When we booked this trip we decided to try something different with our flights. Instead of doing one huge long haul from Edmonton to Toronto to Barbados, and the same coming home, we broke it up and stayed overnight in Toronto. This gave us two 4 – 5 hour flights with a sleep in between. I liked this as I am not so jet lagged and not so tired. There was less stress in Toronto as we didn’t have to make a tight connection. I would recommend doing this if you have an extra couple of days. It cost a couple of nights in an airport hotel, but I think it was worth the price.
Some random thoughts…….
The Barbados dive boat helper, M, drove us home after we dove and was telling us about Barbados on the way. We drove by what was once a McDonald’s and he told us that McDonald’s tried to make a go of it there but did not succeed. M said that McDonald’s only sold hamburgers and that the people on the island like chicken! That explains alot of the food on Dominica too. Chicken was a prominent item on all menus and the grocery stores carried lots of chicken and almost no burger. Guess there isn’t much grazing land on the islands.
Apparently, Barbados is out of the hurricane belt of the Caribbean. When looking at a map, the island is out in the Atlantic compared to the other islands. Our airport taxi driver was telling us the last big storm to hit Barbados was in the 1950’s. So it sounds like the island may be a good destination for a fall trip when the other Caribbean islands are on hurricane watch.
Don’t tell anyone, but we checked our bags on the way home. Murray has a Westjet Elite Mastercard and with that card we each get one free checked bag. We will not check bags going somewhere as we want the bags to arrive with us, but we decided to check them coming home. It was nice not having to deal with the rollie bags when boarding the plane but it was slightly annoying having to wait for the bags to show up on the carousel. Give and take, I guess.
When we checked our bags, they got weighed and we realized they were a little heavier than we thought, so we are going to reevaluate what we are carrying and hopefully shave a few pounds out of the bags.