Alone in Bim!

 Monday March 25th, 2024         Farewell to Shannon & JT!

We woke up to another gorgeous morning, however the anticipation of saying farewell to Shannon and JT did put a melancholy damper on it!  We enjoyed our last morning together with Munchie making us "perfect eggs" for breakfast!  I don't recall if I've ever mentioned the "perfect egg" thing before on any of my posts, so at the risk of HIB (heard it before) : Even though many of our friends may challenge this statement; I can be a bit fussy on certain foods!  In particular, eggs!  I prefer mine over easy.  That being said, my Munchie does them to perfection, hence "perfect eggs"!   Producing perfect eggs abroad presents some challenges for Munchkin, in particular, her culinary equipment.  In her St. Albert kitchen she has all the tools she needs to easily whip up perfect eggs.  She even has a dedicated frying pan for eggs!  While travelling, she is at the mercy of the pans available!  I must say, she rises to the challenge and shows that although good equipment can make things easier and more convenient, its the skills and ability that are key!  Back in Alberta, perfect egg day is usually Sunday.  This week, perfect egg day was Monday!

At BGI, saying farewell!

Shannon did get an alert from Westjet advising the flight leaving Barbados was delayed.  This created a bit of stress as they already had a fairly tight connection in Toronto.  On our drive to the airport, they got another alert that now showed their connecting flight was delayed 2 hours!  So no more worries about missing the connection, but instead of arriving in Edmonton at 1am, it would be closer to 3am!

On our drive back from the airport, Munchie spied a roadside vendor with produce!  We zipped in to pick up some supplies as when we got back we would be turning the chariot back in.  We opted to be car-less until Dave and Pat arrive on April 3rd.  We planned on using the local buses and see how that goes.  Munchie scored at the vendor and was happy with the produce she picked up, which included beets!  Munchie has been trying to find beets for quite some time as she wanted to make beet borscht for JT!  

Sorry JT, borscht just

wasn't in the cards for you!  On the plus side, I get borscht, and that is a bit of a story as well.  I've never been a fan of beets or beet borscht.  You see I can be a fussy eater!  However in Hawaii 2022, Munchie made beet borscht for JT. Both Shannon and I were not fans of it, but it did look so good, that we both tried some.  We both were taken a-back, it was quite tasty!  Well now I'm hooked! 

Tuesday & Wednesday March 26th & 27th, 2024  Sunsets on Fitt's!

We pretty much stayed close to home for the next couple of days.  We went down to the beach to catch the sunsets.  It was very serene and peaceful.  And, sailboats sailing across the setting sun provided some great photo ops!

Tuesday, March 26th.

On Wednesday, again, the "cats" were cooperating for more great pics!

Wednesday, March 27th.

Thursday, March 28th,               Yellow Bus to Bridgetown!

Today, we tried out the local bus system!  There are "options"!  The big blue buses are the public buses.  The yellow buses are public/private.  Then there are the ZR buses!  All buses have the same fare, $3.50 BB$.  No transfers, no passes (exception: residents over 65 and students)!  The blue buses are by far the most comfortable (unless you are travelling at peak times then its packed like a can of sardines!)  There are far more yellow buses on the road.  These guys motor!  It amazes me that any of them have side mirrors.  It is pretty obvious the drivers are very experienced and know how much room they need (we're talking within mm!) when meeting oncoming traffic and getting by parked vehicles!  Again, they pack in the passengers!  All you need to do to catch a yellow or ZR is wave at the driver and he will pull over for you! 

The ZR are mainly on the south coast, between Oistins and Bridgetown.  These guys are white with a red stripe 15 passenger vans.  I have seen some of them with closer to 20 (or more) crammed in!  The ZR's always have music rockin' and they will signal with their "la cucaracha" horns as they approach a stop or just a group of random people walking!

Typical ZR payload!

Our yellow bus ride to Bridgetown is best described as being on a roller coaster!  Fortunately most roads in Barbados, and particularly the ones nearer to Bridgedown don't allow for high speed travel. So although it felt like the bus was about to get airborne, in actuality, we likely didn't get much above 60kmph!  

On our ride, Brenda had a seat a row ahead and to my right, I was in a rear seat on the left.  Brenda sat next to a wonderful fellow, Adrian Rollins.  Brenda and Adrian soon discovered they both had a passion for cooking and Adrian was one of the cooks at the Fairmont Royal Pavilion in Holetown.  Adrian had learned his craft on the NCL cruise ships and is now an established member of the Fairmont culinary team!  I also had a bit of a connection with Adrian, his father was a police officer with the Royal Barbados Police Force for over 30 years!  And Adrian's brother is a serving member of the Force currently!  As it turned out Adrian was getting off at the stop we needed to get off at.  We had told Adrian we were heading to Pebbles Beach at Carlyle Bay.  Without hesitation, Adrian insisted he guide us through the downtown to be sure we got to our destination without getting lost!  Once he was certain we were on the right track, we parted company.  Adrian had gone out of his way to help out complete strangers!  He is another example of the Bajan people's character of kindness and caring!  Traits we have consistently found with the Bajan people we have met!

Thank you again Adrian!

We spent the afternoon on the beach and it was a great relaxing day.  

Back at home, it was banana harvest time!  Our host, Sherry handed me a knife and then pointed out where to cut and "bob's your uncle" we had a lovely bunch of bananas!  Thanks to Sherry for her generous gift!  She wanted to get the bananas before the monkeys did!  

Max mag on my phone!

After the harvest, we hit the beach for another sunset!  The Wind Star made an appearance, even though it may be hard to notice in the pic without the indicator!

Friday, March 29th,                      Oistin's Fish Fry

We took another bus ride today!  This time we hopped the blue bus.  It was quite a bit different from the yellow bus experience!  There was no transfer required!  We took the "Airport" bus as one of its stops was right at the Oistins Fish Fry.  The ride was not a white knuckle affair!  It could almost be described as tame, when compared to the yellow bus ride the day before!  Again, though, kudos to the driver's skills to operate these full sized buses on narrow, busy, congested roads!  

Brenda had ordered a pair of sandals from Denise, whom we met on day one of our Barbados adventure!  Munchie had described what she was looking for and Denise delivered!  Regardless of what else that was to transpire, Munchie was happy with her new shoes!

We walked down to "Surfer's Cafe" for a bite to eat.  It's a nice little restaurant on the beach just on the west side of the Oistin's Fish Market.  

After our meal, we headed down to the bus stop to catch the blue bus home.  Well this was not as quick and easy as the ride down!  We ended up waiting nearly 2 and a half hours for the bus!  While waiting we met a local gal, Sherri, who had been waiting for about 40 minutes when we walked up to the stop.  Sherri was a tad annoyed with the Barbados Transit Board, as being a holiday, Good Friday, they reduced the number of blue buses running.  Also, no yellow buses were running on the holiday!  Sherri, became our bus foreman, and with Munchie and me, plus 4 other visitors, a couple from Texas and a mom and teenaged daughter from England, Sherri led us down the road to the Oistin's bus terminal explaining given the infrequency of the buses, we may not get a seat one stop away from the terminal!  Sherri was right!  When the bus finally arrived, it was already half full and it was all we could do to get everyone on board!  Well, the ride home was not as comfortable as the ride down!  The bus made a number of stops along the way, and one passenger would exit and 2 would get on!  Packed like sardines does not adequately describe the inside of that bus!

  We finally made it home after 11:30 pm.  

Thanks to Sherri for her help and guidance!  (Another Bajan, looking out for random strangers!)  

Sunday, March 31st             Munchie feeds new arrivals!

Being Sunday, it was again "perfect egg day"!  My Darling Bride did not disappoint!  It was a fabulous way to start the day!  That and some games!  We enjoy all kinds of games, and play a card game called

Play Nine pretty much daily.  Sometimes multiple times throughout the day!  Another favourite of ours is Spades and our old stand by Yahtzee.  We have been playing Yahtzee together since 1977!  After perfect eggs and coffee, we whiled the morning away, chillaxin', reading and more cards!  I know, we are real live wires!

Original!      New Look!

Late afternoon, two young couples arrived in the AirBnB just above our place.  We share the driveway.  Being the introverts we are, Munchie and I started up a conversation with our new neighbours.  We invited them down for a beverage!  Kendal and Paul and Natalie and Marcus had flown in from Toronto then hopped a blue bus from the airport to Fitts.  Natalie and Marcus are actually from Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory in Canada.  Kendal and Paul are from Thunder Bay, Ontario. Being a holiday we knew none of the grocery stores were open.  Munchie asked if they had any food for the evening and they said they had some trail mix!  Well that just wouldn't do, so Munchie invited them to join us for supper!  Munchie also put together a breakfast package for them, homemade bran muffins, homemade banana bread, apples and some coffee packets!  

We chatted for a while with Brenda and I trying to provide some insight into what to see and do here on the island.  They did not have a car so would be taking the bus mostly.  

We told them that we would be taking in the sunset on the beach again and they said they would be headed down there for their first swim!  By the time Munchie and I got down to the beach The Thunder Bay Quartet (TBQ) were already out in the water!

After the sunset, we went back up.  The TBQ  were still enjoying the evening swim.   Munchie got busy in the kitchen and with limited provisions available,  produced oven fried chicken pieces, garlic shrimp, garlic bread, and potatoes and broccoli.  

We gathered around our table outside and had a great meal and conversation with our new friends!

Monday April 1st                        Munchie's Birthday!

It was Munchie's birthday today!  All day long she received happy birthday messages and thanks everyone for the calls, texts and emails!

For her day, we hopped a yellow bus and zipped up to Holetown.  The bus ride was seamless!  And our driver did not appear to be concerned about making up time!  We still made the trip in about 8 minutes (Google maps says its 10 minutes by car!).

We had a great birthday brunch at the Cafe Bar Carizma.  And then to top off a great birthday morning, we took a stroll through the Massy!  A stroll through a store, any store is enjoyment for Munchie and so it capped off her birthday morning well!

We caught another spectacular sunset to cap off Munchie's day!  

On Wednesday, Dave and Pat arrive!   Look for some more posts after that!

Cheers!