Monday Dec. 12^th

The first day in Tobago was mostly taken by the administrative things. I went over to customs to find out I first had to go to immigration... :-o At immigration I had to fill in all the forms but nonetheless the rest of the crew had to come over too to present themselves. Then I learned that I hed to write a letter to the chief immigration officer to ask permission to add Clare and Kitty to the crew list, also Jur has to present his hotel booking in order to get him off the crew list....

but first I had to go back to customs to get clearance to go ashore... There they told me I can't sail to the North of the Island without getting clearance first and of course I have to report at Charlotville to get clearance to leave Tobago...

Anyway, after I did all this we went up to King George fort. That was at the top of the mountain ans since it was very hot we had to take a break every 15 minutes and have a drink. At the last stop we had a beer at a Errol's place. We had a nice chat with Errol and when we came down from the foert we had another drink there and asked him for a good place to have dinner. He recommended a restaurant in Plymouth, about 15 minutes by car. He also happened to know this Scotty who would take us there. He would come over soon anyway to have his beer so if we wanted he could call him. So Scotty had his beer and took us to this restaurant. That really was a good place and we had a great dinner. Prices were European but that was okay. Afterwards Scotty picked us up again and joined us for a drink at the bar just 100 meters down the road. The music was good and loud !!

Scareborough is not a very nice place to stay, it's kind of shabby so next day, after we had a traditional Xmas breakfast with all kinds of local dishes at Errol's place, we sailed to Store Bay, some 12 nm further, just round the Southern corner of the Island. That was more like in the brochure... :-) A beautiful bay and beach. Also from there it's a 10 minute walk to the airport where we picked up Clare. The letter I wrote was stamped by immigration and I had to take that to immigration. Clare was already prepared so when they asked her for the letter she could tell them it had actually been delivered. It was a good thing I had gone through all this because she would not have gotten past immigration otherwise. Afterwards we had a drink with the crew from Maja, the yacht we met mid ocean and had just arrived in Store bay too. That had skipped Barbados because of the same letter crap they needed for the wife of the skipper who was flying in on Monday.

Anyway, Sunday we chilled out on the beach. There Franky came along and offered us to take us for a rainforest trip. That was something we already had planned to do when Kitty had arrived, so we booked a tour for Tuesday together with Jur, Elisabeth and her brother who would arrrive an Sunday. Actually, Franky would take us all to immigration first so we could sort out the changes in the crew list so that was very handy.

He also sold us tickets for the step up Sunday School, a kind of tradition where everybody is partying on the street, with life steel bands, food and drinks of course.

Although it was not as crowded as we expected, it was nice and the steel band was very good.

Today we took the dinghy to go to the lagoon, just North of Pigeon Bay. Luckily the outboard still runs. Rutger got capsized the day before when landing on the beach. A wave took him by surprise… Everything was floating is the see and the outboard was upside down. Luckily it wasn't still running so it did start later but obviously it hadn't liked the dipping and ran with a hiccup...

Anyway the lagoon was gorgeous and we had a great time. When we came back at the boat to get ready to pick Kitty up from the airport, she called me to tell me that her flight from Curacao to Trinidad was canceled. Technical problems.... they would try and get another plane but that wouldn't be until tomorrow. Later she send me and sms to tell me there wasn't a flight available form Trinidad to Tobago so it might be she won't be able to get in before Wednesday... :-(

Well anyway, I guess this is Caribbean style too. Too bad she'll miss the rainforest tour tomorrow but she has a good place to stay over with her father.