Paria Suites and Conference Centre Trinidad

I decided to take advantage of my paid vacation and spend two weeks in Trinidad and Tobago. My good friend Kevin Fortune, who I met in college, is from Trinidad and was a phenomenal tour guide. I stayed away from computers, cell phones and any reading materials related to the economy and/or the environment.

... Yesterday, after court, the police managed to find us accommodation in the town where you can see the leatherback turtles for a third of the usual place and get us a tour for free. We also got free food next to the courtroom. We've worked out that we've actually saved alot of money by being robbed! At night we saw the leatherbacks coming out of the water in their hundreds. We saw them laying eggs and disguising their nests. We touched and ...

... if yuh nickname is "T'ick T'ing". Some of the Bands were nothing more than a huge moving party. The individual groups (some many thousand) were roped off and within those groups, several semi trucks rolled slowly along providing ear-splitting music, rolling porta-potties, bars and mist showers to cool a body off. We were glad once again for the ear plugs and shaded seats. When we visit new islands, I like to find out what the local cuisine features. In Trinidad we ...

... and DJ's - blasting music and most important a truck that has porta potties. The music is so loud - everyone wears ear plugs. Check out some of the pictures of the costumes.

Another event is the steel drum contest. Imagine over 100 steel drums playing at one time. The contest consists of neighborhood steel drum bands, each with at least 100 players playing an original selection. It is awesome!

... Female said "We deserve some respect here." Don't the new people deserve respect too, since, afterall, they are human beings too? Calling someone "it" is not respect. Forbidding someone to show emotion is not respect. Making the new kids stand for hours with their hands behind their backs while the crowd of milnerites laugh at their own inside jokes for a ridiculous amount of time is not respect. I think of myself as a pretty strong person. I can take ...

... het water. Het is tegen tienen als we de smalle ingang naar Chaquaramas binnenvaren. En dan wordt het toch nog spannend. Er staat enorm veel stroming, terwijl aan beide kanten de rotspunten uit het water steken. De roerganger heeft alle moeite de boot op koers te houden. Net zo snel als het begon is het ook weer opgehouden. We varen voor de nacht Scotland Bay binnen: een prachtige smalle baai, tussen hoge rotsen. Het is hier wel drukker dan op ...

... we managed to put in a honest days work of anti fouling. By hanging the centre board inside a near by tent thing, i could keep painting coat after coat onto it with out too many interruptions while the rest of the force gave Sparrows bottom second and third coats, as well as brand new coats where the stands had been. Sparrow has tuned out looking very smart if I may say so with her racing green top sides and black bottom. she really looks like ...

... got to Trinidad (after another flight delay of about an hour and a half) on Saturday and stayed out at Maracas Bay. Its a really nice spot, with palm trees by the beach and moutains with jungle vegetation complete with cloud mist at the tops. Quite the scenic place. We then travelled to Port of Spain on Sunday morning to get the ferry to Tobago. The port ran like a well oiled machine, and by well oiled machine I mean a pig circus! We were lucky to get ...

... was pirate territory so the last leg of the journey was fun. However, we are here, safe, in one piece, and going out tonight for our leaving the boat do. We sailed about 350 miles, over three weeks and visited six caribbean islands. We made two really great american friends. Joel, who reminds of us our friend Chris R, very funny guy, always laughing and having fun. Brittany, who reminds us of Chris's girlfriend Lucy H, also very ...

... lift. On the ride home, Tony's head got heavy, and leaned in my direction and passed out. I felt bad for exposing the poor driver to Tony, so I offered him money for the ride. He refused. Standing once again with me on a city sidewalk, Tony reasoned that if I was going to give money to the driver, I could give it to him. "Here, give me the money," he said. (What he meant by this was: "Won't you support my drug habit?") I gave TT$5 so he could return to his part of ...