Barbados- Almond Beach Resort

To celebrate our fifteen year anniversary, we decided we would like to go back to Barbados and stay a week this time. Ben's mom was kind enough to fly out to stay with the kids so we could head off. 

The resort was beautiful, and we were sad to learn that it has been purchased and will be completely demolished in April. I'm glad we got a chance to stay there, though I'm sure it will be lovely again once it's rebuilt. 

We had a grand time wandering around and exploring. It is beautiful. 

We called this little lizard JoAnna. She was always hanging around outside our balcony door. She may have been more than one lizard, but we didn't pay that close of attention. 

The view from our room. The best part was being so close to the beach. I like listening to the waves crashing, but it may have kept Ben up at night a few times. 

There are several different pools and we tried them all out except for the kiddie pool. No sense being surrounded by kids when we left our own behind. Ben still played with kids in the main pool because he can't help himself. He also made friends with a few guys from a cricket team that was staying in the hotel for a tournament. He learned a lot about cricket. 

I did some swimming, but mostly just liked laying around by the pool. 

There weren't many people at Almond Beach that were our age, so it was nice to feel young. The couples that were our age all had little kids with them, so we mostly met older folks. 

There were 3 restaurants at the hotel, so we took turns eating in all of them. Ben liked Horizons because it was a buffet. I liked Enid's but Ben never got dessert that he liked there. All of the staff was nice and Ben made friends with all of them. We went over to a sister resort one night, and their restaurant was better than all of them. Ben kept wanting to find spicy food. 

We only saw these flowers open at night. I still can't figure that out. 

We stayed in Pringles village and had a wonderful time there. We were right above Tommy's bar and Enid's restaurant which was convenient. We were still 20 minutes late for dinner one night somehow. 

The breakfast food was my favorite. 

This pool was rarely used, probably because it is right outside one of the restaurants. I thought it was rather nice to have it to ourselves and everyone eating lunch. 

Stray cats hung out in all 3 restaurants. I called this one Smoky. 

These trees that have a red band painted around them are poisonous. It is not advised to stand under them when it rains, or to touch the fruit at all. Of course there are several spots on the beach just covered with the fruit, but we had no problem avoiding it. 

The walk into Speightstown is gorgeous and took just a few minutes. We went there several times. Ben met a guy at the grocery store named Eddie who owned 7 or 8 stores in the town. We talked to him for quite a while and learned lots of interesting things. 

I called this kitty Peanut, and admit that I did feed him some bacon one morning. He was looking at me with sad eyes! He was usually in the same place as a black cat I called Inky, but I don't have a picture of her. 

The beach was pretty rough a couple days, so that was why we hung out by the pool so much. Every time it was nice out, we headed straight to the beach though. 

Ben kept trying to pick up these little crabs, but would get scared. They were less scary during the day, but he still screamed and ran away. 

It was fun to see monkeys just hanging around. I tried to follow this guy, but he snuck away. 

Monkeys on the golf course. They were a cute family!

Ben swam with money in his pocket, so I made him blow dry it out. It was silly. 

I only saw this cat one time, but called him Lynx.

Fresh coconut! Ben's gardener friend hunted him down to make sure he tried one. 

 Ben made friends with Steven, who owns an anime shop. We really enjoyed talking to him. The last night we were there, his band performed in the lounge, and it was the best music of the week. Lots of 90s. Some of the older people seemed to not enjoy it as much, especially when they started doing George Michael songs in grunge style. We had a good time. 

 I wish we were back there relaxing!