Barbados is a tropical island some 21 miles x 13 miles in area. It is the most easterly of the Caribbean islands with a population of approximately 280,000. As everyone knows, Barbados is famed for its beautiful beaches, rum and cricket. The interior rises to a hilly plateau and is lush and green with sugar growing wild in many places, as well as being cultivated, principally to serve the rum industry. Tourism is now the island’s main economic activity.
A bit of History
The English arrived in 1625 aboard ‘The Olive Blossom’ and claimed the island in the name of King James I. Sugar was introduced in 1640 which completely transformed the island’s economic and social landscape and the colony became a plantation economy, relying on imported slave labour from Africa.
We consciously avoided enlisting to do any of the plantation ‘tours’. Why anyone would feel the need to pay to ‘admire’ a faded mansion built solely on the profits of the torture and murder of thousands of people is a mystery of unfathomable depths. And as we heard mutterings around the ship later to the effect that ‘nobody mentioned the slave trade’ from those who had done the plantation tour, we knew we had made the correct decision. If plantations must be preserved, they have a moral duty not to gloss over the horrors that led to their success. The most brutal periods of human history must be remembered if we are to avoid their repetition.
Barbados became politically independent in 1966 and became a republic in 2021, although still part of the commonwealth.
Our experience …
After disembarking the ship, we met with a chaotic scene outside the cruise terminal. Even though we were booked on a Cunard tour, this in no way helped us! Nobody was telling anybody where they needed to go and there was no signage or instruction whatsoever. Imagine approximately one thousand people (there were 3 cruise ships in port today) all squashed together, with no idea which direction to head in and everyone pushing and shoving. I know, I know, first world problems, but it was an irksome business all the same. Finally Bridge located someone from Cunard and we were promptly sent to the back(!) where we stood for an age until our coach turned up half an hour late. Upon grumbling to our equally disenchanted neighbours about the general chaos, they told us ‘welcome to Barbados’.
At great length our less than liberal-minded driver Adrian allowed us to enter the bus before taking us on a tour of the island, during which he shared his view that prisoners should not be fed, given a bed or allowed to wash; (nobody pointed out that in the current century these practices are no longer generally accepted). He also cheerily informed us that in Barbados, on Sundays, husbands send their wives to church for spiritual enlightenment whilst the men congregate in the nearest pub and drink rum! 
After two and a half hours of driving seemingly aimlessly around the bumpy interior of the island, whilst Adrian pointed out precisely how much virtually every single building on the island would cost us, should we want to buy it, we were eventually liberated at Accra Beach, an hour late, and with everyone parched and hungry and pretty jaded. And as beautiful as the beach was, we couldn’t help thinking how spoilt it was by insensitive over-development and exploitation of its beauty.
