Barbados Part 2

After returning to Bridgetown, instead of flying home right away, we instead rented a car and toured more of Barbados. The first stop was St. Nicholas Abbey, a 350-year-old mansion and plantation built in 1658. They built a railway from the port of Bridgetown to the Abbey to serve the sugar cane industry and later the railway served tourists from the UK to holiday in Barbados. The abbey was once owned by Benedict Cumberbatch's family who made a fortune in Barbados. Cumberbatch has spoken about his father's family's "dodgy" legacy in the Caribbean.

Later, we stopped at the childhood home of Rihanna, Barbados is very proud of her and many people in her neighborhood in the outskirts of Bridgetown remember her fondly.

We parked and walked around downtown Bridgetown a place most tourists don't visit. Many people come to Barbados and get transferred directly to their expensive resorts and never see anything outside of that. Bridgetown literally doesn't have any hotels, most of the resorts are concentrated up the west coast and near the south between the airport and Bridgetown.

Finally, my cruise thoughts. I'm not going to turn into a perpetual cruiser, but they do have their advantages in certain parts of the world. 95% of cruise itineraries don't interest me, but this one brought such great value for money and the chance to see eight unique islands. There's no way we could have visited the West Indies for under $2000 on our own. We paid well under $200 a day, for two people, for meals, accommodation, transportation, and entertainment. We used a combination of the ship's shore excursions, which were excellent, but crowded, and at times hired our own guides for private tours. Both have their advantages.