CHAGUARAMAS, TRINIDAD

Well, the place to start is wherever you happen to have been.  In Chaguaramas Bay, Trinidad, in the West Indies, we stayed a total of twenty months, so we got to know the watering holes there fairly well...please bear in mind that what is said on this page is from an entirely individual and personal point of view. This is where freedom of speech will allow us all to say what we really think. 

Starting at the eastern end of the bay, at the Lighthouse Bar/Restaurant at Crews Inn Marina - we were singularly unimpressed by the service on each of the several occasions we visited to eat or drink there. The food bore little or no resemblance to the descriptions in the menu, the prices were disproportionately high, in our opinions, and the manners of the bar staff represented the extremes. One barman was charming and friendly, but another was downright rude and snappy when a moment was being taken to consider what to imbibe. The beer is just as cold as the worst of the staff. 

The bar has a reasonable decor but is not the height of comfort, although clean and tidy The place changed hands at least once in the eighteen months over which period we came and went. There is an excellent musician and singer who plays in there some lunchtimes, it is the nearest watering-hole to customs and immigration and the view is quite pleasant. It's also over the biggest supermarket in the area, Hi-Lo. Louvered shutters are propped up to provide a free flow of air and extra shade.

Walking round the bay from there (or nipping across in the dinghy) the next place is the Wheelhouse Pub on Tropical Marine, a tiny marina. Cold beer is a certainty. There is efficient air-conditioning, if you like that kind of thing. We don't, but you can sit outside in the evenings (or by day if you can stand the heat). Two pool tables take up half of the premises and two or three tables with attendant chairs have the rest. There are cast fake-stone concrete tables and benches outside and umbrellas sometimes, although not always. 

The manageress was charming as were others who work there, with the exception of an older woman who can be pleasant but is not usually and tends to glare at one with the expression of one who has just bitten into an unripe lemon...if it is the natural repose of her features she might consider altering her nature...still she didn't detract that much from the fun! The prices were currently the lowest on the bay. The music tends to be too loud and not everyone we met in there was someone we would have sought out as company - the penny-pinchers and the free-loaders always gravitate to the cheapest watering-hole in case they don't find anyone to sponge from...on the other hand we did meet a few good people there in our dozen or so visits. 

At Voyagers Bar on Humming Bird Marine,  another small marina, the prices were almost as low as at the Wheelhouse. The bar was in its infancy and one could never be sure of opening or closing times, so the place was empty more often than full, making it unattractive if a social outing was what you had in mind. It had heaps of potential and, indeed, when we were berthed there in 1998, we had quite a social scene going quite quickly. It seemed to come and go, according to whether gregarious people were in residence or not. 

The seating area is open on three sides making it cool and breezy. The bar top is fascinating, all the great sailors are represented on it. The family who own the marina, and are often present, are fascinating too. Three books about their adventures are mentioned in Cruising Books in the Marine Bookshelves of our The Library section. They are the La Bordes, Trinidad's first circumnavigators. 

Next watering hole along is Sails Bar/Restaurant, at Power Boats marina/boatyard. The place often feels sparsely occupied because it is relatively spacious and people tend to dot themselves around, except when a concert packs the place out or the Friday night live music fills it almost to capacity. Plenty of cold beer in the middle of the price range. 

The service had a tendency to be somewhere between chronically slow and non-existent although the staff were quite friendly when they felt so inclined.  It is the most central of the bars and is open on three sides. Management were very kind to us and we frequented it for the fact that pretty well everyone in the bay is a sometime regular and you meet all the most interesting (to us, anyway) people in there.

Next along is The Bight at Peake's yard. Air-conditioned, loud, two pool tables, looks as though an expensive but vulgar interior decorator has been let loose on it. Lots of reasonably interesting objects hanging from the ceilings and perched above the bar. Slow service from indifferent staff, mid to high-range prices, several television screens vying with one another. 

Our idea of a nightmare although the terrace is open to the air and quite pleasant, unless you hope to get served before you have fainted from hunger or become entirely dehydrated. Young and  noisy people liked it at weekends although we noticed it was frequently close to deserted. Perhaps having an ill-deserved tip sneered at, as insufficient, has insulted other customers too. If we go to hell we have a nasty feeling it will be very similar, although perhaps warmer...actually a couple of the younger waiters were charming and we'd hate them to think we hadn't noticed. On the contrary, they bloomed like orchids in a wasteland. 

Last in the line of boatyards, but far from least, is where we ended up as regulars. The Galley Bar, at I.M.S. (Industrial Marine Services) boatyard a drab place when we arrived in Chaguaramas was, soon thereafter, transformed by Dutchman Albert Faas. The decor he put in place was small and intimate and yet open and airy. The six girls who cooked and served drinks, in two shifts of three staff each, were all charming and delightful, good-looking into the bargain and thoroughly nice, decent, young women. The menu was quite limited, but good, and there was a different lunch special every day, in addition to the usual menu. 

Thursday nights were video movie nights and a special two-course dinner (main meal and dessert) was available very economically. There was cable TV a lot of the rest of the time. Opening hours were 0800 to 2200 hours, there was always plenty of cold non-alcoholic beer, (they made a great mug of tea and good coffee too!) and nice people tended to congregate there, including interesting and articulate ones, something of a rarity in the environs. Unfortunately, we  have since received news that our lovely host, Albert  Faas  who, with help from his delightful wife Helen, had made the Galley Bar what it was and hired all the lovely girls, was rudely ousted by the landlord as soon as the business became an attractive proposition to a friend of his. 

Frankly, that sort of thing is pretty typical of Chaguaramas and the Caribbean in general. We were extremely sorry to hear that, in the middle of May 2000, a couple of months after we left, Albert died of a massive heart attack. 

Meanwhile, at least one of the girls from the Galley Bar is now working at the Island Surf Internet Café on Mariner's Haven, the boatyard between Peake's and I.M.S., a commercial yard. We are hoping for news of a possible bar opening there too...

Tell us about the cold non-alcoholic beers you have found, and the warm ones too! We'd love to hear about places you've visited or are visiting right now...