Barbados

 Our second port of call was Barbados. It was probably my least favorite port, which was most likely our own fault. We like to do cruising our own way. We don't do any tours with the ship and we always research ahead of time, decide what we want to do and see and either set up tours with people on shore or we just play it by ear once we get off the boat. It usually works great and Barbados wasn't terrible, I just feel like we might have had a better time had we chosen to do something different. Brad, Nicole, Mike and I got off the ship, walked outside the cruise terminal (always infested with companies and taxi drivers wanting to charge double the regular prices) and found a cheap cab to Payne's Bay. We had heard that you can take a $60 tour to swim with sea turtles or you can go to Payne's Bay, swim out about 500 feet and do it yourself. We took the free option. The bay was beautiful, no doubt about that. It was a gorgeous setting but getting in and out of the ocean was a little bit of a pain (no pun intended) because there was so much coral where the waves broke. When we noticed the first tour group boat pull into the bay Mike and Brad swam out to see the turtles (we were told you need to wait until the boats come because the tour companies feed the turtles). Mike and Brad came back with stories of seeing giant eels, beautiful fish and yes, turtles! Nicole and I were up next so we grabbed our gear and started swimming. The water was definitely not very clear, but we figured it must get better once you get out to where the turtles are. There were still a few boats and snorkelers lingering around when we made it to the spot, but other than glimpsing a huge eel that nearly ran us over then disappeared into the deep we saw absolutely no marine life. Well... I take that back, we did see a shark. He wasn't exactly a marine animal either though :) He was one of the native tour guides. When I asked him when they were going to feed the turtles he laughed at us and said they already had and we should have been out there 15 minutes ago. I told him we would have been but our husbands were out at that time. He looked shocked, husbands? How old were we? We explained that we are both in our late 20s and actually have children. He was very surprised but then went on to explain that he too has children - four of them with THREE different women! The crazy thing is he said it like we were supposed to be impressed. Nope. Not so much. So we headed back to the beach without seeing turtles. Oh well! The beach was beautiful and we enjoyed the view. We didn't get a chance to see too much of the island but we heard from Ben and Lindsay (who did a catamaran tour) that it's actually quite beautiful. They loved it. Like I said... probably my own fault it was my least favorite port! I also took very few pictures. Just a couple of Nicole and I in snorkel gear. And that's all I have to say about that.