Barbados

The ship folk asked us to get off by 10 am at the latest. So by 10am the Customs folk had let us go and we had a taxi for the 7 of us. With luggage. Dad, T & me for our hotel, everyone else for the airport. Our driver insisted on stuffing four more people into our van. We were friendly, but I don't believe any of us really wanted to be THAT friendly.

Unlike our first trip to Barbados, the driver took us directly to our hotel (vs getting totally lost). Not a traditional US hotel. The "lobby" was the size of a closet, and unair-conditioned. She took our money and our luggage and told us to come back in four hours

Ugh. Four hours

By a circulous path, we went to the tiny bar across the street, which at least had shade and a breeze. The bartender was surprisingly eloquent and discussed US politics and history with us for an hour. When her shift ended, she took us in her car (I had brief visions of dark alleys) and dropped us at a beach tiki bar

No well-spoken bartenders, but the beach view was fantastic, the food decent, the drinks steady, and the bathroom clean. It was pretty much all I could hope for in a place to dribble away several hours. We lasted almost two hours, before the encroaching sun drove us out again.

Evidently the last thing I want to do in the hot sun is wander a beach with sand-unfriendly sandals and no sun screen. We had run out of sunscreen and alternate shoes were trapped far away in our bags. We had another 1.25 hours. I wanted to be quiet, read my book in the shade with a cool drink. *sigh* I bought us a 1.25 hour taxi drive. At least it had shade. And sometimes the driver told us stories about the things we passed.

When they FINALLY let us into our room at the hotel, it was... spartan. Not your Motel 6 in the US. It had weak AC in the bedroom. There were mosquitoes that fed happily on me. I never managed to get the shower to run anything but cold water (though after the first few seconds, I didn't care). We bought fruit for my breakfast to augment my ship pilfered roll (Thank you, J!) and I went to bed. At about 6pm, I took melatonin and went to sleep. The alarm to make it to the airport went off at 4:30am. Ugh.

The flights back were long long long and filled with screaming children. *sigh* But the flights were mostly on time and we only landed at home about an hour late. T wanted to do party prep, but I just wanted to unpack the minimum items and fall into bed. *thud* I swear these flights just get longer the older I get. Though Dad held up well. Perhaps the newness of the experience helped him. Yes, this was his first trip out of the country. And his first cruise. Ever.