Staying true to my mission, I chilled and do some reading until about noon when I decided to motor into Charlestown for lunch and a walk around. A native had told me there wasn't much to see in Charlestown, but me, I'm always suspicious that natives talk down their towns.
As I was parking my scooter, a boy in his school uniform, came up to ask me about it. Clearly an afficiando, he even wanted to hear the engine. I obliged him and then asked him if he was done with school for the day. No, just a break for lunch, which reminded me to ask him where he would recommend for lunch.
He was happy to show me a place and scampered past the line to the ferry to the old cotton gin, up the stairs and all the way to the back. Here I got another Carib lunch of pork in a sort of bbq sauce, rice and "peas", pasta salad and a pale tomato slice on iceberg lettuce that was trying to pass for salad. It was not the Octagon. The meat was mostly fat, few pigeon peas in the rice, very little pasta salads and the ""green" salad. But the home made ginger beer--there we had a hit.
From there I started to walk down the main street to check out the shops. I had to stop a few times in the shade. Before I knew it, I was back to the Best Buy market. I went in and swooped up the last three packages of the Shirley ginger biscuits I discovered.
I headed back to the center of town on the other side of the street. It's a charming looking town but there really isn't much there. The shops had cheap clothing and shoes from China that were made for people about five inches shorter than me and 75 pounds lighter.
I did pop in the drug store to get some antibacterial cream because my alt-mom Liz told me to. Then I took some photos of a few churches but none were open for viewing inside. I also found a marker to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the docking of the theee ships headed to Jamestown in 1607. It seems a circurtuous route until you look at the map and consider the wind patterns.
I think I found the old slave auction area but it was not marked nor was it maintained. If I was a local who was of African descent, I might want it to fall into complete disrepair.
I returned to "my" bakery for more cinnamon rolls and the cotton gin restaurant for two more bottles of that ginger beer. I went down the back stairs and discovers two shops. I bought a turtle windchime at one and some guava jam. The other had mostly tourist crap, but I did get some postcards and a magnet.
Then it was back towards the hotel to find "LoversBeach". I turned off on a dirt road that I hoped would bring me there and it did! Lovely spot and very few people there. I found a place on the shade for my stuff and then went for a swim in the azure waters. Gorgeous!
It was back up to the hotel for the night from there where I had another swim in the pool, a rum cocktail, and dinner before turning in.
Comments