Barbados - Day Three

Today. Slept in again, never gets old!


Took forever getting ready, ate breakfast, loaded the 3 surfboards in the car we needed to return to Melanie (she is the one we are renting the house from) and get the right boards, and headed out to Brandon’s yet again. It is so nice having the freedom of a car, and starting to know our way around. It takes about 40 minutes to get from our place (the East side of the Island, Bathsheba) to the Southwest side of the island, where Brandon’s is – and Bridgetown is right there as well.


We hung around Brandon’s until Melanie came, and switched out the boards. We then headed to Freights, where the surf was supposed to be incredible and mellower than Brandon’s. The coast is so incredible!! The beaches are so white and pristine, and the water so clear and blue/turquoise. I love it!


We stopped at The Surfer’s Café and got lunch. Our table overlooked the ocean. Perfect.


We then made our way to Freights. Parking was a pain – we had to just park on the street in some neighborhood. The tide was up and there was really no beach – it just went from ocean to rock mostly. Made it interesting.


Andrew sprained his ankle really badly playing soccer right before he came to Barbados, so he was very concerned about surfing with it. He wrapped it really well and used a brace, but it still made it really painful to surf, which is so sad – since that is why he chose Barbados to come to in the first place.


My board seriously weighs a hundred pounds. For beginners, it is easier to have a bigger board. Mine is I think 9 feet? And it is fat and thick and weights a ton. I had to carry it so far to the water and I about died. I may be exaggerating. But still it sucked. Once in the water, I had this delusion that I’d be all pro in 2.5 seconds. More like I’d be exhausted and soaking wet within 2.5 seconds. I had the hardest time balancing. On my stomach. I was thrashing and tipping over and doing all sorts of lame unattractive things. Andrew ended up pulling me most the way to the waves – I felt like I was a child. An incompetent child. But it was fun. Towards the end I was finding my balance better and able to paddle better, but from all the waves and turning and not knowing what I was doing and choppy waves, I got suuuuper seasick. I was not expecting that at all.


There were lots of turtles where we were, and other big fish. It was awesome. You’d be chilling there on your board waiting to catch a wave (how pro do I sound? I can sound as pro as I want because none of you were there to see what my version of chilling there on my board waiting to catch a wave looked like) and little turtle heads would pop up next to you. Probably my favorite part about the surfing experience. Oh – and I think I saw a big sting ray! Either that or a massive floating clump of seaweed or other such substance.


Anyways, I was feeling way too sick to continue on (I NEVER get seasick… until over Christmas went I went diving in the Red Sea and got sick and burst an eardrum and threw up all over the beautiful Red Sea and then my ears hurt so much I thought I’d die and couldn’t hear and kept throwing up and got car sick every time I got in a car for the next month and then my ear started hearting bad again for months and I finally went to the doctor and he said my ears were fine he thinks my ear bone is infected and to take Aleve 2 times daily… so anyways moral of that story is I think I did some major damage to my ear/equilibrium because I never got sea sick my whole life until over Christmas and then now… and who gets sick while surfing?? I suck) so Andrew set me up to catch a wave to shore, and I caught it and it was the funnest thing EVER. I didn’t try to stand up – I was moving so quickly it didn’t even occur to me to stand up. I had no idea you go that fast when you surf – it looks so much slower than it feels. Those waves have so much power and push you so fast. It was so fun.


After that, I got out and took pictures/videos of Andrew trying to surf. Poor guy – his ankle hurt so much he only caught a couple of waves and would drop down quickly because it hurt so much.


I put on SO much sunscreen so many times, and still felt the sun scorching me. I have never in my life put on so much sunscreen or been so careful. The sun here is intense! But I love it.


After a while longer, we loaded our stuff back up (after carrying my board back to the car, while seriously considering leaving it on the beach and just paying for the stupid thing as a lost fee… haha) and headed to see Harrison’s caves.


We stopped at the Grocery store on the way, to get some Ginger Ale and other ginger snacks for tomorrow (we are going snorkeling with the turtles and over a ship wreck!!! I am so stinking thrilled, but also nervous about the sea sickness thing…). The grocery stores here are seriously under-stocked. It is so different from the states, where everything is chalk full. The only isle completely full is the alcohol isle. It is chalk full. Rum everywhere! The other thing I’m shocked at is the produce. I thought for sure Barbados would have all kinds of awesome tropical fruit. But their fruit is not only expensive, it looks nasty. Their apples – you couldn’t pay me to eat them. They look that bad. You can get coconuts and sugar cane everywhere and for super cheep – but that’s it. That is the one disappointment for Barbados thus far. The fruit.


We continued on the Harrison’s Cave and actually made it with very little confusion. It is so fun to feel like we’re finally starting to get the hang of the island!! Our map is tearing though – that much use. And Andrew is still letting me navigate – which means either he is really retarded or I’m not as bad of a navigator as I thought… or maybe it’s just desperation on his part combined with enthusiastic optimism on mine…


Sadly, the caves close early, so we didn’t make it on time. We did, however, get the privilege of driving back to our place through the most beautiful and scenic jungle hilly area, in the cold rain, with wet swimming suits on, in the near dark, with no top on the car. It was wet and cooooold but so pretty. We also escaped near death in the form of a truck losing a tire and it hitting our tiny little car. It didn’t appear to do any damage, besides a small dent in the front. I hope they don’t notice when we return the car… so we did make it straight back to our house which is so awesome. I am loving this whole not getting lost thing…


We came back, and wanted to order pizza (we memorized the pizza number off an ad at the grocery store) but they didn’t answer their phone. Interesting. So Andrew had a boxed lasagna from Kuwait we cooked. It didn’t need to be refrigerated; it was just in a box. We have no microwave and the oven was being weird so we cooked it in the toaster oven. We had that, olives, almonds and pickles for dinner. Completely delicious. Andrew tried to pop popcorn in the toaster oven… and he gave it a good go, until it started to smell like the paper was catching on fire (who would have seen that coming!?). it’s so fun just hanging out in the house, with the ocean in front of us, the sound of the waves and the breeze coming in through every door and window.


And that concludes my third day in Barbados. I’m sun burnt and beat and happy.