To the Caribbean With Love: Barbados

8 March 2015

Another day, another tour. Today's tour took us all around Barbados, the 50th country I've ever visited. Our first stop was Harrison's Cave, and we went down a total of 160 feet to see stalactites and stalacmites. Harrison's Cave was first discovered in the 17th century but the location became lost to history. It was finally rediscovered in 1970.

We were warned that the Barbadian Government would not tolerate passengers going ashore wearing camouflage of any kind. Even so, one idiot wore khaki shorts. But...why Barbados, of all places, would be paranoid about this we don't know.

As we drove around the island, we learned that Barbados, which is not as hilly as Grenada, sources its water from underground springs and from a desalination plant, unlike Grenada which has plentiful rainfall with 120 inches each year. Barbados' temperatures range from 19 to 33 degrees Celsius year round. The island has many plants, including frangipani, African tulip, and mahogany. It has many bananas too, but no longer exports them.

Our driver, Dwayne, gave us rum punch. He drove us through a jungle and pointed out eucalyptus from Australia. At one point, we were 780 feet above sea level and we could feel a cool breeze. Dwayne said this was the northeast trade winds. Late morning, we arrived at Bathsheba Beach, where large rocks have sat on the sand since Barbados first rose above the ocean surface some 60,000 years ago.

This afternoon, our tour over, Jean and I walked into the capital, Bridgetown. Last month in Finland, my relative, Ilkka, told of an individual connected to the family who had worked in Bridgetown. He produced an old photo showing the Barbados Parliament building. This afternoon, we found it and took a picture to show how it looks today.

The sunrise over Barbados guides our ship into the port at Bridgetown.