It's the easternmost island of the West Indies. The west coast of the island is lined with over 10 miles of perfect white-sand beaches with perfectly clear water. This is why this piece of paradise has been dubbed the "Platinum Coast." Barbados is mostly a flat coral island, but there are rolling hills and many deep ridges and gullies, with an interesting distribution of flora and fauna. Within the Barbados coral core, there is a vast array of caves and underground lakes which provide an excellent supply of drinking water that is amongst the purest in the world. Geologically Barbados is unique, being actually two land masses that merged together over the years. The island is relatively small - only 166 square miles, 21 miles long by 14 miles at its widest. It is divided into 11 "parishes" or counties - 10 named for saints of the Christian calendar, plus the southern area called Christ Church. All roads lead to or out of Bridgetown. Most rural roads are winding and narrow, and in the British tradition, traffic moves on the left. Barbados has a public smoking ban and camouflaged clothing is forbidden in Barbados.
We got up early to head out for some shopping since we shouldn't miss it according to the shopping guy. He told us to go directly downtown and work our way back. Well as soon as we got out of the terminal we were bombarded with taxi drivers and people wanting to take us on a tour. I was not a fan of that at all! We made it downtown and found more taxi drivers wanting to take us somewhere...no thank you! Once we were downtown and started our shopping we found that the only thing around was jewelry. I really love jewelry, but when I asked to see a ring and it was around $4,000 I knew Jason wasn't going to buy me anything so the shopping was a waste. :) We walked around and actually found a lady selling paintings that she had painted of the island. They were beautiful so we bought one to have framed. I didn't feel safe at all walking around and one guy stopped us trying to give us a bag of fruit because he wanted money. At that point I told Jason that we could leave! We headed back to the ship and just in time because it started pouring. Our taxi driver said that it would normally rain and then clear up for the day. We ate lunch in a little cafe on the ship that served crepes. It was delicious, but we had to leave and couldn't order dessert. :( We had booked an afternoon beach break excursion and it was much better going out of the terminal for a scheduled tour...no pressure from taxi drivers! The rain had cleared up and we had a beautiful time at the beach. The water was gorgeous!! It was very relaxing and beautiful weather for a great afternoon. On our way back to the ship I noticed some shops that I wish we would have found in the morning...not jewelry and local in a cute area. Next time! :) While I was getting ready that night we were able to see a gorgeous sunset from our balcony as we pulled out of port. Our entertainment for the evening was Comedian Fred Klett. The description given to us was this: "Fred's comedy is family oriented, observations from his life, childhood, marriage, and children that anyone can relate to. He has been seen on Showtime, NBC and has worked with Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld." He was hilarious and I haven't laughed that hard in a long time! After his show we went to the "Late Night Liars Club." There was a panel made up of our cruise director, Alexander, comedian, Fred Klett, and another officer on the ship. They were asked to define a word and we had to guess who was telling the true definition. It was another hour of lots of laughs. The saying is definitely true...laughter is the best medicine! It was a wonderful way to end the night! Next up...St. Lucia!
Welcome to Barbados!
Our ship in Barbados...with the cloudy skies in the morning.
Looking towards downtown
Buildings along the waterway...the colors screamed Caribbean!
Pirate ship Jolly Roger...this was an excursion that probably would have been a fun one...next time!
View from our room in port and the gorgeous water
Beach Break!
Jason loves to explore. This was an interesting area. Those are steps coming down to the ocean from the building above. We weren't sure if it once went onto the beach or not.
On the steps were lots of crabs! How many can you see?
View of the other side of the beach
Leaving port from our balcony
Sunset
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