ST. GEORGE, GRENADA—Pierce, a hulk of a man from Florida who has come to Grenada to dive in the shipwreck-rich waters off the coast of this lush West Indies’ island, tells us this is the first time he’s been back here since “the mid ’80s.”

“Oh, so then you must see a real change,” says Nadine, an attractive British woman who is driving us along the country’s breathtaking coastal highway — it’s only highway — in the direction of Gouyave, a small fishing village.

“No, not really” replies Pierce matter-of-factly, “from what I see, nothing much has changed here since my last visit.”

“Well,” Nadine assures her American guest, “things are about to change now.”

After decades of being the Rip Van Winkle of Caribbean tourism, sleepy little Grenada is being shaken out of its slumber and entering the big leagues of travel, thanks in large part to the hundreds of millions of dollars being invested here by some major hotel organizations including Four Seasons (and probably Ritz Carlton), as well as a group of top international developers headed by Britain’s Peter De Savary, the man whose luxurious Abaco Club creation at Winding Bay, Bahamas, a few years ago is still the talk of the Caribbean.

Soon, Grenada’s current inventory of quaint but aging hotels, nestled along pristine beaches and surrounded by a backdrop of dramatic volcanic mountains and rainforests, will be joined by an A-list of resorts, million-dollar luxury homes and an ultra-modern marina now being built in St. George’s harbor to attract the mega yachts which ply the azure waters in these parts.

“This is a very exciting time for Grenada,” says Nadine as we enter Gouyave, where locals are setting up cooking stands along the narrow main street for the village’s weekly Friday evening fish fry.

“For a long time, people stayed away from Grenada, mainly because of the bad rap it got when the U.S. invaded it in 1984,” she says, referring to the island’s darkest period in modern times when then president Ronald Reagan ordered American troops to invade Grenada to free U.S. students being held hostage by the island’s Marxist government, which had close ties with Cuba.

The Marxists and the U.S. troops have long gone, but the students, over 4,000 of them from a variety of countries attending world renowned American University in St. George, remain, adding their own spice of life to a place known as “Spice Island.”

Grenadians are arguably some of the Caribbean's friendliest people. (Marc Atchison/ITD)

This is also where much of Grenada’s treasured nutmeg plantations, at least the remaining ones, are located. Much of that industry was destroyed when Hurricane Ivan touched down here in 2004. Most of the nutmeg trees were uprooted and the ones planted to replace them need seven years to reach maturity.

“We’ll come back here later for the fish fry but first I’d like to show you what makes Grenada unlike any other island in the Caribbean,” says Nadine as she leaves the main highway just outside the fishing village and begins to climb a steep mountain road bordered by lush rainforest vegetation.