photopost

Man. Time flies. Here’s some of what I haven’t had time to write about.

– Barbados part 3
– Team Chaos went to Banff and met with some pretty fantastic success, and new friends
– while Marjorie and Avery hit Vancouver for some family time
– and then Team Taverner spent a few days with my sister’s family
– Lee broke his foot, Adrian hurt his back, Matt moved to Toronto
– Avery eats people food because 4 teeth!
– and she dances
– the haunted duck book
– Team Chaos/CAM (the line is pretty blurry) shot a TV commercial
– and then an epic 2-day for L’Oréal Professionnel
– Rita and Adrian celebrated some birthday with the gang
– Team Avery took a jaunt up to Riverdale to hang with Team Josephine

And that’s just the stuff I can remember without referring to the photos. There will be more. I also hope I get time to actually sketch in some details on that list.

Here, then, is part 3 of the Barbados pics:

I may have to have Marjorie sitting beside me for part 4, because the memory already grows dim. I should eat more… memory food thing.

So! I discovered a tiny lizard living with us. He was with us for at least three days. Then he vanished. I really hope it wasn’t into the stove, which did get used. Cute little lizard though. Those are egg cups in the image above. Small egg cups.

The next day we loaded up the car and trundled north west. We meant to go north, but the island… she encourages exploring. As does the tourist “map”. No harm done as long as you aren’t in a hurry. We weren’t.

After many adventures we managed to find Bathsheba – utterly gorgeous – and this mysterious concrete and stone structure perched alone on a massive boulder. The interior is subdivided into four stalls. Change rooms? Outhouse? Showers? Privacy-obsessed fish cleaning? No idea. We didn’t stick around long enough to investigate. Too much too explore, and we had spent an amazing amount of time getting to know the… you can’t call them back roads because they’re what passes for highway on the quieter side of the island. Let’s call them… suicidally narrow switchbacks crawling along the central mountain ridge.

Our ultimate destination was this fancy resort restaurant called (see, there’s the fading memory. M will help.) We just wanted a cold drink, as much to cool poor Avery off as to get a beer in my face. Even though they were closing shop they accommodated us. You can’t say no to a baby that cute. So we enjoyed our frosty beverages on the famous veranda (well, lots of famous people have also enjoyed frosty beverages on it). The wind was picking up and for a while all three of us were hypnotized by the monster clouds rolling in. Then I realized we’d have to drive through whatever they were bringing, and it was time to raise anchor.

We reckoned we were just far enough ahead of the weather to check out Codrington College, a beautiful old campus on a coral cliff. When would we be back, right? Beautiful, serene, knowledgy.

And we made it back just fine. The storm apparently soaked the other end of the island, but we barely got a shower. Nice.

Coming up next: more adventures, including the boozeum.

Here we go. Some more of The Taverners Take Barbados.

When last we saw our adventurers, they were about to brave the descent to Certain Death Beach (aka Bottom Bay Beach). At street level, there’s room for three or four cars and the requisite dude selling cocktails in coconuts. So you don’t really have any idea what to expect from the beach. How good could it be? Back where we come from, any beach worth the name has three conveniently located six-level concrete garages, a 7-11, and a Holiday Inn.

We descended the intriguingly well-kept but low-key trail with no expectations. So when we stepped out of the jungle and onto the stunning kilometer-wide white sandy beach with all of four other people on it… well, we were all smiles.

Marjorie found a patch of shade under the massive coral cliff and I soon discovered the large cave. While the ladies made themselves comfortable I followed the cave in as deep as I could, finding all manner of amazing fossilized coral. Also deck chair frames and a few empty rum bottles. Naturally.

Back at the blanket, I did my best to capture the vista with the iPhone’s panorama feature. Turns out the AI has a really hard time with surf. But I eventually got something good enough to share. The image is about 160 degrees wide, so go ahead and cut the image out from your monitor and wrap it around your head. There. That’s how amazing this beach is.

We couldn’t wait to get Avery into the water. She loves the bath. She loved the pool. Surely this was going to be The New Best Thing Ever.

Nope. Did not like. In retrospect, who in their right mind would enjoy seeing an entire horizon of water rushing right toward you, clearly hell bent on swallowing you whole? So. Not a fan.

But she enjoyed the blanket and some snacks just fine. And drinking water from our bottle was a highlight, for sure.

Bottom Bay Beach: amazing pristine beach, isolated but not hard to reach. Do not go in the water. It will eat you.

Coming up next: the road trip across the island to… a really fancy resort whose name escapes me.

It’s taking forever to get all the pics cranked through Photoshop in the few minutes of me time I have each day. So let’s just get to it.

Day 1 – We had an early flight, which meant getting out of bed at 4:30 or so. That used to be a really big deal, and worth contemplating just staying up. In a post-Avery world, that’s not much earlier than she greets the day anyway. So, yeah, that’s early, and ungodly so, but that’s how the new Taverners roll. I guess. Hooray.

Anyway, early flight means early arrival. Hello, Barbados! We landed in time to tag the usual bases, picking up the rental car, navigating to the villa to meet the property manager lady (Jan, very nice), and backtracking to the local supermarket to get a few necessities. Of course there was time for a dip in the pool. There is always time for a dip in the pool. Lava could be bearing down on us, and there would still be time for a dip in the pool. But I digress. Our villa was on the east side of the island, in Bottom Bay in the parish of St Philip.

Then we drove by tourist map (hilariously not entirely accurate) to the south side – Oistins in the parish of Christ Church. Friday nights there is a massive fish fry next to the fish market right on the beach, and that’s The Thing You Do On Friday Night. So we did. We hit it up early, partly because of Avery, but also because we knew it would be a loud and boisterous zoo. We went to Pat’s, because the reviews said we should. And they were right. While my fried chicken was authentic but mediocre, Marjorie’s Mahi Mahi was excellent. Recommend. We wrapped up just as the dj was cycling up the theatre-sized sound system.

Full of good food, and having enjoyed our first Banks (the beer of Barbados), we navigated home and crashed out at something like 9:30. Because that’s how we roll. I had a dip in the pool before bed, naturally. Glorious.

In the morning, we assembled the provisions and gear, and sallied forth on our next quest: to check out the beach at Bottom Bay, where swimming is stupid but the beach itself is supposed to be stunning. Stay tuned for that next episode.