LIVING THE LIFE OF TIGER IN BARBADOS...AND IRELAND, TOO

 

SANDY LANE, Barbados – I can’t drive the ball like he does. Or putt. Or chip. Or probably even drive a damned golf cart as well.

 

But I did get to stay the night on Father’s Day (awww…..) at the place where Tiger Woods laid his head prior to his wedding to the lovely Elin a few years back. It’s an absolutely stunning resort on the west coast of Barbados, north of Bridgetown.

 

I’ll provide more details in the future but suffice to say it’s a lovely, lovely, lovely place and the spa is absolutely divine. I snapped a couple photos near sunset and I’ve posted one below (wanted it to be higher up on the page but danged if I can figure out exactly where to put these things) just for show. Not my best picture but 'twas a lovely sunset.

 

Off today to play the Green Monkey course; said to be one of the best in the Caribbean.

 

BABY YOU CAN DRIVE MY CAR

 

I managed to finish my first day of left-side-of-the-road driving in nine years without a single incident. Most Americans and lots of other folks get drivers or taxis when they come to Barbados, but I wanted to see a pretty good variety of things in my short stay so I opted to rent a car.

 

I drove around the parking lot at the airport a few times to get used to things – a bit – but then had to head out on the “highway” pretty quickly to get to the central part of the island, where I was checking out some gardens. It only took a couple minutes to get used to things, and I’m proud to say I even passed a few slowpokes along the way (stupid tourists).

 

A couple told me that Canadians are much more willing to rent a car down here than Americans. And, I say, good for us.

 

GARDEN OF EDEN

 

I was supposed to be heading to Orchid World in central Barbados on Sunday but I spotted a sign for Hunte’s Gardens on my way up the hill and remembered that Gail Stewart from the Barbados tourist office in Toronto had recommended it to me as a place she’d heard of.

 

Great call, Gail. The guy who runs the garden, Anthony Hunte, is as colourful and fasincating a character as you’d want to find. A great quote, a terrific by-the-seat-of-his-pants gardener and a terrific host who offers up rum punch or instant coffee to visitors and regales them with stories, some of them possibly true.

 

Oh, and the gardens are a delight.

 

WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

 

Had a very brief visit to the east side of Barbados, which is nothing like most of the western, Caribbean side. Waves rolling in from Africa pound the shore and have eroded the limestone coastline into fantastic shapes near Bathsheba. Some of them look like the Bay of Fundy or Flowerpot Island up at the tip of the Bruce Peninsula.

 

There are casual bars and funky B and B’s and a fair bit of surfers on what is really the last frontier of Barbados. Definitely worth checking out,

 

ST. LUCIA – ALMOST FORGOT

 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the great hike I had Saturday morning. I was staying at the Landings and walked about 10 minutes to the island, which actually isn’t an island anymore because of the fairly new causeway but is still caused Pigeon Island. You can climb up to the remains of an old English fort that also was used during WWII, and it’s  one of the great views in the Caribbean as far as I can tell with pretty limited knowledge.

 

You can see all the to way to Martinique, an island that has always intrigued me. Not to mention Antigua and St. Bart’s and Anguilla and St. Vincent and….

 

 

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING ELSE

 

Star movies editor Linda Barnard still on the road in Ireland. Check out her latest blog for another good read.

 

Comments

[jack martin]

please put me in email contact with Linda Bernard - I want to give her some information to help one of her people