Documenting Cemeteries on Boxing Day in Antigua

Antigua is not a tender port, so we had a nice breakfast in the dining room and then proceeded to get off the ship. We have been to Antigua twice - the first time we went to the usual places that people go to - Nelson's Dockyard and Shirley Heights. The second time we did a helicopter tour to Montserat. So I didn't need the usual tour. I had an email exchange with a guy in Colorado who comes to Antigua often. He had given me a list of cemeteries that could use some work, and I had written them down on the Antigua handout.

Pacific Princess

We went out to the taxi drivers place, and I said to the guy with a clipboard that I didn't want the usual tour, that I wanted to go to these four places. So they talked among themselves and looked at the list and then one of the guys who I think was named Joseph, said he would do that for $200.00. We got into his van. I was struggling to get into the front seat. I had my foot up on the step and was trying to get momentum up to get up into the seat. The van driver grabbed me by the hips and boosted me into the seat. It was surprising but effective.

Driving through the streets of St Johns

Stop lights

Creche at the end of the street

We started out for the cemeteries. He said it would be best to go to the St John Public Cemetery first in case there were funerals later.

St John's Public Cemetery gate

So we did and Bob and I took about 180 photos. Bob said he had to be careful not to fall into a grave,

St. John's Public Cemetery graves

but I was on the "road" on the scooter so I didn't have that problem.

St John's Public Cemetery road inside the cemetery

He not only took us to the four that I had on my list (two of which were new for FindAGrave), but he also showed us four more that were not even on my list. We drove out along the north side of the island.

Farm fields

To an area called Bethesda where there was a Donkey Sanctuary. Our driver said the sanctuary was to keep the donkeys off the road.

Welcome to Bethesda - Donkey Sanctuary

The first cemetery we saw was the

Bethesda-Christian Hill Cemetery

which is between the communities of Bethesda and Christian Hill. We didn't stop to take photos. Then we went to the Newfield Enon Moravian Church which my friend had told me about.

Moravian church

We stopped here and got out and Bob took about 30 photos of all the graves in the cemetery.

The above are a sample of the photos he took. We drove by the

Liberta Village Cemetery

but we did not stop here. We drove by a whole field of solar panels and the taxi driver said that the island was trying to use more renewable energy. Apparently this field of solar panels was built and commissioned by PV Energy, is now the largest solar installation in the state.

Part of the Solar panel field

We bypassed English Harbour and drove briefly through the parking lot of

St. Barnabas Anglican Church

This is a historic church located in Liberta which was originally built between 1824 and 1842 as a Chapel school. It is one of the most photographed buildings in Antigua because it is built of a uniquely Antiguan basaltic green stone.

We saw this church for the first time on a previous visit. It doesn't have a cemetery associated with it.

St Barnabas from 2007

My friend had told me about

Our Lady of the Valley Anglican Church

but while it looked interesting, I decided not to stop there for photos as it had already been entered on the website. We went to the Swetes area where our guide showed us the catholic church cemetery

Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Cemetery in Swetes. The sign says "This is a burial ground. Please do not throw garbage"

The gate was locked, so we didn't go in but just took photos from outside the fence.
Then we visit a cemetery in the John Hughes district which was somewhat barren and rocky.

Bob in John Hughes Cemetery

Bob took photos of all the stones.

Above is a sampling of the photos. From here we drove through the

Jungle

and then along the coast

Montserat in the distance

Sea and cliff

Walking on the beach

Water toys

Down to an area called Old Road to the

Old Road Wesleyan Holiness Church Cemetery

This was our last cemetery and we then drove back to town

St John's

We got back to the ship about 12:30, and I decided that I would go swimming. So I went swimming while Bob had lunch in the buffet. Then I had some ice cream. There is no place in this room to hang something to dry. There's no line in the shower like in most ships.

Two Royal Caribbean ships at the dock

As I was working on the photos and with the GPS locations etc, another ship came in on the other side of the pier. The next pier over had two RCCI ships - the one on this side was Serenade of the Seas but I couldn't see the name of the other one. The ship that came in next to us was a Costa ship- we were on the dock side so we could see it come in (although I didn't take any photos). When we went up to trivia, Laurie said that people were coming back to the ship, and trying to get on the wrong one. She said she had been at a port with 9 ships in port that day and there were 4 Princess ships - the Princess ships were every other one, and they had all hands escorting people to the correct ship as passengers couldn't figure out which Princess ship they were on.

Again I had the correct answer to the question but didn't insist - it was what sea animal, when stressed, will start to eat it self, and it was the octopus. But one of the groups got 15.5 because one of the questions was to give the scientific name of a goldfish and they got half of the name correct.

At dinner Bob stuck to the Apple soup, and his salmon and ice cream and he had no trouble eating that. I had the surf and turf (shrimp and steak)

Surf and Turf

in addition to the chilled Granny Smith and cider soup. They no longer give straws with the soup (being politically correct because of the straw thing) although they still serve it in glasses. Then I had the chocolate mousse cake, which was a little bit dry.

Sugar-Free Milk Chocolate Mousse Cake

We are in Guadeloupe Ilse de Saintes tomorrow - another tender port.