Island Color

We set out to find the elusive St. Joseph's church in the Bathsheba area again today. Last week, we made the trek to the east coast of the island in search of the old church, but had no luck finding it. Today, however, was full of good luck! We studied some maps last night and were able to find a bus stop in the general area where we were told St. Joseph's is located and with the help of a kind bus driver, we found it! The church building is absolutely breathtaking- granted it is completely abandoned and falling apart in some areas:) But I think that sometimes the most beautiful things in the world are abandoned buildings- they have so many stories to tell! The graveyard out in front of the church showed signs of recent care and we ran into a man as he came down the long pathway that was visiting his grandmother's grave. We found a side door that was rotten through, so we were able to walk into the church and look around. The foundation was cracked and leaning and many of the windows were crooked and broken but the building still held the beautiful sense of serenity that we have found in many of the other cathedrals on the island.

While we were well prepared for our trip to the church, we forgot to have a plan to get home:) haha! After I finished taking so many gorgeous pictures, we decided that our best chance of finding another bus was to walk about 3km (close to 2 miles) into the town of Bathsheba. Alas, Google let us down once again. The route that Google suggested we take was blocked by construction and we ended up hiking through about 5 miles of banana tree forests before we finally found Bathsheba beach! I'm so glad the giant banana spiders stayed in their trees and didn't attack us. We had to wait about two hours for another bus to make its way through Bathsheba, so we decided to cool off by drinking some coconut water- it is amazing! There is nothing better than a fresh coconut on a hot day! The man who hacked open our coconuts with his machete was super nice and offered to teach us how to surf! Maybe we'll take him up on the offer later this week. We also found a rock just off shore that looks like a thumbs up:) When our bus finally came, we jumped aboard and headed back to Bridgetown. About 5 minutes into our return ride, the bus started sputtering and then came to a crashing halt in the middle of a steep hill. Black clouds started billowing from the engine and the bus driver asked us all to get off for a few minutes. After he inspected the engine, he told us that we would have to wait for the next bus to come and take us back- another hour wait:) We spent the time trying to chat with the other three ladies who were on the bus with us but we didn't have much success because we had to ask them to repeat themselves over and over again. The native language here is English, but it's hard to believe sometimes!

I have been wanting to write about all the brightly colored houses we see here since we arrived and have just been forgetting to take pictures of them so I could show you. So today we decided to not forget:) I think that Bathsheba is the most colorful area in Barbados. We saw so many vibrantly colored homes and shops all over the little surfing town that could rival the rainbow.