Goodbye Barbados

We needed to some final swimming to make up for all the gourmet eating that we'd been doing.

The swimming pool was fairly empty, but surrounded by people intent on getting their skin burnt.

And young American girls are a bit too 'Precious' & 'Booby' to be around for too long.

We really like the rough sea...even though it smashed us a lot.

We limited ourselves to 30-45 minutes a day in the sea and sun.....trying to protect our biggest organ with lashings of factor.

It was pretty rough down in the south, from the trade winds. And I was smashed a couple of times.

Tony reckons that he nearly had his neck snapped like a carrot! In surf just like this.

Whilst watching cricket in the bar, we saw a wedding at our hotel beach :

And we said our goodbyes to the barmen. The Gregs, Louis and the rest!!

And here is Alvin with a 'rummy' bear :

Then we took it easy with our packing, and had our last 'Cane Field Beef'.

Snapping some last photos of the 'Vanilla skies" :

And we flew home Club Class,....a bit of a let-down from FIRST ....but we slept; and I journeyed on to Heathrow, whilst Tony headed up to Leeds.

We had a pretty good four week break. Great people, food, booze & beaches:

What more could you ask for?

Choice : Cane Field Beef

We were introduced to the fine "Silver Point" restaurant (Tel. 420 4416) by the indefatigable Jim & Jan fairly early in our stay and we kept on going back.

Also it was only about 1 mile from our hotel, near the kite-surfers (rough!) beach.

The lovely Kaisha (an artist / designer) and friendly Dwane (professional bullshitter-he says) were great with their service, and as talkers & entertainers......, and real friendly, as were all the other wonderful staff.

But the Chef Reggie, produced this most wonderfully succulent "Cane Field Beef" dish.

And here it is on the plate.

We thought it was reared in cane fields that had been cut.

But we found out that it was an area - "Cane Field", above the jungle in central Barbados:

"Cane Field " is where the cows - bullocks really, (owned by Sir Charles Williams -the famous sportsman), have an easy life eating the herb-filled pasture.

Here they are, on the hoof :

And here they are about to be consumed for the tenth time !!

We couldn't get enough...and Reggie knew just how to do it medium-rare....!!!!

The best steak I've had in 20+years!!

Siver sands entertainment

When we were not at the cricket or the races we were eating out .....

or generally having a good time with the entertainment arranged at the hotel or meeting other guests

We slowly learned that too much rum after dinner didn't bode well for the next day's head!!

Jim & Jan, the restaurant Gems

Another lovely couple that we met in the Silver Sands Hotel were Jim & Jan. He was big-time in to music, and they were both very knowledgeable about local restaurants.


We told them about our horror story at the Atlantis in Bethsheba....the black pork...and Tony's chicken turned out to be Dolphin!!!


But they sent us back to the Roundhouse in Bethsheba. Also Surfers point bar & the SilverPoint hotel (more of which later)....which were only two minutes form our hotel!







We had spare tickets for the "Party Stand" in the last friendly match in the ICC world Cricket.
And we had a very enjoyable day watching New Zealand triumphing over Sri Lanka by 19 runs!






After the cricket, we in turn introduced them to "Mojo's" in Worthing...where the music was 60's and Jim was ecstatic.... Led Zeplin etc..... & the photos are great.











We had a final meal together at another "GEM" of theirs - the Little Arches near the nicknamed "Miami beach" where we often swum.


Here we also met Stephen & Rachael, more fans of Jim & Jan.....

....and I also tried to clear Tony's windpipe with a tracheotomy!!!

New Friends all around

When you have out an outgoing personality, you tend to attract all kinds of interesting people.


This is Alexander who I brought back to our rooms at 2am, to awake Tony from his 7pm rum-slumber.



This handsome pair with the "Caribbean Hair" is that of Anita (Jet Pilot) and Phil (Engineer, ex-Navy)...all the NICE girls luv a sailor!!


And we kept on bumping in to them....



At the beach..





At Oistins fish-fry-on-a Friday





....where Bruno gets in on the act... as bears (think they) know all about fish.







So we all went out to the Gold Cup Day at Garrison Savannah... and what a great day we had : I had three winners but Anita picked the Gold Cup winner :

And you can tell that she was quite pleased, as she was drinking with her prehensile feet afterwards :


















But we had a few celebratory glasses of wine at the "Caribb" bar....and Tony sports his newly acquired black eye (accidentally received whilst slipping on the way to bed the previous night!)

March

Forgot to say that the month has changed....it passed in a haze of rum....
We are here in Barbados until the 20th....arriving in UK on the 21st.
I'll be back in Kome on 24th.....

Silver Sands

The "Silver Sands Hotel" where we are staying is only three star, but it is in a lovely location in the very south of the island.

The waves are very rough........I was slammed down by "The Arm of Thor", even though I was out in the deeper green water......the surf itself will knock you over. But the para-sailors & surfer love it!

The food can be a bit quetionable......we have had all grades here.

From crusty flying fish to wonderful dorado....

But the local rums are good, as is the Banks beer.......and they have a good wine list which is a lot cheaper than Gozo.

And Margaret cleans our big suite every day......we have a kitchen, balcony, two bedroom/sitting rooms, etc. So we can make a cuppa, or bacon sandwich when we need

First class to Barbados

Off we set in BA "FIRST", looked after a wonderfully attentive crew.

Tony discovered the delights of "Blue Label" whiskey

And we had a very alchoholic time....and didn't misbehave too much.

Somersaulting car on cliff edge

I'm posting this, as I'm not too busy....but I will be at the rig, all day & night on Wednesday.

It's Jean's birthday today (12th)...and they'll be eating at the "Tavern on the Green" in Central Park, and seeing the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Carnegie Hall tonight.
Happy birthday darling.

This set of photographs was sent to me by Revel.
The car hits the crash barrier, leaves the road and somersaults across the gap, and ends up pointing the wrong way :

But what a gap........

................the hand of God was working with split-second timing that day !

Steve Heaven on the lawn

This was taken some time ago during the preparations for our celebrations for not having had a serious accident for 20 million man hours on this project.
This is the lawn behind our Esso offices.

The featured model is Steve Heaven, a Senior Safety Advisor, who is a Brummy living a clean & honest life in Thailand. He arrived here on the same day as me: 12th Dec 2001.
He is a good mate in spite of his diplomatic skills.

The skies are just like this now in February...30-35°C and with a very pleasant breeze.

And here is a good joke sent to me by Revel Barker, a friend who can be glimpsed on a photo in an early party-blog:

Bob the farmer was in the fertilized egg business. He had several hundred young layers (hens), called "pullets" and eight or ten roosters,whose job was to fertilize the eggs. The farmer kept records and any rooster that didn't perform went into the soup pot and was replaced.
That took an awful lot of his time so he bought a set of tiny bells and attached them to his roosters. Each bell had a different tone so Bob could tell from a distance, which rooster was performing. Now he could sit on the porch and fill out an efficiency report simply by listening to the bells.

The farmer's favorite rooster was old Butch, and a very fine specimen he was, too. But on this particular morning Bob noticed old Butch's bell hadn't rung at all! Bob went to investigate. The other roosters were chasing pullets, bells-a-ringing. The pullets, hearing the roosters coming, would run for cover. But to Farmer Bob's amazement, Butch had his bell in his beak, so it couldn't ring. He'd sneak up on a pullet, do his job and walk on to the next one.
Bob was so proud of Butch, he entered him in the County Fair and Butch became an overnight sensation among the judges.
The judges not only awarded Butch the No Bell Piece Prize, but they also awarded him the Pullet Surprise as well.

Clearly Butch was a politician in the making: who else but a politician could figure out how to win two of the most highly coveted awards on our planet by being the best at sneaking up on the populace and screwing them when they weren't paying attention?

Jean's In New York

Jean's now in New York with her best friend Larraine and with temperatures of -2 t0 -9°C, they are surviving Manhattan in their fur coats.


This picture is of Oswego, to the north of the state, where they have received up to 10 feet of snow. Because of the exceptionally mild winter, the great lakes did not freeze over, and now the cold north-westerly winds that are bearing down on NY state from Canada, are picking up warm moisture, and depositing loads of snow on landfall.

It's crisp (and freezing) in NYC, and the ladies have phoned me from various familiar venues. Friday they were listening to Jazz at Birdland on 34th, and last night the were eating at the exclusive Rue 57 restaurant where Jack Buttigieg, from Qala, is the manager.

I have made some more "exclusive" reservations for the coming week......and I'm a little jealous to be here in Chad...but my time will come !!!

Not much going on here down in warm Kome. It's 30-35°C, and very dry & dusty here in the winter season. But the skies are an unbroken light blue, and the constant breeze is refreshing.

Talking of "Blue Skies" : I noticed on the TV news playing in the office's commissary, that Exxon Mobil declared at $40 billion profit for last year.

This means that they are making $100+ million/ day.....NET

This is their stock price in comparison to the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which has also done pretty well in this long bull market.

But, big oil has done VERY WELL.

Everybody is very happy.

It makes you want to bug a honey....slug a dummy, rub yer tummy, tug it funny :

• NO :--- HUG A BUNNY !!

Jean's over in Manchester getting ready to freeze in New York....and I'm chasing World Cup Cricket tickets for Barbados. The travelling life goes on......