I will not get into the mess of our Westjet and Selloff Vacations experience here, but what we had planned worked out fine. Landing in Toronto at about 9:00 pm we walked to the Sheraton hotel which is located right in the airport, no need for winter coats and boots, threw our suitcases into the room while getting stuff out for the next morning flight, then went downstairs for a bite to eat and a couple of cold ones. You think Champers is expensive.
Your Arrival:
Lot of paperwork to do before you land in Barbados compared to Cuba. Customs was quick, very pleasant lady in customs greeted us welcome, good first impression. Picked up suitcases and went outside to see what Barbados had in store for us. Remember this is our first time to a non AI, so we are used to having buses waiting for us. Remembering what I learned on this site about asking the taxi drivers how much first, paid $18 US plus tip to get to
Rooms: Check in was quick and very informative about the hours and services of the apartment block. Our Superior Studio room was number 203 on the second floor. When we arrived in our room we noticed there was no way of locking our room safe, so I went down to inquire about this while Sandy unpacked. I was told the key would cost $15 or $50 Bds to replace it if we lost it, which was no problem. The room was close to the street but it didn’t bother us. We had the windows closed and the air conditioning on for most of our stay. The kitchenette had a good size fridge (keep the beer cold) and gas stove, had enough dishes and utensils for two people, also overlooked the front walkway of the apartment. The bedroom had a nice good size balcony with wicker furniture and the bed consisted of two twin beds attached to each other but was comfortable. The TV worked good but had a limited selection of channels. The bathroom had a full shower and tub, always stocked with clean towels. Overall the room was good sized, clean and comfortable to sleep in. One final thing about our room a big hug and kisses to our room attendants Vonda and Shirley, who kept our room in tip top shape.
Restaurants and Bars: I ate all my breakfasts at the Courtyard Bistro. It costs $10 Bds for cereal, toast, juice and coffee and $20 for bacon, sausage, 2 eggs, toast and coffee. We ate some of our suppers here to. We had supper a couple of times at the Lucky Horse Shoe, it was good and close by. Another place that wasn’t too far to walk to was MO JO’s. It was a bar down the street and you have to walk along a really narrow strip of sidewalk to get there, which made it an interesting walk home, especially after a few beers. We really liked the music and they also make good wraps. Bert’s bar was also an establishment that we went to. We made reservations on the way to the beach one day. You really have to make reservations, the place was just packed. We arrived with me being all dressed in my Ottawa Senator’s garb for the big game, got our table and noticed that we had a bunch of Leaf and Hab fans behind us. Not a good night for the Sens not to show up to play. What a long night, but it was fun. We went to the Gap twice to eat at Cafe Sol. Nice sunset views and great Mexican food. Will try to get to Oistins Fish Fry next year. We went to Champers for a 6 o’clock setting for Sandy’s birthday and the place was dead. I guess if you go at that time you don’t need a reservation but it’s probably better to make one anyway. The place was nice (beautiful sunset shot) but expensive. They had a table set up for us decorated with different coloured confetti on it. Sandy had the Swordfish and I had the Pork Tenderloin, we both really liked the food. For dessert they came out with ice cream with a lighted candle in it (too bad the wind was blowing towards Sandy) and they sang Happy Birthday to Sandy. We each had two beers and the total was $220 Bds plus tip.
Beach/Pools/Grounds:
Worthing Court Apartments is a small complex consisting of 20 apartments ranging from Studio, Superior Studio and One Bedroom apartments. The cost for our Superior studio room was $103 US a night tax included. The complex has a small pool which is in the best shape of any resort we have stayed at, it also had enough sun loungers for everybody. Courtyard Bistro is connected to the pool area and was staffed by one chef (sorry didn’t get his name), Sasha (Barbados only pink car owner) and (Killer) Howard which always provided us with great service and laughs. Courtyard Bistro is going through start up pains but the food was good and the atmosphere was great. Happy Hour was instituted at the restaurant while we stayed there (nothing to do with us).
Activities on and off the Resort/Hotel: The location of Worthing Court Apartments is great as you are within walking distance to restaurants, Worthing, Accra Beach, grocery stores, banks and the St. Lawrence Gap. We walked the Rockley Beach/Accra beach to Needhams Point/Hilton resort almost every day. Rockley/Accra beach and connecting beaches are nice but they are not as nice as Varadero beach in Cuba for beach walkers. Even with the boardwalk it is not the same. We heard they are expanding the boardwalk in the future. Worthing Beach is nice if you just want to sit by the beach, it is not a beach walker’s beach, but it is still nice. We did the Adventureland 4X4 tour. We selected The Congaline Adventure (lunch tour). They were a half hour late picking us up because they couldn’t find a certain hotel to pick up a couple that were supposed to be on the tour with us. Nelson was a great tour guide, we had a couple of locals on the tour with us and he was really picking on them, it was funny. Barbados is a beautiful island, we went to the Welchman Hall Gully for a casual walk, taking pictures of the green monkeys and learning about the poisonous plants of Barbados. The drive from and to the gully was interesting, didn’t miss a bump. The view of the Cattlewash and Bathsheba was fantastic, thank god for digital cameras. On the way there we stopped and had a short talk with a 103 year old lady who still does everything for herself. Barbados has the second purest air in the world, the first being the Swiss Alps and the water is also very pure. We also stopped at St. Johns Church and the Lions statue. We drove through Bridgetown on the way back to Worthing Court didn’t seem like there was much to do there but shop.
Other Comments: We left the room at 12 noon and went downstairs with our suitcases to check out. They had a place for us to put our suitcases since we weren’t leaving yet. We went back to the bar to have a couple of cold ones, while we were sitting there one of the room attendants asked us what time we were leaving and we told her 1:30pm. Later when we went back to the reception to get our suitcases and for me to get out of my sandals, to our surprise Vonda and Shirley presented us with a Valentine’s Day card which they all had signed. We thought that was really nice of them to do that. They called us a cab for the time we said we wanted to leave and the driver was there on time. We left vowing to return. Barbados airport was different than any other airport we have been to. It’s like being outside when you check in your luggage because it’s not closed in. Unfortunately for us there was a cruise leaving at the same time we were so there was a bit of confusion around one of the line ups for flights and one line up for the cruise which was not marked, we were in the wrong line, no problem we just slipped over to the other line, as did a bunch of other people following us. The airport is small but nice, with lots of kiosks selling food, alcohol, clothes and duty free. There weren’t very many empty seating places but that could have been because it was so busy. We flew out an hour late, could have been because the pilot didn’t know how to count, saying we were third in line when actually we were fifth. We landed in Toronto and went straight to our hotel and went to bed for our early flight home the next morning.