Why Barbados?

Barbados offers great breadth of experiences for visitors and is an easy island to explore, so car hire will enhance your flexibility and you can easily tour the island in a day.

The south coast has good beaches and tends to be the place for wind-related water sports as well as having a lively nightlife scene.

The west coast has equally good, maybe even better, beaches, calmer seas, good for sailing, diving and water skiing and has the most upscale hotels. The focus is less on nightlife and more on excellent restaurants and beach bars.

On this, you have established names like The Cliff, The Tides, Lone Star and Sea Shed, among others. In contrast, you have totally Caribbean beachfront chill out shacks like Bumbas or inland rum shops like Chris’s Place.

The busy capital of Bridgetown is interesting as well as having an easy to explore history, including the third oldest active synagogue in the Americas after Recife and Curacao, and for shopping.

On the West Coast, Holetown has colourful chattel house boutiques and the elegant Limegrove shopping centre. In the North, Speightstown is reinventing itself with an artistic flair and really good dining options like Local and Co and Baia .

One of the many highlights of Barbados is getting up close and personal with the amazing sea turtles. Most hotels can arrange this, but it is very easy to hire a boat for personal excursions if you want to spend some more time exploring the lovely island.

Whilst the island does not have as much dramatic scenery as some of the other islands, the East Coast offers a total contrast. Facing the Atlantic, it is wild, windy and rugged, with high seas and dramatic scenery, so only the most confident or foolhardy would consider venturing in, but it is marvellously unspoilt, with small rural villages and deserted beaches.

Also worth considering a visit would be Harrison’s Cave, with its amazing stalactites and stalagmite… Barbados Wildlife Reserve, where you can usually glimpse the famous green monkey… and Andromeda Botanical Garden, where you have one of the largest collection of tropical plants.

For the lovers of rum and history, a tour of St Nicholas Abbey is recommended. The tour includes the Great House, gardens, small museum, factory, distillery and rum tasting. This is also an authentic Victorian steam railway on the plantation.

Getting There

There are daily flights on both Virgin Atlantic & British Airways. Most will operate non stop. Usual flying time is 8 hours, and taxi transfer to the west coast hotels approx. 45 minutes.

Out & About

Bajans love their sport, and apart from cricket, you will see football and basketball players all over the island, as well as probably the loudest game of dominoes you are likely to encounter. Horse Racing is popular, taking place in Bridgetown most Saturdays in season. Not to forget the amazing golf courses with Sandy Lane and now Apes Hill being the most exclusive.

Barbados has a couple of good weekend markets at Holders in the West coast or Brighton on the South coast. Numerous stalls selling only locally made produce, including clothing, jewellery and jams. Feel good island sustainability.

Barbados has a population around 280,000. The area around Bridgetown is the most populated, and into the commercial centre of Warrens. And the south and west coasts show their popularity with many hotels, apartments and villas. But when you travel around the north and east coasts, you might to see more sheep, goats and cattle than people.

The style of Barbados is unique. Totally relaxed yet proud and rather disciplined in their lifestyle, reflected in island pride, so you see hardly any litter or trash – very different from many of the other islands. It has one of the highest literacy levels in the world.

Not sure if churches outnumber the rum shops, but it’s a close call. It is an expensive island in comparison to others, but this is reflected in the abundant choice, quality and service.

Weather

Barbados is a popular year-round destination. The most settled weather is between November to May, when the days are usually bright and sunny with limited rainfall. It is also the time of the highest hotel prices, especially between mid December to mid April, when the island attracts many from Northern Europe / America keen to escape harsh winters.

June to October usually have more humidity and maybe some quick tropical showers, but the hotel prices are at their most favourable. Barbados is located furthest east of all the islands so is away from the usual hurricane belt effecting other islands late summer/early autumn.