Barbados is a 14 by 21 mile island with a population of 279,000. It was named Barbados by the Portuguese and means “bearded one” because of the shaggy exposed roots of the fig trees. I did a tour to Sunbury Sugar Plantation House, which is over 300 years old and is a living monument to plantation life of a bygone era. While we were at Sunbury, we had a cooking demonstration. The demonstrators made fish cakes and Bajan dip, Jerk chicken, Plantains which look like bananas, which were dipped in egg and breadcrumbs and fried, bread fruit which is evidently full of protein and extremely plentiful, Bajan rum punch and Corn N Oil which was an old time planters drink made from rum, velvet falernum and angostura bitters. After sampling this cooking we continued our trip around the island to the orchid farm. The orchids are all grown in fenced off areas to prevent the local green monkeys from destroying them. Evidently, these monkeys, which were brought to Barbados as pets are now so prolific that they destroy all the crops that are not fenced off. When we returned to the ship we had a concert given by the locals. There were dancing women, the national and international band, an acrobat who did the splits and many somersaults and a wonderfully talented stilt walker and dancer. It was a very different and most enjoyable concert. (Barbara) I went on a snorkelling tour to swim with turtles and visit an old shipwreck in a marine park. The turtles moved around our group without fear as they took food from our tour guides. There were also large fish and prolific schools of smaller ones. We were taken to and from the Dawn Princess in a high powered jet boat much faster than anything I have travelled in before. We got very wet but the water was warm. Our guide Ife was a laugh a minute as he captained the boat and handed out the rum punch at the end of the snorkelling. It was a very noisy ride home to the ship as a consequence. (Bill)
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