Tales from Trinidad

I recently made my second trip to Trinidad to complete some work for a client. On my first trip I was only there long enough to complete the work and that mainly at the Port of Spain airport.
This time I rented a car as I had to go to a town called Couva, about thirty miles south of the airport.

Trinidad, being formally part of the British Commonwealth, drive on the left side of the road, so that made the adventure a little more interesting. Our flight out of Houston was delayed an hour due to fog, so the already late arrival of 8:30 PM was going to make for a long day. To add to my concern about driving, it was raining upon our arrival...pouring down tropical monsoon rain!

Customs and Immigration are notoriously slow in Trinidad, so our original arrival of 8:30 became 9:30 and out the door to pick up the car at 10:45 and finally in the car around 11:30. It was still raining as I sat the car, with the windshield wiper slapping back and forth, I was mentally conditioning myself to the right hand drive and setting up the GPS to get to the hotel.

With my courage finally up I headed out the airport exit only to make a wrong turn and had to wrap back around the terminal for another try. This time I made it to the first “round about”, another uniquely British phenomenon, before indecision and the rain caused a couple of loops around before I got in the correct lane to exit and head for the hotel – which was only a mile away.

Air and road weary I plopped into bed...ready to tackle the roads the next day.

The rains of the night before had passed and morning brought crisp clear skies. The main road into Port of Spain is called Churchill Roosevelt and is a very crowded three lane highway; I had to head into town to reach the highway south to Couva. Carefully merging into traffic I head toward my destination, my trusty GPS giving turn directions.

While I have driven on the left side many times in the UK, Ireland and Australia I realized that each had unique “quirks” that had best be learned to keep from becoming a statistic.
And Trinidad has some “quirks”!

The most important one is what’s going on the shoulders...that’s where the taxies stop (not yellow cabs, but ordinary cars with an H on the license plate) and other use as a passing lane.
And that’s where the real story was!

While not legal, many use the shoulder to pass the long lines of backed up traffic. Vendors work the inside lane with peanuts, drinks and other food items to make the wait more bearable. “So there I was”, about to turn when I looked into the rearview mirror (just before) and in a blur I saw a small car moving at a high rate of speed trying to get to the front of the lane and duck back into the traffic headed toward town...cutting across the lane I was in he swerved, narrowly missing me, a concrete barrier and a large dump truck...wow! I’m sure glad I looked twice!

Now here is the irony...Trinidadians are very polite people, gently of nature and easy going....UNTIL they get behind the wheel of a car (not all but some) and “schzammm” they turn into “road warriors”!