Coconut Jelly

I had quite an event filled day in Barbados today. I met up with my friend Mark again and his wife, Nicole. We took a drive along the west coast of Barbados up to the very northern point. Along the way we stopped for rum punch at a beach and then pastries in Spice Town. I had a jam puff, which reminded me of a croissant. The drive took us through rural areas of Barbados where they even had bales of hay – a site I haven’t seen since leaving Colorado. There were also fields of sugar cane and loads of mango trees and bread fruit trees (more on those in a minute).

North Point was really impressive. There were massive waves slamming into the cliffs and creating lots of sea spray. I imagine it’s a bit similar to Big Sur and Carmel in California, but I’ve never actually been to those places so can’t say for sure. It was incredibly windy. I thought the wind was going to literally blow me over a few times – luckily it was blowing towards the land and not over the cliffs!

After North Point we went back to Bridgetown and stopped at a gas station for Tiger Malta (tastes a bit like molasses soda) and Bank’s Beer – the local Baygan (not sure if I’m spelling that correctly, but it’s the equivalent of saying Coloradan) brew. We also stopped at a little stand on the side of the road where a man was selling coconuts. They eat ‘green’ coconuts in Barbados or coconuts that aren’t ripe. The coconuts we get stateside are mature, that’s why they’re brown and the flesh has hardened. Here’s the process: The guy cuts a hole into the coconut with a machete like blade and hands you a straw. You slurp all the coconut water out which has a fain milky taste and is supposedly really good for your kidneys. You then hand the coconut back to the guy and he splits it open with the machete and cuts a scoop out of the outside of the coconut. You use the scoop to eat the coconut jelly which is the unripe flesh. I wasn’t a very big fan of the jelly as it had a texture similar to squid or octopus.

After this they took me back to the ship where I had to put in my half hour of work for the day. I then rounded up some of my shipmates and we went to meet Mark at somewhat of a boardwalk for dinner. Getting to the boardwalk was an interesting adventure. We ended up walking about half an hour from the port to catch a local taxi van. The local taxi vans are very cheap (.75 USD) and very local! It’s about the size of a mini-van, maybe a bit bigger and they cram in as many bodies as they can fit. It was probably the closest I’ll ever get to feeling like a sardine! They also drive with lead feet, so there’s a lot of getting to know your neighbor involved with corners.

When I say boardwalk, it’s more like an outdoor food court area along the beach. There are all sorts of different stands and a band stand in the middle where they had Karaoke. I had a fried flying fish plate which included flying fish, rice and peas, fried plantains, macaroni and cheese, green salad, potato salad, and bread fruit – all for $13 USD! Bread fruit grows on trees (as mentioned before) and has to be baked or grilled to eat it. I’d say the closest thing it tastes like is a sweet potato – it’s very starchy and dry. I enjoyed every last bite of my Baygan cuisine! We left around 9:00 p.m. to make it back on-board before sailing away at 10:30. Now I’m on my way to St. Lucia and sweet dreams!

Okay, so this is going to be a mega post since a day has passed and I have more to report from St. Lucia! It seems like the past 2 days have been my agricultural adventure days. I went on an excursion exploring the northern part of St. Lucia and saw where many of the foods we love to eat in the States come from.

I saw a cocoa tree and saw the orangish/purplish leaves that bear the pods that we ultimately get chocolate from. The locals dry the paste into sticks and then make chocolate tea out of them. I also saw a coffee plant and the red Arabica beans of the tree. These get harvested and roasted to brew the essential ingredient for many people’s morning wake-up. The most interesting tree I saw was a cashew tree. I now know why cashews are on of the most expensive nuts. Each fruit of the tree only produced one cashew. The fruit was about the size of a tennis ball and red and had a brown sprout poking out which is the cashew. The other fascinating stop we made was at a banana plantation. Banana trees are quite fascinating. The fruit starts in a purple pod and then a bunch of bananas begin to sprout out of that with a flower on the end. At just the right time of maturity the flowers must be cut off otherwise the birds will ruin the bananas. After the flower is cut off, a blue bag is placed around the growing bananas to protect them from the elements. Once the tree produces its bunch of bananas it dies – they have very short life cycles. Luckily the roots reproduce extremely well and as soon as the tree has died a new tree sprouts right back up. It just takes one banana tree to plant an entire plantation! There’s some food for thought the next time you go to peel a banana!

There’s not much else to report except we have a new bandmaster/trumpeter and drummer. They are both very nice and the drummer is a much more sensitive player, so I think my hearing will receive some relief!