Trinidad & Tobago: A weekend in Tobago

March 30th was 'Shouter Baptist Liberation Day' here in Trinidad, a holiday which commemorates the day when the British allowed Shouter Baptists to freely practice their religion.

To make the most of the occasion i also took the 31st (a Friday) as a holiday and booked a flight over to Tobago.

My flight arrived early in the morning on Thursday and I ended up catching a swim and a snooze on Store Bay near the airport before heading further east on the island. I grabbed a car to Scarborough, where i bought a bus ticket to Charlotteville.

At the terminal, I asked the driver if the bus waiting there was in fact the bus to Charolotteville, to which he growled 'I told you dat already!'. Somewhat bewildered, I hopped on the bus and met Max and Kyla from California who were heading to Argyle Falls for a cooldown fête. As the bus rattled down the windward coast road we chatted and generally hit it off. they invited me to the fete and i figured why not and hopped off the bus with them at Roxborough.

We arrived in the mid-afternoon and the sound system was already thumping at maximum volume despite the lack of audience. We carried on past the stage to the falls themselves - a beautiful tropical waterfall consisting of three distinct ledges with various pools for wading.

Afterwards we joined in the festivities and were treated to performances by various calypso artists, including Squeezy (sp?) whose photo you can see below. (btw, is it possible that he named himself after the liquid dish soap of the same name that is so popular in T&T?) We decided that we would return to Max and Kyla's guesthouse to clean up, have a rest and return, however we were held captive by the promise of a wet t-shirt contest. Of course Max and I thought that this would be an event not to be missed due to the profound insight it would provide into the Trinibagonian collective psyche, but much to our dismay a lack of willing competitors precluded the much anticipated event. instead we were treated to another cultural institution - five men competing to be the first to drink two beers with a straw. As you might imagine, much quarelling ensued with allegations that the winner had in fact left a considerable amount of foam in his last bottle...

We managed to stay long enough to get down to the great tunes being spun by the attention deficit affected DJ (30 seconds per track is really all you need to hear, isn't it?) before we dragged our tired bodies back to Roxborough. Max and Kyla very kindly offered me the spare bed for the night as I was a bit uncertain about how easy it would be to continue on to Charlotteville that night.

the next morning i said goodbye to max and kyla and made my way to charlotteville where I checked into Moore's. after a quick dip in the sea i was settling into a book on my balcony when to my surprise max and kyla showed up. they had decided to check out things in charlotteville and would end up spending the next couple of nights there. of course i was happy to see them because not only were they fun to hang out with, i also had someone to put sunscreen on my back...

we spent the next couple of days goofing around on the beach and snorkelling in the day and liming by night. a deep sea fishing competition was happening in town, which meant plenty of beer-bellied american (sorry...) fisher-types wandering about drunk at night bragging about the fish they had caught and their position in the contest. perhaps even more amusing was the continuous sound-system blasting the oft empty center square from 9 in the morning until late at night.

upon my return to port-of-spain, max and kyla joined me for a couple of great evenings before they returned to venezuela. they introduced me to harry's punch stand and i introduced them to the music of my friend mark. it was great to have met such kind and generous people - perhaps our paths will cross at some point in the future...