Day 1 and a bit: London - Antigua - Tobago
We've made it! We've left London and travelled as far as Tobago.
Our day started at midnight. This was because the night before had not quite finished yet. Finalising the packing of rucksacks and packing up and cleaning the flat took a little longer than expected, and we finally left our house -cleaner and tidier than it has ever been - at around 11pm to drive across London to our first stop: Jason's Place at Tower Bridge for easy access to trains to Gatwick. Cheers Jase, you're a star.
A midnight feast of Chinese take-away and about 4 hours sleep later, we were on our way to Tobago, via a couple of hours in Antigua (the plane routed via Antigua, so although technically we can say we've been there, we never set foot on the island - shame).
And the guidebooks were right. Tobago airport is in the middle of 'town' (town includes fields with cows in amongst the houses) and within walking distance of a number of hotels. However, we succumbed to one of the taxi drivers offering his services - which was just as well, as our guidebook's map turned out to be wrong and we would have strolled the opposite way to find
Kariwak Village, which with a backpack containing a small library would not have been quite the experience we were hoping for after so many hours awake (I know, I know! my excuse is that there is not real market for Dutch books outside the Benelux and I am determined to read some of the books that have been on my reading list for way too long now - and I will be handing out or sending back my collection along the way).
Instead, we were relaxing by the pool within 30 minutes of landing. Not a bad start! Kariwak Village was a great treat for our first night, and gave us a chance to try Caribbean dishes, both at dinner (which featured a very nice coollolloo soup) and breakfast (consisting of chopped herring in tomato and spices, served with coconut bread, also very nice). The hotel was very close to the airport (the runway was the other side of the trees!), but as the planes were small and infrequent, this really did not matter.
The next day was spent waiting for our next set of flights to our real first destination: Suriname. We hope to spend waiting time like this again: after a stroll to town to have a closer look at the cows and discover the beach, we had a lazy afternoon back at the hotel, watching the Netherlands-Ivory Coast game with the hotel staff with a 'jazzy grilled cheese sandwich' and catching up on sleep in the hammocks in the garden. Then back to the airport. This time we decided to be proper backpackers and walk all the way - a whole 7 minutes.
At the airport, we had some explaining to do about why we were only staying for 1 day in Tobago, as nobody could believe why we could possibly want to leave so soon (and understandably so!), but....we'll be back! After a week in Suriname.
Our day started at midnight. This was because the night before had not quite finished yet. Finalising the packing of rucksacks and packing up and cleaning the flat took a little longer than expected, and we finally left our house -cleaner and tidier than it has ever been - at around 11pm to drive across London to our first stop: Jason's Place at Tower Bridge for easy access to trains to Gatwick. Cheers Jase, you're a star.
A midnight feast of Chinese take-away and about 4 hours sleep later, we were on our way to Tobago, via a couple of hours in Antigua (the plane routed via Antigua, so although technically we can say we've been there, we never set foot on the island - shame).
And the guidebooks were right. Tobago airport is in the middle of 'town' (town includes fields with cows in amongst the houses) and within walking distance of a number of hotels. However, we succumbed to one of the taxi drivers offering his services - which was just as well, as our guidebook's map turned out to be wrong and we would have strolled the opposite way to find
Kariwak Village, which with a backpack containing a small library would not have been quite the experience we were hoping for after so many hours awake (I know, I know! my excuse is that there is not real market for Dutch books outside the Benelux and I am determined to read some of the books that have been on my reading list for way too long now - and I will be handing out or sending back my collection along the way).Instead, we were relaxing by the pool within 30 minutes of landing. Not a bad start! Kariwak Village was a great treat for our first night, and gave us a chance to try Caribbean dishes, both at dinner (which featured a very nice coollolloo soup) and breakfast (consisting of chopped herring in tomato and spices, served with coconut bread, also very nice). The hotel was very close to the airport (the runway was the other side of the trees!), but as the planes were small and infrequent, this really did not matter.
The next day was spent waiting for our next set of flights to our real first destination: Suriname. We hope to spend waiting time like this again: after a stroll to town to have a closer look at the cows and discover the beach, we had a lazy afternoon back at the hotel, watching the Netherlands-Ivory Coast game with the hotel staff with a 'jazzy grilled cheese sandwich' and catching up on sleep in the hammocks in the garden. Then back to the airport. This time we decided to be proper backpackers and walk all the way - a whole 7 minutes.
At the airport, we had some explaining to do about why we were only staying for 1 day in Tobago, as nobody could believe why we could possibly want to leave so soon (and understandably so!), but....we'll be back! After a week in Suriname.
Comments