The best beach bar in the world?

26th October 2024

There must be thousands of contenders for this high accolade, even if I’ve only been to half of them. If you include seaside pubs, the numbers rise higher still. Well, we’ve both long had a soft spot for the place where we had lunch today. I proudly present:

Our first ever visit in 2002 was mainly memorable for the sight of my brother-in-law Pete shaking his booty on the dancefloor with Miss Barbados 1978, and we’ve been regular visitors since. Like most places, the Carib has had its ups and downs over the years. It even closed for a while. Good to report that it’s back to form, and today we thoroughly enjoyed having the opportunity to express (in the form of a modest lunch, a few rum sours and one mojito) the smallest of thanks to our amazing immediate support network here. Take a bow Anne, Rachel, Tara and Mike. Without you we’d have been lost over the last month. We can only apologise that every time we meet it’s like heavy group therapy. Well, it’s working for us at least. We can’t thank you enough.

Back to the topic of the Carib, alongside familiar bar food its menu features local favourites like Bajan fish cakes – and souse. This is an interesting one. It tastes far better than it reads: traditionally pig’s head and trotters, pickled. I’m told today’s version was made from pork chops. The original recipe was clearly meant to salvage every possible edible part of the animal – rather like haggis in Scotland, whose main ingredient is lambs’ lungs. Sounds awful, tastes delicious. Souse is served with ‘pudding’ – in Barbados, benign steamed sweet potato. Trinidadians are clearly hardcore – their pudding is made of blood!

To finish on a lighter note, a couple of snaps taken this afternoon from the bar in its lovely setting on the south coast. Happy weekend everyone 😎 🇧🇧