The main sport of interest to the schools in Barbados is athletics. This has meant we have lost people and lost entire sessions to athletics, this happened a lot over the last week.
We settled on a general theme for the week of first touch control. This went well with our sessions over Monday and Tuesday. Some of the groups really took to it brilliantly and this allowed us to progress through quickly and cover a lot.
Wednesday was Ash Wednesday and this meant our session was replaced by an assembly. After our afternoon session we met up with Paul and Oore to head to the beach bar to watch some football. Marseille v Inter was on and afterwards I started playing volleyball and then football with a few locals.
On Thursday only 1 of our 3 sessions went ahead, but it went very well and it was evident how much improvement there was. Friday we had all of our sessions cancelled so I joined Paul and Oore in a couple of their school. Workman’s Primary was a very different experience! Tiny area to play in with a lot of kids that just wanted to fight each other. Paul and Oore seemed to handle it very well though. Another session at Foundation Secondary followed.
After the end of the day we went to the Kensington Oval to watch some cricket. Barbados were the home team and were in bat. We saw a few wickets in the time we were there and Paul, of course, had several beers.
Saturday morning I managed to be only 1 minute late picking up Paul on the way to our morning session. That made me roughly 29 minutes early by Bajan standards.
The double club went well with a focus on the Inter-War years and the Second World War. Outside on the pasture we focused on the principles of defending.
As we were in the North of Barbados we decided to carry on north and explore. With Paul navigating, terribly, we took a few wrong turns until I took control of a map. We found a cliff first, which according to Paul’s directions I should have carried on over! We then doubled back on ourselves in search of Harrison’s Point Lighthouse. After driving past a Warning sign we found ourselves in an abandoned and overgrown complex which we eventually realised was an old prison. The road became too overgrown so we left the car and carried on by foot. We found our way to the lighthouse only to find it hadn’t been locked properly. Paul and I decided to go up and proceeded very sheepishly. It was about 100 foot high and took a while to climb at the pace we were going! The final level was up a ladder to the light. Wind was whistling through the broken glass around the top and after taking a few photos and admiring the view we started to head back down. Strangely the descent was not as scary as the ascent and took far less time.
We then headed back to the car, only to have both the Police and Army waiting for us! Seeing camouflage and assault rifles made us quickly aware that perhaps we were not meant to be there. After receiving some friendly advice about where would be nicer to see, we were escorted out and sent on our way. We carried on heading north looking for the most Northerly point. We found it, more by accident than by Paul’s map-reading, and took a walk to the cliff edge. Some very spectacular cliffs and caves and some of the waves even made it above the 60 foot cliffs.
We carried on down the east coast and then back across the hills towards home. As we had a kick-around scheduled for that evening we stopped at a very busy KFC. Whilst waiting for our food a lively debate kicked off between an Arsenal fan and a Barcelona fan about the relative merits of their teams. The scrimmage match that evening was good and we played some of it as an 11-a-side match which was great. I managed 2 goals, thanks to Paul pushing over small female defenders as I bore down on goal.
Sunday was a big day for football. We went to the Beach Bar for Arsenal v Tottenham which was brilliant! After the final whistle we went for a swim where we found a Turtle caught between two rocks by a fishing line. I swam back to the beach bar and borrowed a pair of scissors to free the turtle.
Next up was the Carling Cup final. However for some reason the beach bar was not showing it so we moved elsewhere to watch it. After the penalty shootout we went to the University of the West Indies campus where Yasmin was due to play for my hosts football team. Having been told to get there for 1500, we did. Everyone else didn’t though. They came up to an hour and a bit later. The pitch is a full-sized astro however it plays like being on a rug. It has a stand too, where Paul and I watched the first half. It was a good game which the team won 2-1 despite some interesting ‘refereeing’.
The twins that are hosting Paul invited us out for the evening with them and one of their friends. We went to near the airport where there is a bit of an entertainment complex. First we bowled. Paul took an early lead which i only started to claw back when I realised how to bowl and a spare followed by a strike got me back in contention. It went down to the very last bowl in which I just took the win and the cuddly toy bowling pin as my trophy.
Go karting was next on the agenda. Only one of the twins was brave enough to join Paul and I so we set off as the three of us. After 1 lap the other twin was no longer brave enough and pulled over and got out. This just left the two of us to have an epic duel, with over half the race being within a couple of metres of each other. I took another win here but unfortunately there was no cuddly toy go-kart to be won and so we returned to a rather late bedtime.
After 4 weeks in Barbados we have had over 40 sessions with an average of 18.25 kids at each which has given us a total of 813 attendees.