The original name for the island was actual St Christopher’s Island, but a common shortening of Christopher was Kitt, so in the 17th Century it evolved into St Kitts Island, or just St Kitts.

Like a lot of the other Caribbean islands, sugar was grown in plantations and on St Kitts, a train line was built in 1912 to take the cane to a central processing plant.

The sugar industry took a huge hit when the price dropped when the world turned to beets and the railway was in decline by the late 1920s. It was resurrected in 2003 as a tourist attraction.

The remnants of windmills used to split the sugar cane are dotted around the island. The train winds its way half way around the island pottering along at 10mph. Fast enough to navigate the slight inclines, but slow enough to allow goats and cows to get out of the way.

The tour guide was Patricia (but you can call me Sweet-P) and she kept up a running commentary of everything visible from the train, including the island’s junkyard. A rare tour indeed where the guide lists all the garbage she can see: “refrigerators, containers, machinery” all in that languid Caribbean drawl.

Monkeys! Ange actually saw them first, bounding away in front of the train along the rails. She actually thought that they were rabbits at first. Then they cut left and headed out over the fields. The farmers on St Vincent have to deal with snakes and monkeys, making for some interesting hazards!

Dancers in traditional costumes joined each carriage to demonstrate some of the islands dances. We’d seen them making their way through the other carriages, and the second time through a couple of the kids got up and attempted to learn the dance.

There are four bridges on the route, and this was the most scenic.

While we crossed over the road four times, we crossed it more often than that. The cars waited patiently and after the second or third crossing I noticed that the barriers were manual and were being operated by the same guy in the cream SUV.

He would drive along ahead, block the road until we’d passed and then jump back into his car to go to the next stop. Waiting there until we caught back up and repeat the whole thing all over again. It took two hours to get to the EcoPark and then two hours back so four hours of nurse-maiding the train through the roads.

The route finished at the St Kitts EcoPark, where we decamped to complete the circuit of the island by mini bus and the other group took our places on the train for the return trip. After returning to the ship and leaving Basseterre, we headed to Philipsburg on the Dutch side of Sint Maarten.

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As the world began to get back to normal after Covid, we decided to have a look at some of the islands of the Caribbean, leaving the port of Bridgetown in Barbados on the Grandeur of the Seas.

Checking in required us to travel 200m by bus from the terminal to the testing facility where we had to do a lateral flow Covid test and then wait for the results.

There was supposed to be Wi-Fi so that we could get the email regarding the test results, but it was a little patchy so we ended up going up to the desk after 25 minutes and they pulled up our results, allowing us to proceed.

The Grandeur of the Seas was just outside the testing station, tantalisingly close while we were waiting for the results…

And then we were allowed on board. Our room cards were in an envelope on the door. Our cabin was the cheapest they had: on the second floor, with no windows. The mirrors were partly to make the room appear larger!

Having said that, the room did have a couch. Which was the perfect size for Ange.

My favourite was Channel 3 which featured a feed from the camera on the bridge looking out over the front right of the ship. Handy for figuring out whether we’d docked yet. The feed rotated through maps of where we were including such data as our depth, course, speed, time of sunrise and sunset etc.

There was a compulsory safety briefing which meant we had to go up to our muster station and check in.

But that was it – time to explore the ship! The top level featured a running track.

A big screen TV for watching movies. Sounds great. But the soundtrack for the movies would cut out randomly for 30-60 seconds every 5-10 minutes, replaced with random music. Nothing ruins immersion quicker!

The view down to the Windjammer buffet restaurant.

The Solarium was an adults only area under glass with a deep pool (and lifeguard) and two Jacuzzis.

The main restaurant was Art Deco’s finest Great Gatsby.

The Centrum was a central atrium with live music at the base of the elevators. Which was a terrible design as the Customer Service desk, Next Cruise desk and Excursions desks were all on the fifth floor, so the music drowned out any attempts at communications.

A climbing wall was at the stern of the ship. Looking down from the top would be 200ft from the water’s surface.

There was a slight shifting of our destinations due to Covid but we ended up going to:

Kingstown in St Vincent and the Grenadines

Basseterre in St Kitts and Nevis

Philipsburg in Sint Maarten

St John’s in Antigua

St George’s in Grenada

before returning to Bridgetown in Barbados.

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