Caribbean Soulmates: Trinidad And Tobago

Story and Photography by Eric Anderson

The island nation of Trinidad & Tobago is about as far down the Caribbean chain you can drag without dropping into Venezuela -- at one point that country is only seven miles away.

They are unlikely soul mates: little Tobago on whose 26 by 7 miles 50,000 souls enjoy essentially the unspoiled Caribbean life of the 1950s, and Trinidad, measuring 50 miles by 37 miles, with a population of 1.2 million living on a bustling island that has become the most commercially and successfully developed in all the Caribbean. But it works, this union between those two who've been bound together since they gained independence from Britain in 1962 and became a republic in 1976.

Trinidad, wealthy from its huge natural resources of oil, natural gas and minerals has not spent much energy wooing the tourist. "We didn't need to develop visitor attractions on Trinidad because when Trinidadians take a holiday they go to Tobago," says Gerald Nicholas who runs Sensational Tours (Tel: 868-623-3511 ext 535, Email: sensationaltours@hotmail.com).

Still, Trinidad (www.visittnt.com) boasts the world-famous bird sanctuary at the Asa Wright Nature Centre, an hour or so to the east of Port of Spain and, in the capital itself, some of the most interesting architecture in the Caribbean , the so-called Magnificent Seven mansions around the Queen's Park Savannah. Some of those buildings need maintenance but they remain a striking example of what is now, understandably, an un popular subject:

Colonial times. All are a five-minute walk from the Kapok hotel.

Tobago, lying north east of Trinidad, shows much less of the hand of man.

Tobago is for the tourist who has seen everything in the Caribbean and longs for an island with less glitz, where the people are friendly because that's the way they are not because they've learned to court the tourist dollar.

Tobago is for the visitor who longs for simpler times and the uncomplicated fun of yesterday.

Tobago is also where locals protected their animal kingdom long before ecology was a politician's buzz word. It has the oldest forest reserve in the Western Hemisphere (established in 1765). It's a spot where bamboo, introduced 400 years ago from China, grows four to six inches in a day, and where rainforests wave their canopies over more than 400 species of birds.

And it's a place where villages stage their annual festivals not for tourist interest but for their own pleasure. One pleasure they willingly share is the steelpan band which began in their islands. (Guests at the Trinidad Turf Club first heard this sound , in 1950 when The Bells of St. Mary's then Chopin's Etude in E Flat rolled out to captivate an unsuspecting audience.)

Each village in Tobago has its personality. Charlotteville, for example, is a fishing village with its own folk lore; Speyside is more busy with interesting off-shore excursions, tasty local restaurants like Jemma's and unpretentious resorts like the Blue Waters Inn; Crown Point, close to the airport, is more sophisticated and has the highest concentration of hotels on Tobago. And when you visit its romantic Coco Reef Resort, you know it's true: "Build it and they will come."

The Caribbean's Who's Who:

David Swanson, author of Fielding's Caribbean, feels Trinidad would win any "Caribbean's Best Cultural Experience" award. "And it excels in bird watching," he says waving at the motmot bird flying overhead. Invited to give his Caribbean's Bests for Physician's Money Digest readers, he answers:

"Best food St. Barts. Best night life Puerto Rico; diving, Bonaire; beaches Anguilla; shopping St Martin." Asked the Best Undiscovered, he replies, "I'd say, Bequia although sometimes that's like saying, who has the worst PR?"

Tobago has come late on the scene, says Swanson, and may be able to avoid the problems other islands have created, such as the heavy traffic in Martinique and the overdevelopment in St. Thomas. Furthermore, an island shaped for U.S. tourists is not necessarily what visitors want.