Our arrival in Barbados was delayed by some four hours due to a problem with the charter flight which was fortunate because it meant we could watch England’s last qualifying match against Slovenia. A tense affair with England playing marginally better than they have so far in this World Cup and just doing enough to qualify.

A visit to the coin operated laundry before leaving St Kitts would mean another session of ironing today which I was not looking forward to with relish and have now just completed. I would really like to know who the clever individual is that invented such a thing as a pleat in the back of a shirt and have sworn that I will never take long sleeved shirts on tour again!!

Last night, however, was awesome. Once again we were invited to the Digicel welcome party which was held in an aeroplane hanger next to the airport inside which was Concorde. Although no longer in service, we were able to board the aircraft and experience a little of what it would have been like to have flown in this extraordinary plane. The seats were comfortable although not luxurious. There is no first or business class but they tell me that the catering was of a very high standard with champagne and drinks complimentary on all flights. The whole idea was merely to get to the final destination as quickly as possible. The flight time from London to New York was just 3 hours and from London to Barbados was four hours (a nine hour flight these days). The cost of flying from London to Barbados return was US$10,000. The party was a lively one with local musicians and dancing girls entertaining the guests. All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable evening with a very different theme.

The Accra Beach Hotel in Barbados is very nice indeed. The balcony of my room on the third floor overlooks the sea to the left and the swimming pool to the right. The pool has two features one of which is a rock formation with a cave at the bottom and water cascading down like a waterfall across the entrance to the cave. The other feature is the pool bar (much more important to most of us) two thirds of which protrudes into the pool with underwater seats that the swimmers sit at sipping on their margarita’s and rum punches. In my heyday I could have thrown a cricket ball from my balcony into the sea and I can almost reach out and touch the top of the palm tree growing outside my room. The hotel is built in the shape of horse shoe around the pool with the beach making up the empty side so to speak. I think I’m going to like it here.

As far as the cricket is concerned we are all hoping that the Barbados pitch provides a lot more entertainment than the flat, lifeless surface that the bowlers toiled manfully on in St Kitts.