Wednesday – Bridgetown, Barbados

Today, we arrived at our final Caribbean port, Bridgetown, in Barbados.

Again, I hadn’t been given any tour escort duty, so I had the day to myself. The answer to the question; what does one do in Barbados when one has nothing else pressing?… is, let’s face it, a bit of a no-brainer. Answer; go looking for a beach…

Having been to Barbados many times before, I wasn’t too bothered about taking the long walk into town. Instead, I decided to go for a walk, in search of a beach close to the port, where I’d been to once before (but only in a taxi). As with Castries, yesterday, I was harangued by eager taxi drivers, but I resolutely walked on, fending them off as politely, but firmly as I could. Yes, I did know where I was going; no, I didn’t need a taxi….

In some ways, I can understand why they might want to discourage me from walking in the opposite direction to the town, past the many small industrial units that skirted the bay. If everyone got wind of the fact that there was a small beach within 15-20 minutes walking distance of the port, then the taxi drivers might lose income from it. Instead, they make a grand gesture of herding passengers freshly alighting from the terminal, into a busy, highly organised, taxi pick-up area, where they can point to their scale of charges – I’m sure they’d want to charge me $5 – $10 just to take me 5 minutes around the corner (I only had $4 in my pocket, though, so that was never going to happen). From the inside of a cab, many people, I’m sure, are generally blissfully unaware of exactly how far they’re being taxied, or where they are in relation to the port. Sure; there are larger, more commercial beaches on the other side of the island, that are not within walking distance, but if all you want is a place to dip your toes, then it’s usually possible to find a beach if you put your mind to it, and not be swayed by persistent taxi drivers.

Needless to say; as I walked, I realised I was getting the occasional odd look from passers-by; mostly workers from the small warehouses and factories that I passed… no-one else seemed to be walking this way. True to my instincts, though, I finally came to the beach in question, which was long and sandy, and seemed to have no more than a dozen people or so dotted along its length. I found myself a good spot to plant my rucksack and belongings, and duly went for a swim. The waves here were rather splendid, and fun to play around in; I figured I could legitimately consider this a ‘Wave Observation Project’, a kind of ‘field-study’ for future seascapes… well, as I’m always saying to my students; observation is as important to the task of painting as the painting itself. Someone has to do it.

I swam for about an hour before heading back to the ship in time for lunch. After lunch, I spent the rest of the afternoon making use of the terminal building’s wonderful (not) free wi-fi. A much shorter day than yesterday, our departure time was 5:30pm.

This is the point in the cruise at which we turn right and head back across the Atlantic, towards the Azores, and the final leg of our voyage. With no less than five days at sea ahead of us, it’ll be back to work tomorrow, as watercolour classes resume once more.