4) Port of Spain, Trinidad

February 8, 2005

Carnival!

Trinidad & Tobago

(You Tube clip) Carnival pt1

(You Tube clip) Carnival pt2

(You Tube clip) Carnival pt3

            Admittedly Trinidad is not known for the turquoise-blue sea and white sands predominantly marketed in travel brochures.  It is as far away from the Pina Colada Caribbean as you can get in the Caribbean.  Nestled close by the coast of South America, to which they were once joined eons ago, Trinidad and Tobago (pronounced toe-bay-go), also referred to as T & T, geologically remain as exotic as Brazil.  A mere 21 miles separates the two islands of which are daily spanned by plane and ferry.  T & T also possess a very wide ethnic and religious diversity wherein tolerance comes naturally.

            The islands’ first settlers were Arawaks, followed by Caribs.  Trinidad, itself, was Columbus’ name for the island with three hills that he sighted in 1498.  The Spanish settled in Sangre Grande, San Fernando and Port of Spain.  With the evil of slavery abolished in 1833, indentured laborers were brought to Trinidad, predominantly from India.  As African and Indian influences permeated, modern Trinidad was born.  Trinidad and Tobago gained independence from Britain in 1962 and in 1976 declared itself a republic.

            Trinidad money is very similar to US money and appears to imitate it in appearance. They refer to it as TT’s and it means Trinidad & Tobago dollars.  One US dollar equals roughly 6 to 6.3 TT’s.  As with all foreign money it is hard at first to do the exchange rate in your head when you try to pay with US dollars while in Trinidad.  Most things you purchase are reasonable and the US dollar goes far.  The people readily accept US dollars and are very helpful.  Only one place I went to, a restaurant, required you to fill out a form allowing you to pay with US dollars.

            Phones are another interesting topic.  They don’t have coin-operated public payphones so you have to buy a pre-paid phone card.  The cards seem to be in short supply.  The used cards appear to be tossed out the windows of cars as I saw them everywhere.  It’s fairly simple to dial and enter the code from the back of the card after it prompts you.  The prompt even tells you how much time you have left on the card before you start.  There is a local card and an international card.  It’s cheaper to use them for each purpose.

Parties are a serious pastime here and Carnival is the biggest bash of all.  Its energy builds from Christmas onwards as anticipation grips the island.  People party, choose costumes and learn that year’s songs.  Carnival itself bursts forth a rhythmic ‘theatre of the streets’. Imitated in a hundred cities around the world, T & T is the birthplace of Carnival.  Inherent in Carnival celebrations are the musical styles of Calypso and Soca, which are the essence of movement and dance.  Of major prominence is Steelpan, the only new musical instrument invented this century.

If there is a central to Carnival it is Queens Park Savannah.  Most of the dramatic costumes and dance sequences performed for the judges pretty much happen here on the large outdoor stage with bleachers.  After the massive parade makes its way through miles of pre-planned routes throughout the city, at midnight Carnival Tuesday, the festival ends.

(You Tube clip) Pete's pics pt1

            (You Tube clip) Pete's pics pt2

3) Chaguaramas, Trinidad

February 7, 2005

            Pete went traveling into town today and did not make it back until very late.  Joby showed up this afternoon and couldn’t get in the room because Pete had the key and the office, of course, was closed.  Joby hung with us and watched some TV in our room that evening until he fell asleep sitting up in the plastic chair.  He took the cot that was in our kitchen and opened it on the upstairs balcony outside his and Pete’s room.  Luckily, Pete showed around midnight and let Joby in.  The next day Joby said he had gotten lots of mosquito bites.  How’s that for a welcome to the tropics. No concerns, please, he was not cold.

2) Chaguaramas, Trinidad

February 6, 2005

                                                                                                                   

We are in Power Boats boatyard in the town of Chaguaramas on the island of Trinidad (off the northeastern Venezuelan coast) outside the large city Port of Spain which is approximately 61° 31’ W 10° 39’ N and is roughly 600 miles north of the equator. 

Geographically we are 4 hours ahead of California.                     

 

                                                             (You Tube clip)
                                                       Power Boats boat-yard

We are staying in one of four rooms at the end of a boatyard building.  The boat is still on the hard (you can just see the light blue hull to the left in the far distance) and much has to still be done on the boat by the locals.  It’s during Carnival and it seems that the yard has shut down.  So, no work is being done on the boat.

Jeff and I managed to get the dinghy off the boat, mount the motor, paddle to the fuel dock to get gas and miraculously the motor started.  We have transportation!  All the cars were rented on account of Carnival and we have been using cabs and the bus.  We’re about 20 miles away from town where it all happens. 

Since we now have a dinghy we need to park it when we aren’t using it.  We figured this dock area was convenient right outside our front door and we would be the only dinghy there. We didn’t notice the sign until the next day.  No, it is not our private dock so we decided to move to the more congested dinghy dock near the fuel dock.  It takes only a couple minutes to walk there.

For the afternoon Jeff and I sat at a restaurant table on the water and had a beer and some food.

Pete.

Pete showed up in the late afternoon and once again we were at the restaurant having a beer.  We were drinking one of the local brews.

The idea came up to go get some sleep and wake up around 1-2 a.m. local time and go to town.  Why?  Well, one of the main events actually started at 4 a.m. on February 7^th and we were told it was something to see.  It is called ‘Jouvert’ (pronounced joo-vey) and is the official start of the final 2 days of Carnival.

Taxi.

At the boatyard front gate we managed to beg our way into one of three cabs (similar to little Volkswagen buses) that were filled with tourists in semi-costume going to Carnival.

We made it to a part of town where there was a judging booth and bleachers and used that as our starting point.

Here it is 5 a.m. and the streets were filled with thousands of people and blasting music everywhere and vendors and….  In our strolls we found a pizza place and why not.  The picture does not do justice.  It was great!

 

Jeff in the white t-shirt with shirtless Joby.

A flatbed truck filled to the edges as high as it could go with audio equipment

and live bands blasting festive dance music would travel slowly down the parade route followed by hundreds of supporters in costume that were dancing.  You have to see it to believe it.  In the foreground, that’s Jeff on the left with the white T-shirt and Joby in front of him with the green shirt around his waist.

We saw several steel drum bands up close.  These people were awesome.  The sounds generated were an incredible rhythmic work of art.  

We basically wandered the streets with tens of thousands and when the sun came up we started making our way to the bus.

The rumor about people covered in mud is true.  Here is a graphic example of the mud supply.  It is suggested that you don’t wear nice, clean or white clothes for this event.

            This is one of the only locations where all the buses and taxis and people collect.  In the background the sun is rising.  We witnessed thousands of people participate in this early morning event.

1) Chaguaramas, Trinidad

February 5, 2005

…And it begins. The 7 a.m. flight out of SFO was uneventful.  The interesting stuff only occurred when slight turbulence reared its ugly head.  In my eyes the bumps were small and an accepted part of flying.  But, in the eyes of the woman next to me there were not enough prayers to say or enough arm rests to dig into with her hands.  Yes, I flew for 5 hours with a terrified passenger next to me. In broken English she apologized while on short final into Miami.

During this flight I looked out the window as all pilots do.  I was lucky to look out just as traffic was passing perpendicular behind us.  The plane was clearly a business jet maybe 1000’ below us producing a beautiful contrail as a result of flying at approximately 35,000 feet.  How do I know these details?  This business jet was so close to us I thought I was in a general aviation airplane in the traffic pattern.  I still love flying.

I had an hour between landing and my connecting flight to Port of Spain, Trinidad and participated in the walking tour of the Miami airport.  All of us that have ever traveled by air know well that airports are designed with plenty of ‘under construction’ billboards to help you along.  It’s a pleasure to see all the endless corridors with no windows that lead you to escalators that turn you the opposite direction of where you need to go.  Once you get to the top of the escalator there is always another corridor that sends you to your gate area.  This time my gate was almost the last gate at the end of this wing.  I navigated around many obstacles.  Is it a law to stand in the way of people carrying luggage? 

The sun began to set around 3 p.m. California time according to my watch.  We were about halfway across the Caribbean on my way to the island of Trinidad when I realized that things were changing.  Once close to Trinidad we entered a fifteen-minute holding pattern.  It was 9 0’clock at night local time and there were so many people coming in, it was stacked-up. Did I mention that ‘Carnival’ was almost here?  Holding pattern means lots and lots of people going through customs and almost one hour of waiting in line.  Port of Spain baggage claim supplies free carts and that almost made up for the wait.

A taxi had been arranged outside for me.  The driver was to have a sign with the boat name Laetitia and my name.  But, I had to get out of baggage first.  It was going so well after I got out of customs.  I found the free carts and my only checked bag and the correct line to get out of baggage claim.  I was about 4^th in line when in front of me the yelling began.  And I mean the yelling.  It was all coming from a nicely dressed fairly large black man with a heavy accent accusing the security guard of assault for touching him.  The room stopped.  The yelling continued about ‘I want to see the supervisor’ or something like this.  He seemed to calm down when a plain-clothes police officer approached him and flashed a badge.  Hmmm, where am I?

Okay, walking out the door of the airport, hundreds and hundreds of people, car exhaust, cigarette smoke, noise, horns, the hot blast of humid nighttime heat and tucked in the corner of a roped area was my name on a sign.  Lucky?  Yes.

The driver’s name is Sterling.  He drives fast and slow.  He talks fast and slow and really loud.  He had to make sure that the guy in back and I were able to hear him over the noise coming in the open windows.  The wheel is on the right and they drive on the left.  Leaving the airport he pointed out five 50’ tall steel and wire and rebar statues that represent the characters of ‘Carnival’ for the tourists.  This is when the audio portion of the tour began.  He was very animated and entertaining.  He showed us everything he could.  He was polite enough to ask if he was talking too fast.

He asked if we liked beer.  Can you believe my luck?  He offered us a beer on him. Earlier at the airport I saw a passenger drinking a beer in the car and thought… Anyway, I was pretty uncomfortable going into a bar in a foreign country with my luggage in the car and he said “no-no-no don’t worry I go in and get it and we drive”.  Apparently it’s ok for everybody in the car to drink except the driver.  But, the driver can drink as long as he doesn’t weave and draw attention to himself.  Sterling doesn’t like empties in the car so he just pulls over and tells me to drop the bottles on the side of the road.  I said hold on here I don’t want to litter.  He said it’s ok. Everybody does it and some one comes along everyday and picks the empties up and turns them in for money.  Someone actually did this with so much success that he built two houses, has a family and now has locals that do the work for him.

The traffic was really heavy and we stopped for another beer. Did I mention that I liked Trinidad so far?

We finally made it to the place where I was going to stay.  A marina in Chaguaramas named Power Boats is where the boat is and has four rooms for rent.  The room is small with 2 beds, air-conditioning, refrigerator and a two-channel TV.  My watch said 7:30 p.m. California time and it was really 11:30 p.m. local time.  Jeff, the owner of the boat, and I went walking to find some food.  We have no car because all of them are rented on account of ‘Carnival’.  The restaurants were closed because it was late.  I ate a granola bar.

Blog Guide: Start Here

S/V Chasch Mer 2007 Transpac crew
front row: Don, Mark, Dave, Ron, Eric
back row: John, Wayne, Peter, Brian, Gib.

This blog is exclusively about my sailing experiences.  

In order to get a better understanding of the content it is best to start at the first entry of each sailing trip.

These are the individual starting points:

* February 5, 2005 : Chaguaramas, Trinidad 

* October 23, 2005 : Frankfurt, Germany (Fiumicino, Italy to Colon, Panama)

  101 days, 6,388 miles

* July 21, 2008 : Rarotonga, Cook Islands to Brisbane, Australia

  72 days, 3,924 miles

* August 15, 2010 : Santa Cruz 50 delivery & TransPac 2011

  17 days, 2,529 miles

* October 24, 2010 : San Diego to Cabo San Lucas (Baja Ha-Ha 17)

 

- Under Construction-  

 

* September 2001 : S/V Learjet Alameda, CA to Cabo San Lucas (Baja Ha-Ha)

* June 2002 : S/V Learjet Cabo San Lucas to Alameda, CA (delivery)

* June 2006 : S/V Leinetar Seattle, WA to Brisbane, CA (delivery)

* October 2006 : S/V Sea Breeze San Diego, CA to Cabo San Lucas (Baja Ha-Ha)

* March 2007 : S/V Chasch Mer Oahu to Maui (round-trip) 

* July 2007 : S/V Chasch Mer Long Beach, CA to Oahu (Transpac 12 days 2,260 miles)

* March 2009 : S/V Mighty Tongaroa Newport, CA to Avalon (round-trip) 

* April 2009 : S/V Narrow Escape Oceanside, CA to Newport to San Diego (Border Run Race)

* October 2012 : S/V Indiscretion Marina Coral, Ensenada, Baja, CA, Sur to Cabo San Lucas (Baja Ha-Ha)

* April 2013 : S/V Duende Alamitos Bay, CA to Oahu (delivery)

* July 2013 : S/V Chasch Mer Long Beach, CA to Oahu (Transpac)

* March 2015 : S/V B'Quest Long Beach to San Diego (Islands Race)

* February 2017 : S/V Cobane St Lucia to Mustique (round-trip charter/cruise)

* April 2018 : S/V Iconoclast St Martin to Cartagena, Columbia (delivery)    

     

Where it all began...

One day in the spring of 2000 I woke up in Baja, CA, without a hangover and had an epiphany.  I realized I wanted to learn how to sail.  I had previous power-boat experience of the water skiing and dive boat variety and had no idea of the rivalry between sailboats and powerboats.

As an active private pilot I thought aerodynamics and fluid dynamics were pretty close in nature and jumping mediums would be an easy transition.  With what I know now I would suggest to anyone setting out on this path to reassess and check your notes.  But, that is not to say don’t try.  After all, Charles Dickens once penned, “It is a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done.…”

My introduction to the world of high-performance off-shore sailing was part luck and part not knowing any better.  Soon after I learned to sail at a sailing school that used the San Francisco Bay as its lesson ground I put my name on a crew list hoping to get free rides.  Because, if the sailing school said I knew how to sail then I must know, right?

S/V Learjet 2001 Baja HaHa (I'm sitting the furthest forward of the mast on the rail)

One of the first and probably the first offer I received was to crew S/V Learjet, a 56’ Nelson-Marek, in an October rally from San Diego to Cabo San Lucas called the Baja Ha-Ha.  The phone interview went well and we agreed the next step was to go sailing on the bay so the potential crew could meet and learn the boat.  Many practice sails later with lots of crew making their way across the deck resulted in a small group of us willing, committed and accepted by the owner to participate in the trip. This specific trip was also to be a shakedown for a much longer trip to the South Pacific where this boat was eventually headed.

It was on this boat that I first heard about Santa Cruz 50s.  For many months I volunteered to work on the boat and help prepare it for long-distance sailing.  From the owner I learned that he considered only two boats to choose from and it was either an SC50 or this specific Nelson-Marek.  It was a combination of value for the money and what was available at the time.  This hull is comparable in design and has many of the same performance characteristics as an SC50.

I managed to crew this boat from San Francisco to Cabo San Lucas and back.  It was during this time that I got a crash course in long-distance offshore sailing on a high-performance sailboat.  Any of those items would be enough for a lesson to be learned and I was lucky enough to get it all at once.  Having no experience in this area it made all the difference to have several others on board with exemplary skills.  It is with their talent that gratitude from me goes their way.  There are times during a passage where the mundane and simple conditions prevail and then there are times when you get your money’s worth out of someone that has been there before and done that.  It is the skills acquired from experience that make the difference in the outcome.

S/V Learjet racing in Mexico