (conch) and rice, peas, and chicken, runs about $7.

Like most Caribbean islands, there are no real deals when it comes to renting cars on Grenada. Expect to pay at least $50 a day for a four-cylinder stick-shift compact with an air-conditioner that may not work. But Grenada is wonderfully served by a public transportation system consisting of countless white or red Mitsubishi minibuses that are constantly on the prowl. If you are walking down the street and hear a beep behind you, it means a minibus driver is advertising that he has room. Hop in and the fare is one East Caribbean dollar (about 40 cents) no matter where you are going around St. George's. For an extra buck or two, drivers will sometimes alter their established routes to deliver you directly to your hotel or to a restaurant (private cabs can be expensive and fares should be negotiated in advance). Outside of St. George's, minibus rates are based on an inscrutable scale that I never managed to figure out. All I know is that I spent an entire day traveling via minibuses, going from one end of Grenada to the other and back - through the rain forest preserve of Grand Etang National Park to the lovely beach at Bathway on the island's north tip - and it cost me about $9.

Fly like an Osprey: Carriacou

Grenada is actually a three-island nation that also includes Carriacou and Petit Martinique, about 25 miles to the north. Carriacou, (pronounced "Care-a-koo") offers more lodging and restaurants than Petit Martinique and is popular with day-trippers from Grenada who come to enjoy empty beaches. Shuttling twice daily between Grenada and Carriacou is the Osprey Express Ltd., a sleek, modern ferry that serves the first leg in the island-hopping trek to St. Vincent. It boasts an air-conditioned main cabin with seating for about 60, along with a snack bar. Most passengers, however, opt for the deck, at least in balmy weather.

The 90-minute voyage (about $30) skims Grenada's west coast, dipping close to the fishing village of Gouyave (its street party on the final weekend of each month is one of the Caribbean's liveliest) and past "Leapers Hill" in Sauteurs. It was here, in 1651, that the last band of Carib Indians on Grenada - some 40 of them - jumped to their deaths on the rocks below rather than submit to French rule. The Osprey also cuts a careful path around "Kick 'Em Jenny," an underwater volcano that sits between Grenada and Carriacou and still kicks up on occasion.

Once delivered by the Osprey to the main dock in downtown Hillsborough (population, about 700), it's only a three-minute walk to Ade's Dream (Main Street, 473/443-7317, fax 473/443-8435, e-mail: adesdea@caribsurf.com), a two-story, 23-unit guesthouse with exceptionally clean, air-conditioned double rooms starting at about $40 a night. It's owned by the enterprising Adele Mills, a friendly seventy-something islander who also owns the adjacent supermarket, as well as Seawave restaurant across the street, where a dinner of chicken 'n chips is about $4. Nearby, the Sand Island Cafe does wonders with the traditional saltfish-and-cakes breakfast, soaking the fish in coconut milk and adding carrots and cabbage (with side dishes of grapefruit, bananas, papaya, and coffee, it comes to about $5).

For such a small island and one that takes some degree of forethought to reach, Carriacou serves up a surprising number of worthy accommodations. The most notable new venture is the Green Roof Inn (473/443-6399, www.greenroofinn.com), which offers five rooms in an immaculately tended home on a bluff at the north end of Hillsborough Bay. It's the loving project of a Swedish couple, Jonas Gezelius and Asa Johansson, who have appointed it with Danish/Scandinavian furniture and given special attention to sprucing up an otherwise scrubby landscape. There's a small terrace restaurant and prices for a double room range $40 to $70 per night with breakfast. Just up the road-there's really only one road on Carriacou - sits John's Unique Resort (473/443-8345, e-mail: junique@caribsurf.com), with 17 rooms. Shrouded in bougainvillea and featuring a restaurant, John's rates run $20 to $55 per night.

So what's there to do on Carriacou? The beaches are the big thing. And the most easily accessible strand is Paradise Beach, which runs for a good mile or so just south of the island's airport. Indeed, things are so slow on Carriacou that the main road also doubles as the airport's runway (a barricade blocks automobile traffic when planes are approaching). The Hardwood Bar & Restaurant, on Paradise Beach, is a good place to sip a Carib beer or, for the brave, sample the local form of distilled punishment: Jack Iron rum. Bottled on Carriacou and weighing in at almost 160 proof, Jack Iron is so close to pure alcohol that ice cubes sink straight to the bottom. It is carefully measured out in small beakers and sipped over the course of a very long afternoon. If you want to make friends quickly in a Carriacou bar, then simply order a small flask of Jack Iron - an entire quart costs only $7, but that can kill you-and invite other patrons to join you in polishing it off.

The owner of the Hardwood Bar & Restaurant, Joseph Edmunds, also runs a water taxi from the beach in front of his establishment. For about $4 a head, he'll haul visitors out to Sandy Cay, about a mile offshore. It's an idyllic beachy spit - barely a half-mile long, no houses, no nothing, not even a tiki bar - featured on countless postcards. No trip to Carriacou is complete until you've spent a few hours playing Robinson Crusoe on its shore.

Onward to Union Island