Speightstown Barbados

Speightstown viewed from the sea   

Public transport minibus which somehow
manage to cram in about 20 passengers    

Speightstown was not quite what we had expected. In its heyday, before Bridgetown became dominant, it was a major port and the commercial centre of Barbados. We spent quite a while walking around checking out the 2 ‘supermarkets’, the street-side fruit stalls and other collection of small shops to get a feel for the place. As one of Barbados’ main urban centres and the initial settlement area when the island was colonised, we were expecting it to be a bit more swept up and the old colonial buildings to be a bit more picturesque. However, I found that at the end of our wander around that I hadn’t really taken any photos; clearly none of the views had immediately seemed worth capturing. Overall, the town came across to us as a little tired and in need of a bit of a spruce up but then it is not a main tourist area and doesn’t even get a mention in our tourist guide book.

View of the beach from the Fisherman’s Bar   

We grabbed some lunch at one of the local stalls; a roti of spicy beef and potato in a flatbread. Back on the beachside part of the town, the Fisherman’s Bar provided a useful place with cool draught beer and good internet access where we could catch up on the backlog of emails that had built up whilst we had been at sea. It also gave me an opportunity to post some of the blog entries for our crossing whilst Nicky popped back to the food shops. Splitting the purchases between the 2 main supermarkets and a couple of the street stalls to get what looked best, her immediate conclusions were that Barbados is expensive and that we’d probably be looking at Bridgetown for our main shopping.

The sun sets early here and so our walk back to Port St Charles was under golden skies. We paused at one of the beaches to watch a fisherman hand cast his net. His throw had the net fanning out perfectly over a large shoal of fish he had patiently been watching slowly coming into the shallower water. A totally different fishing technique to that which we had been used to seeing in the Mediterranean.

And so, with BV cleaned and ready to go again, and some fresh food in our fridge, we planned a sail south to anchor off Bridgetown, the capital of Barbados. However, not before we had dug out our bikes and done a little sightseeing at the northern end of the island.

Port St Charles, Barbados