The British Trader is currently bound for Japan, roughly half way into our voyage from the sunny shores of Trinidad. Unfortunately for me and my ill timed study day, this Sunday afternoon the weather does not appear to be co-operating with my disciplined bronzing regime! With only 3 months remaining of my trip, my Scottish skin can't afford to be mising out on any available rays if I'm to pay off for Christmas with the slightly "off white" that I'm sure will be the envy of all my friends! A far cry from the 34C heat and blazing sunshine of Trinidad and my recent run ashore a few weeks previously.
At the morning meeting the 2nd Engineer had just finished outlining the job plan for the day when he asked whether anyone intended to "head up the road then".
After a few moments and no takers the 4th Engineer piped up "Eh, I wouldn't mind taking a wander into town, just for a look". I quickly registered my interest in shore leave as well, hesitating just long enough for everyone to forget that I had only been on board a matter of days and had barely unpacked!
Of course this didn't get past everyone though and it was ruefully pointed out that the "4th was always up the road" and the "cadet's hardly in his boiler suit"! But with nobody else showing an interest for the delights of Point Fortin and no objections we were free to head off after smoko.
With shore gear on under boiler suits, sandals and passports in back pockets we headed off to be be escorted through the Terminal and begin our Caribbean experience. Our first lesson was to learn not to leave our gear anywhere near the floor in the terminal changing room, lest you wished to incur the wrath of the local ants on your return!
Meeting up with Terry, the oiler, who had been in Point Fortin before, it appeared out options were to either look around the township of Point Fortin which was quite small or to try and round up a taxi to Gulf City which was about an hours drive awayand where we would find a larger shopping mall!
After some discussion, as neither of us had anything we particularly needed to purchase or wanted to do we decided that a casual laid back stretch of the legs around Point Fortin would probably be wisest as this meant we didn't have to bother with taxi's or have to worry about getting back to the ship so we fell in step with Terry and off we went.
15 minutes later we were strapped in the back of a taxi and heading off to Gulf City with Terry waving us off from the pavement! It hadn't taken long to see Point Fortin and despite the "rustic charm", friendly people and friendlier three legged dogs, we decided that since we had a good few hours to spare it would be silly not to explore a little further.
On our way along the winding road we seemed to pass in and out of dense jungle and busy little villages/markets. We even passed one of South Trinidad's local tourist attractions which we hadn't been told about! The sign for the "San Fernando Tar Pits" claims it as one of the largets bitumen lakes in the world!! After a brief discussion we decided we would leave the "Tar pits" for another day and carried on.
On arrival at "Gulf City" it transpired that it was in fact the city of San Fernando we were visiting but "Gulf City" was the shopping centre. It also transpired that our 45 minutes taxi ride had cost us about £2 so we arranged to meet our taxi driver at the same place in a few hours time and headed in.
First stop was an internet cafe. Then the search began for an alarm clock for the 2nd Engineer. More complicated than it sounds I can assure you!
After several shops and some difficulty in convincing the shop keepers that a "normal" travel alarm clock would be fine and that we did not wish to buy a talking clock or the latest hi-fi and speakers we headed off for some shopping for ourselves and to stock up on enough "tab nabs" to keep the engine room going for a few days.
With our purchases made it was off to TGI Fridays for a bite to eat and then on to meet the taxi driver. Alas he was still no where to be seen 10 minutes later and we had to guiltily lay aside our loyalty to our initial driver and haggle with one of the swarm of taxi's appearing along with nightfall.
An hour or so later we were back on board and heading for our cabins after a slightly longer day than planned but a good run ashore none the less!
Jump forward a fortnight, half way across the Atlantic and it is quiz night in the officer’s bar of the British Trader with a deck of cards brought into fairly chose the 3 teams!
Our team consisted of the Chief Engineer, 2nd Engineer, Gas Engineer and engine ‘gadget’….me. After a quick huddle to ascertain our teams ‘specialist subjects’ it appeared that we would be in contention so long as none of the subjects were sport, music or celebrities related!
Straight into the 1st round then - “name that song”!! With the Mates ipod as the supply of songs from across several decades, the sounds of everything from Boney M to Metallica were intermingled with frustrated whispers and much bad tuneless humming for inspiration!
With that round over it was straight into identify the film scene with monsters as the theme, then a round of “identify the logo”. By now the stomachs of some of our finely tuned athletes were beginning to rumble so competition was adjourned to allow everybody to head down for some buffet before returning.
After a punishing round of identify the football strip it was on to the penultimate final ‘computerised’ round. Each team had a set time to identify as many bands pictures from 250 odd pictures. With tensions rising, and any embarrassment at recognising “boybands” or pre-stone age rockers gone by the wayside it came down to the last few minutes with 1st and 2nd place hotly contested!
Unfortunately 3rd place had been allocated fairly early on, with the deck cadet adamantly reporting that 5 out of 250 in one round was “not that bad considering”.
With the results in though we were devastated to discover that we had been pipped at the post by the Captain, ETO and 4th engineers team due to their comprehensive knowledge of cheesey pop one hit wonders, obscure football strips and dubious boybands.
Nevertheless, good fun was had by all and thanks were passed to the mate for his efforts. A good night that brought everyone together in a social atmosphere and a great way to break up a long ocean passage.
Eating Out