Category Archives: Beauty

Grenada: The Spice Isle, and a brief return to the all-inclusive resort lifestyle

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Yesterday night, we arrived in Grenada, just a 30-minute flight from St. Lucia, also known as the Spice Isle. Grenada is also a former French and British colony, a former sugar plantation turned spice economy. By the early 20th century, nutmeg and mace (the “lace” that wraps around the nutmeg), became Grenada’s dominant export. Today, Grenada is the second leading producer of nutmeg, second only to Indonesia. For an island country with a population of about 118,000 people and a total land area of 131 square miles/340 square kilometers, this is a really impressive fact! Nutmeg became so embedded in the island country’s identity that a split nutmeg is featured on the left side of the Grenada national flag; look very closely, and ye shall see! Grenada is the only sovereign nation in the world to feature FOOD in its national flag! I love this fun fact so, so much. The closest other country would be Canada given a maple leaf, but this isn’t technically correct because we eat maple sap, not maple leaves.

During our three nights in Grenada, we’re staying at an all-inclusive resort again for the second time ever, as well as the second time on this multi-segment trip. While here, we thought we’d try to see if Kaia would be willing to go to the Kids Club this time. While we tried to take advantage of this benefits while at the sister property of our hotel in Barbados, Kaia did not want me to leave and was very clingy. Instead, I stayed with her there, and we spent about an hour in their Kids Club playing with fake food, cars, and making a beaded bracelet. At our current hotel in Grenada, we have access to a Kids Club that runs daily from 9-1, then 2-5. We took a peek inside today, and when Kaia saw all the endless toys, books, fake food, and the big play structure outside the club, she said she wanted to stay — and didn’t mind if I left this time.

Kaia was a very mature big girl: “It’s okay, mama,” Pookster insisted to me with big, brave, happy eyes. “Just make sure to give me a big hug and a big kiss before you go!”

Shanique, one of the Kids Club employees, took great care of Kaia. The Kids Club accepts kids ages 4-12; with these kids, it’s a “kid-only” zone meaning they don’t want any parent or guardian there. A younger child may come, but needs to be accompanied by the parent the whole time present. One other child who was about 2-years old came with her mom, who said they’d stay for a little bit. But they left, and eventually it was just Kaia being tended to by three different employees. The Kids Club workers were extremely hands on and attentive with her. The scheduled activity of the day was a nature walk and bird feeding. So Shanique took Kaia out for a walk and gave her bread to feed the birds. She sent me so many photos and videos documenting what Kaia was doing as they went about their 3.5 hours together. Kaia told Shanique that the bread would make the birds sick (she remembers that I told her this before!), to which Shanique just laughed. For Kaia as she reported back to me after, the highlight of the nature walk was that she got to see some big white birds eat some fish out of the water; she’d never seen this before and was really fascinated! They also played with fake food, went out on the play structure, used beads to make bracelets, and played dress up. Of course, Kaia’s favorite was a sparkly magenta tutu, which she tried to leave the Kids Club with. Shanique said it was fine for her to take it if she was coming back to the Kids Club in the afternoon. But when Chris picked her up, he instructed her to leave it behind since we wouldn’t be returning.

While Kaia was occupied at the Kids Club and on the grounds with our rate-included babysitters, Chris and I tried to figure out our itinerary for our two full days in Grenada. We talked with an excursions specialist and realized that given today was Sunday, pretty much all of St. George, the capital, and the vast majority of shops and restaurants would be closed. Grenada is a very religious nation: over 96 percent of people identify as Christians, so Sunday is taken extremely seriously as a proper day of rest. So our original plan of exploring St. George, was crossed out for us today. Instead, we decided to take advantage of the all-inclusive benefits and stay on the property for the day. It’s been nice to have a couple full or half days when we have absolutely nothing planned. We went to the spa, where Chris got a sports massage, I got a coffee bean scrub/wrap, and we each got a special which included an added mini-facial added to our treatments. I also got to spend a little time in the spa’s steam room and sauna — always good for muscle relaxation, blood circulation, and my skin!

We picked up Kaia from the Kids Club after our treatments, ate lunch, and spent the rest of the afternoon at the beach just steps away from the property and at the pool. We had dinner at an Italian restaurant onsite that was pretty good (I finally ordered osso bucco, something I never really consider at Italian restaurants, which was pretty well made; hard to go wrong with veal shanks!). And on our walk back to our room, we got to see a full moon and a big, bright, starry sky above. I pointed out multiple stars to Kaia, and she loved seeing how bright they were. We also heard lots of nighttime bird songs as well as the calming, summery sound of crickets.

And to feed my casual birding interest, already during this trip and just on the hotel property, I got to see my first local bird: a bananaquit! This tiny, energetic, fast-moving bird was making a little dance party for us while we enjoye some ice cream at the cafe before heading to the beach. It had a bright yellow breast, a black black, and a single white stripe on both sides of its face. curved beak, and The hotel grounds are known to have lots and lots of birds who come to a specific area to hang out, and so I hope to have the opportunity to see more of these feathered friends up close.

Pigeon Island and the unexpected free ride back to our hotel

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After a morning walking around Castries and scoring big with local fruit at Castries Market yesterday, we dropped off our massive fruit haul at the hotel before continuing on to Pigeon Island. Just a short drive from our hotel in Rodney Bay, Pigeon Island is an islet on the northern part of St. Lucia. Once upon a time it was a separate piece of land from St. Lucia, but it was artificially joined to the western coast of the mainland in 1972 by a manmade causeway built from dirt excavated to form what is now the modern-day Rodney Bay Marina. Pigeon Island is beloved by locals for offering a calm, clear, and less tourist-infested beach (versus Reduit Beach nearby). It is also known for having two peaks that you can hike, as well as Fort Rodney on top of one of those peaks, which was once used by the British to spy on French ships from the nearby island Martinique.

We had lunch at a local restaurant (which included a delicious breadfruit mash!) on the quiet beach before heading over to the National Landmark side of the island to hike up to Fort Rodney. From this peak where Fort Rodney sits, you can see stunning views of Rodney Bay and the marina, the Caribbean Sea and Atlantic Ocean, and the northwest coastline of the island country. On very clear days, you can also see the island of Martinique, which is about 25 miles away. What we noticed a lot in St. Lucia is how contrasting the views are of the calm, clear turquoise waters of the Caribbean Sea to the west and rougher deep blue, at times even near-black waters of the Atlantic Ocean. The hike up to Fort Rodney was much shorter than I’d read online, so I was pleasantly surprised when we reached the top of the fort and were quickly rewarded with such stunning 360-degree views. When viewing some parts of the beach from this peak, the water was so clear that you could see the ocean floor!

After we made our descent, we parked ourselves on a shady spot on the local beach to enjoy the crystal clear, calm waters. Kaia had been waiting (impatiently) for beach time, so she was revved up and ready to go. She dragged me all the way across the beach, to where she met a 9-year-old friend and her mother and encircled them until they finally gave her direct attention and started talking to her. The 9-year-old girl, S, doted on her and immediately took Kaia under her wing, showing her different moves in the water and also building sand castles with her. I started chatting with S’s mother, K, who was really personable and friendly, as well. I quickly found out she was not a tourist but actually a local. She had spent some time living in the U.S. and was married to an American who had served in the military. With him, she had two kids, the second of whom was waiting in the car for them to go home. K said she was thinking about moving to the U.S., specifically New York City given how diverse and progressive it is (and the fact that she doesn’t want to own a car ever again because she hates driving and thinks the cost of maintenance is ridiculous). We talked a lot about cultural differences between St. Lucia and the U.S., a (very understandable) fear of guns and gun violence, and how unacceptable it is that some New Yorkers/tri-state people actually think that Coney Island’s “beach” is a real beach. “That water is not any shade of blue…. it’s grey-black, and you can’t see anything in it,” K said incredulously. “If you put your feet in the ocean and you cannot see your feet, that is not a real beach! You should be able to see the bottom of the ocean floor. That is just not right!”

I told her that if she ever decides to move forward with moving to New York or simply visiting, I’d love to see her again and help her out. We exchanged contact details, and as I told her we were getting ready to go back to our hotel, she said it was also time for them to leave, as well. And then, out of nowhere, she insisted that she drive us all back to the hotel. “It’s so close — it’s just right there!” K said. “I will take you. Go tell your husband!”

As this conversation was happening, I saw Chris on the other side of the beach packing up all our belongings and heading over to us. I told him about our new friend’s offer, and he was in shock. But he went along with it. We all got into K’s car, introduced ourselves to her son J. S continued to engage and play with Kaia in the car, which made Kaia so attached to her. And in the end, we got dropped off at our hotel — no Uber ride, just a free ride from a kind, local stranger.

In the last 14-plus years of our relationship (which includes LOTS of travel), this is the very first time that a complete stranger has offered and given us a ride. K said they lived just a two-minute drive from Pigeon Island, but in the opposite direction of our hotel. And given we left during rush hour, K not only was going out of her way given the opposite direction, but she also was adding time to her commute. It was beyond thoughtful, kind, and generous. I thanked her profusely over Whatspp after and also apologized for the inevitable sand we tracked into her car.

In these moments, I am yet again reminded of the famous Blanche DuBois quote at the end of The Streetcar Named Desire when she’s led away to be institutionalized: “Whoever you are—I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.” I would actually change this to: “I have always believed in the kindness of strangers.”

And Chris, while very grateful, exclaimed, “She saved us $18-20 USD!”

Castries Market: THE MANGO VARIETIES and the big fruit haul back to Rodney Bay

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I’ll be honest and say that I was disappointed with the Cheapside Market in Bridgetown, Barbados, we visited on our first full day. I was hoping to see lots of different vendors selling specialized fruit and vegetables, but in the end, almost every vendor was selling the exact same spread. No one specialized in a handful of fruits or vegetables seemingly. A lot of the vegetables were wilted or rotting so badly that I wondered how they sold anything to anyone; would they even use these produce that looked so limp? And almost none of them sold any interesting fruit. Maybe three sold the same type of mango (mango longue). So when I read about Castries Market here in the capital of St. Lucia, Castries, it sounded like it would be what I was hoping for: a market with rows and rows of vendors specializing in very specific fruits and vegetables. As soon as we arrived this morning at the market, I knew I was going to be happy. The spreads were quite elaborate and extremely fresh: lots of dasheen (taro!) and root vegetables sold by one vendor, greens (lots of callaloo) by another, mangoes, papayas, and related tropical fruits by another. I knew for sure I’d find the right vendor to get me all I was thinking about and more: multiple varieties of mango, passion fruit, and if we got lucky, guava. And if I could find a new fruit to obsess over, my mind and belly were open to it.

So we stumbled upon one vendor who looked like she had everything we could possibly ask for: three varieties of mango (Julie, Graham, and Mango Longue), starfruit (a surprise for Kaia, as I knew she’d get a kick from seeing fruit in a perfect star shape), passion fruit, and multiple varieties of tropical bananas. And all the fruit were organized by ripeness. She had a large tray at the front of her stand where all the ripe, ready-to-eat-today fruits were grouped together by type. All the fruit that needed time to ripen before eating were in huge piles in the back. So, I kind of went to town on her fruit, but in piecemeal because I was so overwhelmed by the variety that I would miss something else she had that we would like. We bought four Julie mangoes, three fat Graham mangoes, one mango longue, one starfruit, two small red bananas, and seven fat, heavy passion fruit. We SCORED BIG at this market today!! This place was definitely my vibe and the produce market I was dreaming about experiencing while in the Caribbean.

Here are the Castries Market prices for our incredibly happy fruit haul (which we hope made our fruit vendor very happy that she got an unexpectedly big sale from us!):

Julie mangoes: four for 3 XCD

Graham mangoes: three for 4 XCD

One mango longue for 1.25 XCD

One starfruit for 2 XCD

Seven FAT, heavy passion fruit for 10 XCD

Two mini red bananas for 2 XCD

So in total for a very heavy load of the most beautiful, delicious fruit on earth (and with special gratitude to my fuzzball for carrying this very heavy load for a while all over town!), we spent $22.25 XCD, or about $8.23 USD. If that is what heaven costs, then heaven here is quite a good bargain!!

We had a very juicy, custardy, desserty evening with our mangoes and passion fruit tonight. I was so, so full after dinner and about half this fruit (the other half is being saved for our last day tomorrow before we leave!), but all of us were glowing from how complex and delicious these mangoes were. I can’t believe it took us this long to try the fruit from this part of the world. The closest mangoes we’ve had to this region before this trip have been from Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Kaia especially loves the Graham mango and kept going crazy for more bites of it. This is how I know she will embrace food: she names the exact varietal she loves!

“I want the Graham! I WANT THE GRAHAM!” Kaia kept shouting excitedly as I hurried to slice yet another chunk of mango off the skin for her to eat.

And we all know Chris really, really embraced these mangoes because for the first time in my entire life, he actually started using his teeth to take every last bit of mango flesh off the inside of the skin. “You leave too much on the skin otherwise,” he insisted, as he continued his toothy mango eating. Usually in the U.S., I peel the ataulfos or Kents we get, but this was true dedication on his part!

Here is a description of each of the three mango varieties for drooling purposes only:

Julie mango: This is the mango that was talked up by people we spoke with in Barbados and here. It’s the famous “Caribbean favorite” mango, usually more on the small side, a little flat/oblong, and like a lopsided oval. The skin color changes but can be green-yellow to yellow-orange-red. The flesh is deep yellow to deep orange and the flavor is creamy, juicy, extremely fragrant, floral, tropical, and very tangy.


Graham mango: Chris’s mango palate is quite discerning, as when we cut the mangoes this evening, he immediately said that the Graham was the “partying version of the Julie.” He was right in that Graham is actually a Julie seedling from Trinidad, so the two are related. But these Grahams are significantly larger and more rounded and oval than a Julie. It ripens to be a deep orange/yellow with some pink/red. The flesh is rich, aromatic, sweet, dessert like. The flavor is multi-noted. A description I read about Graham said that it can be considered “Julie’s larger, slightly more robust cousin: still fragrant and dessert-like, but often less sharply tangy/floral than the best Julies.”

Mango longue/ Mango long: We first had two of these in Barbados. These are small, elongated, narrow, and have a citrusy, sweet-tart flavor, and are extremely fibrous. They are juicy, so juicy that the juices will run down your arms when eating them at their peak!  

In addition to all this fruit we hauled back (on Chris’s shoulder), at Castries Market, we also tried “cherry” juice, or acerola fruit juice, which was orange in color and a lot more citrusy than the bing cherries we are used to in the U.S.. We also bought and shared a golden apple ice pop. Golden apple is also known as a June plum or pommecythere; it looks nothing like any apple you’d find in the U.S. and looks more like a plumcot. It tastes like a mix of apple, mango, pineapple, with a citrusy finish. Both treats were delicious and added to our list of new fruits and varietals we’ve enjoyed on this trip!

Now I know that even if I don’t see the best produce markets on the Grenada or Trinidad legs of our trip that my heart and belly have been satiated with fresh, local, tropical fruit here in St. Lucia. And now when I think about it, why would you choose to come here when it’s NOT mango season…?!! What a true loss that would be!

Soufriere, St. Lucia, and its treasure: Les Pitons

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I told a colleague originally from St. Lucia that we would be visiting his birthplace, and he said that the one thing he recommended we had to do was to visit Soufriere, a town on the southwest coast of St. Lucia. Soufriere, which has strong French-Creole heritage, is near the famous Pitons, Gros Pitons and Petit Piton, the twin volcanic peaks that appear in almost every St. Lucia tourism ad. The name “Soufriere” comes from French and is named as such for the area’s sulfurous volcanic landscape. “Les Pitons” in French means “mountain peaks” or “pegs.” In English, they are another word for “metal spikes.” Given that St. Lucia changed hands between the British and the French 14 times, seven times to each side, ending with the Brits, you can easily see the British and French influence here. Because of this turbulent colonial tug-of-war, St. Lucia earned the nickname “Helen of the West Indies.” The French influence clearly persists in the island country given the naming of places like Les Pitons and Soufriere itself. But alas, while “Soufriere” pronounced the proper French way would be said “Su-free-AIR,” the British (and lazier) pronunciation of “Su-FRAIR” is more widely said by locals.

So today, we hired a driver to take us down the twisty, windy “hair pin bendy” roads to Soufriere. Everywhere we went, there were mango trees upon mango trees upon MORE mango trees. I just couldn’t get over how many mango trees there were everywhere. I’d never been any place quite like this before! It seemed like they just grew out in the wild and no one person even owned a lot of these trees. Some are so tall and gigantic that you’d never even be able to reach even a tiny fraction of the fruit available! And when there weren’t mango trees, there were bread fruit trees, more bread fruit trees, and endless other fruits like papaya, gooseberry, guavas, wax apples, and the list just goes on forever!

Along the way, we stopped at some really well staked out viewing points of the Pitons and Anse La Ray (Bay of Stingrays), had some delicious local tastes of hand-pounded cassava bread (cherry-raisin and pineapple, the latter of which Chris declared “tastes just like a hot cross bun without the raisins!”), also visited Toraille Waterfall (overrun by cruise ship tourists and was our first time really feeling like we were surrounded by other tourists this trip!), and did a quick tour of the Sulphur Springs. It’s described as the Caribbean’s only “drive-in volcano,” but that’s a little bit of an exaggeration. You can drive up to the edge of the area, and then you have to get out and walk around it. You are also assigned to a guide… who expects a tip at the end (damn U.S. tipping culture invading other societies!). When doing the tour here, of course the smell of rotten eggs was pervasive. As soon as we got out of the car, Kaia yelled out, “It smells!” The area also had lots of fruit trees, including a fruiting mango tree and a fruiting cashew tree. I’d imagine these trees’ fruit would be especially delicious!

For lunch with the help of ChatGPT premium and my targeted prompting, we went to Martha’s Tables just off Sugar Beach in Soufriere, a little quaint open-air restaurant that feels like you are eating on a huge deck of someone’s private home. They had a large, lush backyard filled with so many types of fruits and vegetables that I couldn’t even name them all. When we complimented our server and said we loved the garden (which we have to walk through to reach the restrooms), she went into the kitchen to tell the chef (maybe Martha?), and the chef came out eagerly to give us a mini tour of her garden, filled with guavas, pomegranates, golden apples (also known as June plums), wax apples, and so may pineapple bushes! None of the fruit were ready for picking except the wax apples, so the chef picked off a large bunch of the wax apples, and to my surprise, gave them all to Kaia! Kaia was ecstatic; she kept squealing nonstop every time she came across yet another pineapple bush! The meal and setting were amazing, but this level of warmth and hospitality was truly above and beyond. We left feeling very welcomed and taken care of.

Our next and final stop before heading back up to Rodney Bay was at the Tet Paul Nature Trail, where we’d go for a hike to see more views of the Pitons. The trail was originally developed as a community tourism/eco-tourism project, run and managed by the people of the town just below. Our kind and friendly driver ended up having to watch Kaia nap in the car because she passed out on our drive to the Nature Trail. This ended up benefiting us because if she had come, she would have whined endlessly about the uphill climb and how long it was (45 minutes isn’t that long, but for a four-year-old, that feels like an eternity without sitting…!).

The most interesting thing about this trail was that the entire time, it felt like I was in an open-air compost pile because of all the fallen, rotted fruit (mostly mangoes!) that were everywhere. There was so much fruit, too much fruit, that no one could ever keep up with all this. While the smell stunned me a little in the beginning, after a while, it actually just felt nice, like we were truly immersed in nature. And along with all the beautiful bird songs, it felt very special. The trail also had many other fruit, like the locally beloved wax apples and bread fruit. And we got really lucky when we saw not one, but two different Antillean crested hummingbirds. I have loved birds since I was little, likely due to the influence of my dad who loves birds, and whenever I see a new, colorful species out in the wild, I always get excited. These little hummingbirds are a stunning blue and green irridescent shade with some black, and most notably have a funny tuff of “hair” on their heads. The hair almost looks like a bumpy mohawk! One of them posed for us for what seemed like a very long time, and our guide (as with the volcano, a guide was required here) noted that it is actually very rare to see these hummingbirds; often he will go weeks with multiple tours and not see any. So the fact that we got to see two was very, very special.

When we finally reached the pinnacle of the trail, known as the “Stairway to Heaven,” we got to see the sweeping views of the Gros Piton et Petit Piton we had originally come for. We also got to see different angles of Sugar Beach, Jalousie Bay, and the south coast. After this hike and all the spectacular views we saw today, I can understand why people love St. Lucia and think it’s one of the most beautiful places in the world. Some people like mountains, while others prefer the beach and ocean. And for those who don’t like either, they have rainforests. St. Lucia has it all — and in a single view point and region!

On the 1.75 hours drive back to our hotel, I still admired all the mango trees we passed by every other second. I know that soon, this will not be my view out the window, and so I want to soak it all up as much as possible. Mango. Trees. Everywhere. I was just floored. I will likely be thinking about this for months to come.

Harrison’s Cave, a much-known tourist attraction, and a lesser explored part of Barbados: the northern rugged coast

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Today, we rented a car for the day and explored some further away parts of the island. Barbados is known for its ubiquitous potholes. We got warned by the couple from the snorkeling cruise that we needed to keep a close lookout for them. On their very first day in Barbados, as they were just leaving the airport in their rental car for the day, they hit a pothole so badly that the rim was destroyed to the point of the car being unusable. So they had to pay for the damage and immediately go back and switch the car out. “What a great way to start our vacation!” they laughed. So, we kept their warning in mind on our day with the rental car.

The first highlight of the day was Harrison’s Cave, which is located in the central uplands of Barbados. It’s a crystallized limestone cavern carved by water over hundreds of thousands of years. The cave is known for its massive stalactites hanging from the ceilings like icicles, and its stalagmites, which grow upward from the cave floor. The cave also has beautiful (and incredibly deep!) emerald-green pools and underground waterfalls. It’s 2.3 kilometers (about 1.4 miles) and stays a humid and warm 24.5 C (76 F) year-round. Each year, the tram guide told us, each of the stalactites and stalagmites grow the thickness of a piece of paper per YEAR. It’s one of the features of Barbados that makes the island unique versus other Caribbean islands in that it was originally formed from colliding tectonic plates and thick coral limestone rather than volcanoes. The cave was formed by rainwater that dissolved this limestone. The caves were first documented in historical records in 1795 but were largely unexplored for about 180 years.

The cave was named after Thomas Harrison, a prominent landowner in the early 1700s who also founded a college on the island. Even though we’ve already been here for about four days, it still feels funny to me that the majority of tourist sights here in Barbados are named after a bunch of White people, who were likely either colonizers or slave owners themselves. The majority of Barbados’s population (over 92 percent) is of Black/African descent. Though it is good to read that the local population is recognizing how terrible this is and slowly renaming important historical sites after prominent Afro-Barbadians. One major example is Trafalgar Square, which was officially renamed National Heroes Square.

We did the tram tour, which was a bit simpler given Kaia was of course with us, and she likely would have whined and whinged endlessly if we did the longer (and much more slippery!) walking tour. What I loved the most about the cave were all extremely different shapes and sizes of the stalactites and stalagmites. Some really unique ones were pointed out, like the formation of the Great Hall (it really felt like a great big hall in a grand home), several chandelier-like formations, and stalactites that looked like real drapes and shawls. The guide warned us at the beginning of the tour that touching any of the cave formations is against Barbadian law, and we could be fined as much as $50,000 USD for just a simple touch! I will say that after seeing so many of the cave formations so close up that it was tempting to see what they felt like. They look like they could feel like a cross between jade or pearl!

The second highlight of the day was our stop at Little Bay, Pie Corner, which is located in the rugged northern parish of St. Lucy. It felt very secluded and remote. Other than one other man who was wandering the area, it was just us. There, the waves were a lot more forceful constantly crashing against the large rocks and cliffs, and the water was darker and more treacherous. Swimming is strongly advised against given how strong the currents are in this area. Here, there are also lots of interesting rock formations like sea caves and geyser-like blowholes. We also saw lots of interesting sea shells, and so many tiny little crabs hurriedly scurrying around.

Kaia fell asleep on the way to Little Bay. So instead of waking her up and dragging her out (which would have been unpleasant for all of us), we let her sleep in the car while we spent a little time exploring the little area. I picked a bunch of shells for her and presented them as a gift when we got back to the car. By that time, she had already woken up and was wondering where we went and when we’d come back. As soon as we opened the car door to see her, she had a big smile on her face to see us. I told her she missed out on seeing the teeny tiny crabs crawling around everywhere. The quick video I took of them moving around definitely amused her.

The last highlight was our stop at Tapas Restaurant, which is a short drive from our hotel and was recommended by a local we met and made small talk with at a coffee shop on our first full day. They are known for their open-air restaurant setup with great beach views, as their large selection of local rums from Foursquare Rum Distillery, an internationally awarded maker of rum. Chris tried two rums: one was a Clifton Hall Great House, made in a bourbon cask, and the second was an R.L. Seale 10-year aged in former bourbon casks. I enjoyed a really well made and smooth dark and stormy, likely one of the best versions of it that I’ve had.

Although rum became a thing in Barbados during the 1640s and 1650s as a byproduct of the island’s booming sugar industry, today, the majority of the rums produced on the island are not made with locally grown sugar cane. The island country just isn’t able to produce enough local molasses to meet the global demand for Barbadian rum. Barbados produces significantly less sugar cane today due to global market shifts making the industry unprofitable. The country is now restructuring its traditional sugar industry by transitioning toward rum production, specialty sugar, renewable energy, and agricultural research.

Despite its downward shift of sugar production, Barbados still continues to be recognized globally as the birthplace of rum, still operating historical sites like Foursquare Rum Distillery, Mount Gay Rum Distillery, and St. Nicholas Abbey. The Geographical Indication (GI) Rules state that every stage of production — distillation, aging, blending, and bottling — must take place entirely on the island using limestone filtered water. The laws intentionally do not restrict the origin of raw sugarcane or molasses. We did pass by many fields of sugarcane, but it still didn’t seem like it could possibly be enough given how much rum is actually still produced here.

It was a a beautiful and tasty way to end our time in Barbados, with lots of culture and learning along the way. Tomorrow, we are off to St. Lucia for another cultural experience!

On a catamaran in Barbados to see sea turtles, shipwreck, and endless colorful fish

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As soon as I read that Barbados was known for sea turtles, and there were near-guaranteed chances to see them when snorkeling, I told Chris we had to do a catamaran tour here. The last time we did a snorkeling excursion, it was in Cebu, the Phillippines, on New Year’s Day this year. We were spoiled given the exchange rate, and so we had a private boat for just the three of us. Here in Barbados, tourism (especially from Westerners) is massive, and of course they are going to capitalize on that. No one’s going to fault them for that! If you want to do a private charter for a day, it will cost close to a thousand USD! So we went with the 36-person max five-hour catamaran tour, which takes you snorkeling at two stops in Carlisle Bay. It includes a Bajan-style lunch and swimming stop near Holetown, and then we’re back to our starting point in Bridgetown.

It feels luxurious that this is the third time we are going snorkeling this year (and the fourth time in my life, after the Great Barrier Reef / Cairns, Queensland, in December 2014), but if you’re only going to be here once, you might as well dive in (literally). While one of my lifelong dreams has been to swim with dolphins, I have always wanted to see sea turtles up close, and what better way than to see them in their natural habitat in the ocean? I love wildlife, and the ocean, while terrifying to me given I have a fear of deep water and scary things that could potentially kill me (okay, the last part is a lesser fear, but you get it), has always been one of the most beautiful sights for me. I still remember my very first time snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef and how surreal the coral reef was to see, and being rendered speechless by exactly how many colors are under the sea. That feeling of being in the water and seeing it all just feels magical to me.

In Carlisle Bay, there are two types of sea turtles that all catamaran cruises say you have a 98 percent chance of seeing: green(back) turtles and hawksbill turtles. Green turtles can grow up to 1.2 meters (just shy of four feet) in shell diameter and weigh over 180 kilograms (about 400 lb). These little guys eat seagrass and algae, and the greens of their diet colors their fat and cartilage, giving them their name. Hawksbill turtles, on the other hand, have shells that can be about 0.8 meters (three feet) in diameter and weigh between 45 to 80 kilograms (100-177 lb). Hawksbill turtles eat sea sponges, giving them the name “spongivores.” This diet helps coral reefs, as these turtles eat aggressive sponges that then prevent the overgrowth of coral colonies, contributing to a healthy coral reef system. Shape-wise, they have narrow, bird-like curved beaks and serrated, patterned shells. In Barbados, sea turtles are protected by law, and they have one of the largest nesting populations of this endangered species in the Caribbean. I spoke with a couple yesterday at the resort we visited, who said that just a few days before, they actually saw a sea turtle come up to their shore to lay their eggs — what a treat to be able to see that in real time!

Our cruise was really, really well run: the staff were extremely warm, friendly, hospitable, knowledgable, and hands-on. When we had our two snorkel stops, they had two crew members act as guides/helpers in the water to show us where to look for wildlife. And because Kaia was the youngest person on the boat, one of those two guys was so kind that he stayed with her (and a floatie) the entire time, which allowed Chris and me to enjoy swimming and snorkeling with more ease and on our own. We brought our own life jacket fitted for her, which she wore the whole time in the water. The cruise offered her a child-sized snorkel set, but she refused to wear it (she was probably still hating it from when we tried to get her to wear one in Cebu, and well, that one was likely malfunctioning as ours did). And when they said we were guaranteed to see sea turtles, they were not joking: during our first snorkel stop, we saw two green turtles on the very bottom of the ocean floor, which was fully clear and just endless white sand in that area. The water was extremely clear, and we could see both of the green turtles waddling around the ocean floor separately as though time did not matter.

For a while, I didn’t even really move while I was watching each of the sea turtles walk around on the ocean floor. It just felt so captivating, watching them move in slow-motion, one or two legs moving at a time. They looked so graceful, so purposeful, with fluid and effortless strides. Given that sea turtles evolved over 100 million years ago and outlived dinosaurs, I think it’s pretty clear they live steady, purposeful lives, and their swimming pace reminds all of us to slow down a little bit and to really enjoy the moment. I could probably spend hours just staring at these gentle little giants swim and waddle across the ocean floor.

While reading about sea turtles, I read this quote that stayed with me: “Watching a sea turtle swim is knowing they are following an incredible, invisible roadmap. They use the Earth’s magnetic field—an innate ability called magnetoreception—to navigate thousands of miles across open oceans to feed and return to the exact beaches where they were born.” I rely so heavily on Google Maps for everything, whether it’s trying to see how long it will take me to get from point A to point B, or just identifying where a restaurant is. I guess I will never be as intelligent as a sea turtle. The fact that sea turtles are so smart and can do this, especially the part about returning to the exact beaches where they were born, is mind-blowing.

During the second snorkel stop, we saw lots more shipwreck, coral reef growing on top of said shipwreck, and endless colorful fish. Many of them are likely the same or related to the colorful fish we saw in Roatan and Cebu, except this time, I definitely know I saw a handful of different parrot fish that were even more than all the colors of the rainbow. I saw lots of scorpion-like fish, endless varieties of angelfish, sergeant majors (just like in Roatan!), and many schools of blue tang fish, which were like dark blue florescent fish with rounded flat bodies and cute little tails. We also got to see THE fish in Barbados, which are the flying fish (very popular for eating, as well. We had these, breaded and fried, at the Trini rum and roti shop we ate at during our first full day in Barbados). They really do “fly” out of water in packs. If a crew member hadn’t pointed them out to us, I barely would have noticed them. They almost looked like little darts coming out of the water in very specific semi-circle patterns. And because of their color, they blend into the water and you need to really look for them.

We also got warned several times to stay away from a certain area of coral, where it got shallower and there was plenty of fire coral. After my Roatan incident of getting my butt burned by what appeared to be dead coral, I will heed those warnings and stay TF away.

Kaia loved being on the boat. She enjoyed being doted on by crew members, being in the water, and fighting over foam noodles with her mama (i did not quite enjoy this, but, well…). She enjoyed the outing so much that she actually ended up napping out on the catamaran (on Chris)! Pookster even attracted the attention of a younger couple just finishing up med school who are planning to have kids soon. They kept raving about how cute and good she was being (even though she had several tantrums and they witnessed first hand her fight with me in the water). We told her the next time we’re out in open water again, she needs to try to put her head in the water so she can actually see the fish and the sea animals. I was bummed she didn’t get to see the sea turtles, as I know for a fact she would have loved them. She’s an animal lover like me after all, so I know she’d get a kick out of seeing these beautiful, graceful gentle giants. I guess there is always next time.

The “dine around” exchange program and the unexpected brand-new swimsuit

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While in Barbados, we’re staying at a south coast all-inclusive resort, which is part of Marriott and their Tribute Portfolio collection of hotels. While in flight to Barbados, Chris looked up additional benefits and perks of staying here, and he found out that we could get access to what is called the “Dine Around” Exchange Program. This means that guests can utilize the “dine around” option at other participating Marriott resorts on the island. So this would not only give us (free/included) access to other properties and their food/drink/amentiies, but also give us an opportunity to enjoy a different part of Barbados. So we chose a hotel to visit today that was on the west coast, which is supposed to have calmer, more child-friendly beaches.

While we had to pay for our transport to get to the second hotel, all our food and drink would be included at this property, so the Uber would be the only real extra expense of the day. And it was really nice to see another part of the coast and see how a sister property was laid out. Of course, Kaia was thrilled to know she was having a full pool/beach day. She went back and forth between the white sand beach with calm, crystal-clear waters back into the east coast hotel’s pools, which were better situated than our hotel’s given that they directly overlooked the beach the way they did at our Roatan hotel last month. We ended up befriending a couple from Edison, New Jersey, and their daughter, who was born 11 months before Kaia. So they played together as we all had our own separate adult conversations.

One funny thing that ended up happening was that while we were on the beach with G and her mom, Kaia suddenly started scratching her crotch area and tried to take off her rashie/swimsuit. I asked her what was wrong, and she said the swimsuit was hurting her leg. G’s mom was so thoughtful that she eagerly offered to give Kaia one of G’s own brand-new swimsuits given she said she overpacked and probably wouldn’t need all the swimsuits anyway. She went a short distance back to their room and brought out a really cute turquoise and white one-piece swimsuit with a big bow on it — so new that it still had its tags on. Kaia happily took off her rashie, put on G’s swimsuit, and went back to splashing.

When it was time for all of us to go, I dried the swimsuit off as much as I could and tried to hand it back to G’s mom, and she insisted that we keep it because they didn’t need it due to having too many swimsuits for G, and they would be leaving in a couple days anyway. I was floored and just in shock.

“You have so much more of your trip to go, so it can’t hurt to have an extra swimsuit for her,” G’s mom insisted to me. “It’s really nothing! I got it from Target!! It’s not like I gave you a Burberry swimsuit or anything…”

I told her it wasn’t about the cost; in most cases of generosity, money has little to do with it. In these and in so many cases I’ve experienced with Kaia, it’s truly about the gesture itself, the selflessness to offer a swimsuit to a child you do not even know when you can see she’s uncomfortable and you know you have an extra one… and then to just let them keep it! We were total strangers who met just hours before, and she was giving one of her daughter’s brand new swimsuits away — who cares that it’s from Target! To be honest, I am not totally sure that if I were in her shoes that I would have done the same thing. And so when I think about cases like this, it just makes me realize how truly kind other people really can be. Being a mama to my Kaia Pookie opens my eyes to that fact every single day.

“Camp” setup at our San Pedro Sula hotel

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Once Kaia had outgrown a crib and pack-n-play, when traveling, we’d ask the hotels for a roll-away bed for her. All hotels accommodate this, of course, but occasionally, you get a special surprise at some properties.

We stayed at an Aloft hotel in San Pedro Sula. Aloft is known for their Camp Aloft, which encourages kids ages 2-12 to have fun by providing them with their own unique Aloft experience. They call it a “bed in a bag with special treats!” The last time Kaia had something close to a tent experience was when we had the Lovevery “fort” setup, but she quickly outgrew that because that was more for babies and younger toddlers. She’s also hidden in the tent at Chris’s aunt and uncle’s place in Melbourne, which she loved. So when we arrived at our hotel room on Saturday late afternoon, she squealed with delight when she saw her little tent bed. After taking off her shoes, she immediately ran over to the bed to hide in her tent. She was obsessed with the little windows where you could play peekaboo. I love that she still loves peekaboo… and I still wonder how long this peekaboo love will last?!

The hotel manager also tried to spoil her by giving her a full-sized bag of M&Ms and a bag of Skittles… which Chris immediately confiscated. I think by the end of the trip, he may have let her have two M&Ms and two Skittles max. I love these experiences that Kaia gets when traveling, and I love seeing people treat children well. I hope she can remember at least some of these experiences when she’s older, as at the age of 4, this is the earliest time of my life that I have very vivid memories of. And even when she isn’t able to remember, we will have lots of photos and videos to document and share with her so she can relish in the fact that she was so spoiled in these travel moments.

My very first cacao fruit — in Honduras

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Few things excite me more than discovering new food, and especially new fruit, while traveling. I love that different countries and and climates have different fruits that can only be grown in certain areas. Some people are upset by this, as they believe that globalization should enable anyone anywhere to get whatever produce they want anytime they want, but I think that’s just unrealistic given how delicate and sensitive some of these fruit and vegetables are. Indian mangoes are a great example: while many are being exported to the U.S. from India, it’s a huge gamble which of them are actually intact once they make it to stateside. Many would have rotted in transit, and they all need to be sprayed to prevent infestation. The one time we bought a box of Indian mangoes in New Jersey and brought it back home, I still remember one of them never ripened, while a couple others were rotted and black. There’s a no-returns policy on these, so it’s fully at your own risk!

While in Guatemala on our day trips to Antigua and Lake Atitlan, I talked to our driver about cacao fruit, and he had mentioned that locals did buy it to eat the fruit around the cacao beans. We saw it at a few fruit stands there, but the road conditions and traffic were unpleasant, and so I never asked our driver to stop. In Ecuador in July, our driver who took us to Quilotoa Crater Lake told us that one of his sons absolutely loves cacao fruit and that it’s one of his favorites, so he gets it just for him. My interest was piqued; I needed to try cacao fruit at least once!

So when we passed several street-side vendors selling the fruit, I asked Javier our driver if that was in fact cacao, and he confirmed it was. So we stopped by a fruit vendor, and from there, I was given a cacao and chose the ripest possible mango (out of likely over 20 that were ROCK hard!) given we had less than 24 hours left here. I just spent over $2 USD on local Honduran fruit, and I was extremely, extremely thrilled.

Back at the hotel last night, I asked if someone from the kitchen could help me cut the cacao in half. I got it back and scooped out all the cacao seeds (beans), which were covered in a thin, custardy white layer — this is the fruit! Chris and I shared the fruit since Kaia seemed extremely uninterested in it, and I didn’t feel like pushing her given it was a potential choking hazard. The flavor was sweet first, then a little tart, with a custardy texture and finish. Chris remarked that he wished there was more flesh to eat, which I agreed with. The more I thought about it, the more the flavor and texture reminded me of the cherimoyas we had while in Peru. Cherimoyas are a lot less work and far more flesh to eat, though! The act of sucking off the flesh from around the beans — this was definitely reminiscent of the mamoncilla fruit we ate while in Colombia and El Salvador. Those seeds were extremely large and round (super big choking hazard!), with a thin, bright pink flesh.

Fruit adventuring while traveling is one of the best things. Now I can finally say I’ve tried cacao the fruit!

A day spent exploring the surrounds of San Pedro Sula, Honduras

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If you look at places to see and what to do in San Pedro Sula, you can tell almost right away that it was never a place built with tourism in mind. There’s virtually zero tourism infrastructure. People obviously live there. Many businesses are located and/or headquartered here, so people come for business travel. But when it comes to sightseeing, most of that is found outside of San Pedro Sula, at least an hour outside the city, where you forget “urban” even exists because of how green, jungle-like, and rugged the area outside of it is.

We didn’t want to rent a car or drive in mainland Honduras, so Chris tried for a while to find a driver who could take us on a day trip, but it was challenging. Some of the drivers he found and reached out to didn’t seem legitimate. Others were quoting such astronomically high costs that they would even be absurd if we got quoted those numbers back home in the U.S. Finally, and unexpectedly, we were able to enlist the hotel manager’s help ahead of time in finding us a safe, legitimate driver who charged a reasonable amount to be our driver for the day outside the city. We were warned he didn’t speak any English, but this was fine because we’d give him our desired itinerary ahead of time. And of course, there was always Google Translate (what a savior!).

We visited a number of interesting places today that made us forget about the city completely. Our first stop was at D&D Brewery and Restaurant in the Pena Blanca area. It’s this little brewery/restaurant/inn that you’d totally overlook when driving passed it because it’s so tucked away. It’s physically inside a rainforest close to Lago de Yojoa (Lake Yojoa). Given they are a craft brewery (that uses mountain spring water), we got a pineapple and raspberry beer along with a slice of very light and fluffy chocolate cake to appease Kaia. We also walked around the property, which really did feel like we were right in the center of a jungle. It was a really beautiful spot with friendly service despite the language barrier.

Our next stop was at Los Naranjos Eco-Archaeological Park, which contains pre-Columbian ruins of a major Lenca city dating back to 800 B.C. That is even older than Copan, the famous Maya ruins also in Honduras that is likely better known. Copan dates back to 400 A.D. There, we got to walk along a long wooden boardwalk that curved through these huge wetlands at the edge of Lake Yojoa. I loved all the unique bird songs we got to hear while walking through it — how beautiful it would be to be able to fall asleep to those nature sounds at night! I also appreciated how relatively covered we felt by the endless large trees from the UV rays (I am officially in my forties now, after all…).

Just past midday, we went down to Lake Yojoa and took a calm, relaxing boat tour of the lake and surrounds. This time, our driver Javier came with us, and he occasionally pointed out interesting things to us, like the famous Goblin’s Cave and the turtle shaped island in the middle of the lake. While on the boat, I was reminded of this time last year when we were in Lake Atitlan, Guatemala, for a day trip. And the mountains in the distance here and the faint mist over them reminded me of that time. There are so many beautiful bodies of water in the world to see and explore!

We passed so many street side fruit vendors that I had to take advantage of this. So I asked Javier if he could stop by one so I could check out some fruit. I ended up getting a local mango and my very first cacao fruit — all for 70 Lempiras; more on this tomorrow!

A typical lunch by the lake will include fried fish, fried fish, and fried fish, all caught from the lake, with a side of freshly fried plantains in the same oil. Chris managed to find us a teeny tiny little quaint spot overlooking the water called Comedor Mayra, where a very nice lady was able to communicate with us and get our order in. I asked if she had juice, and though she didn’t have any, she was eager to get it from a nearby fresh juice vendor once we told her what we’d be interested in. We ended up having a hibiscus and mango juice. The fish was delicious, as were the tostones and the juices. And I’m still in shock from how cheap the meal was: an entire whole fried fish with tostones with all the cabbage and pickled vegetable fixings, plus two large fresh juices for just 250 Lempiras — that’s not even $10 USD!

Our last stop for the day was at Cataratas Pulhapanzak (Pulhapanzak Falls), meaning “white river overflow in Mayan. “Pulha” as it is known is 43 meters/140-feet tall, located on Rio Lindo about an hour’s drive outside of San Pedro Sula. The area served as a pre-Hispanic center, likely overlapping with the Mayan civilization. Before the Spanish arrived here, the falls were deeply revered as a sacred, mystical site by the indigenous Lenca people. Now, it’s fully set up for tourism, with the option to do cave walks, behind-the-water splash adventures, river tubing, and even multi-course ziplining. There is a big “Pulha” sign for photos with the large waterfall in the background, complete with a large platform to which you can walk up to get the perfect photo opp. It felt like mostly locals and maybe domestic tourists when we went. A lot were getting into the water and swimming in calmer, shallower areas. The whole area felt like a big family-friendly outdoor hangout, and a very natural one at that! I do not recall seeing a single obviously foreign tourist there other than ourselves. The falls were beautiful, and the mist went much farther than it appears it would. We had a feeling that we probably came on a lower flow day because the actual fall itself was relatively small.

We packed a lot into today, with the day planning done by Chris and Claude/Gemini, and some occasional help and friendly pointers from our driver Javier. We ended the day with yesterday’s Power Chicken leftovers (a very popular fast food spot with HUGE portions all over Honduras that should be visited if you ever come!) and a good night’s sleep. And luckily by midday today, my right butt cheek stopped hurting and burning, so I hope I’m on the short road to recovery from these coral reef scrapes.