Barbados

Despite the weather forecast, we woke up to beautiful blue skies in Barbados. We are docked with 3 other cruise ships – Jewel of the Seas, Azura, and Braemar. Although I do think that Braemar is a good looking little ship, I think we are by far the best looking of the lot.

We headed ashore after breakfast. I was hoping that there would be a steel drum band to welcome us off the ship, but this didn’t happen. Instead there was a throng of passengers who were very irritable due to the chaotic situation with the shuttle buses that were supposed to take us to the cruise terminal. The buses were small and too few in number to effectively transport a shipload of people who were eager to get ashore and explore. After a long wait in the sun we were eventually able to get on a bus for the ride to the cruise terminal. It turned out that this was a very short drive, and we could have easily walked it.

No band as we went into the terminal. I had assumed there would be one when we exited it then. We had a quick look at the shops in the terminal. There are several liquor and jewelry stores. There are the usual souvenir shops with T-shirts, hats and baskets. There is also a small convenience shop. On the way out of the terminal there is a café where passengers were already enjoying an early morning beer or two. But no welcoming band alas. Not being able to head a steel drum band in the Caribbean is like going to Scotland and not hearing bagpipes playing in the distance. Simply not acceptable.

Our next challenge of the day was to find a taxi. Our goal was to go in to town and find a shoe repair shop to get Brain’s formal shoes mended, and then to head to Dover Beach. Brian’s sister and her family have rented a house there for a week, and we were very excited that it worked out that we would be able to spend the day on the beach with them.

There were scores of taxis and over energetic men gesticulating madly about our need to do a tour of the island, but we couldn’t find anyone willing to do what we wanted. Every time we explained what we wanted, we were told that we didn’t want to do that at all, and that we wanted an island tour. Finally we were able to find a driver who squeezed us into his van and agreed to drop us off in town if we were sure that we didn’t want an island tour. I don’t think the other occupants of the van were too happy with another 2 passengers, and seemed quite relieved when we were unceremoniously deposited in town.

We were about to ask someone to direct us to a shoe repair shop when we realized we had been dropped off outside a rather nice looking shoe shop. We went inside to see if maybe, maybe they had formal shoes. They did indeed, and a lot of other very nice shoes. We decided that we would buy another pair of formal shoes, and wait until we got back home to get the old ones mended. Doesn’t everybody need 2 pairs of formal shoes?

Clutching the new shoes, and a world atlas we had bought so we could see where we are in the world, we found a very nice taxi driver, Mali, who didn’t see any problem taking us to Dover Beach, and picking us up later to take us back to the ship.

There are a lot of beaches on Barbados, but Dover is our favourite. It is a wide beach with picture perfect yellow sand, and palm trees to give you shade. The water is very calm, but there are enough waves to go boogie boarding. There are several restaurants and food shacks nearby. A charming man, Kenny, rents out sun loungers and umbrellas. At the end of the beach where we like to go there is a man who lives in a tree. We didn’t see him today, but there is plenty of evidence that this tree continues to be his abode.

It was fantastic to see our family again, especially our 2 very cute great nieces. We spent the day swimming in the warm blue waters and lying in the shade under the palm trees. There are several food shacks nearby, so we had flying fish sandwiches for lunch on the beach. There have been several sea turtles in the bay, and my niece saw one yesterday, but alas we didn’t see any. I love sea turtles.

After our day on the beach we went back to their house briefly to take care of some important emails. The Internet of the ship is extremely slow, and frequently times out before you can do the work you want to. It’s all very frustrating. So, we decided to take advantage of a brief period of Internet that behaved in a normal manner.

Then Mali appeared to take us back to the ship again. We said goodbye to the family, we won’t see them again until April!

We got back to the terminal just after 6:00. Most of the shops were already closed, but one of the liquor stores was still open, so Brian bought a bottle of whisky. There were signs saying ‘free internet’ so we thought we could do some last minute web surfing, but alas it was not working.

It was actually a quick and easy stroll back to the ship. We will know better next time not to wait for the shuttle. There were also some great opportunities for taking photos of the ship on the walk along the dock. Queen Victoria was looking magnificent in the evening sunlight.

We clearly weren’t the last people back on board, as there were the usual messages for people to contact the pursers’ office. However, Captain Philpott announced that everyone was now back on board, and at 7:10 PM we set sail for the Amazon.