How do you celebrate Christmas if you’re a yachtie, far from home? We had loosely planned something involving a swim, a large tin of confit’d duck thighs, Christmas pudding and champagne, rounded off with rum punches in a very relaxed beach-side shack. But no, we were thwarted … in the best possible way.
Two days earlier, two slightly scruffy yachties had scrubbed up the best they could and presented themselves at the extremely colonial Barbados Yacht Club. Along with four Christmas cards we picked up … a lunch invitation for the 25th, all formally written on stiff card. The writing was familiar, if a little hard to read – was it a joke, to make us realise what we were missing? We looked at the invitation again – there was a Barbados address in the bottom left hand corner. We hardly dared believe it, but the truth suddenly dawned – two much-loved friends had decided to take their winter holiday in Barbados, to join us. I don’t expect the staff of the BYC are used to their guests getting all emotional when they collect their post, it’s not that sort of place – anyway, I sniffed, blew my nose, and rushed off to the phone to accept.
What a lovely day we had. We started off with stockings in the cockpit, with all the things that our resourceful friends and family had managed to have delivered to us, from new books to waterproof mascara. We put on our smartest shorts for the service at the Episcopalian cathedral, feeling very under-dressed compared to the Bajans in their sparkly ball gowns, and sharpest suits. Then to the Queen’s Park to hear the police band play, and to admire the state of the cricket pitch wicket. We found a taxi to take us up to our friends’ apartment to a wonderfully warm welcome, hot showers – and a washing machine at our disposal!
They had scoured the shops to find the components of a proper English Christmas, with everything from sprouts to crackers, gravy to brandy butter. And even a large collection of Braeburns, which we had been longing for ever since eating the last piece of fresh fruit, a few days out from Cape Verde. And, which we devoured almost as ravenously, English papers, not seen since La Gomera, in mid November.
Thank you both for a wonderful, totally unexpected treat, and for making our Christmas unforgettable.
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