The End of the Road

Zorina Shah

Allison Wong Wai photo - Pitch Lake

I have concluded that Allison Wong Wai and Claire Watson will never choose a dry, sunny day for a road trip. They collected me in pouring rain, directly in front of the shrine of St. Joseph, patron saint of workers. We set off for the South Western peninsula, down the San Fernando bypass, along Mosquito Creek, past a lot of construction work which confused us at St. Mary’s Junction, Oropouche, through Rousillac before we made our first stop at the Pitch Lake in La Brea.

The tour guide who was having a slow day, because of the weather, told us of the medical wonders of the sulphur springs and that the land drops approximately six inches every year because of the mining. We didn’t pay guide fees as we could only do so much in the steady drizzle… drive onto the access road, turn and drive out again. We talked a little about the wider area, that there had been a golf course at Brighton, the industrial estate hidden behind the trees and I told them that someone once wrote a Mills and Boon romance, set in Trinidad, in which the couple had gone sailing on the pitch lake.

I should have said earlier that Claire still considers every road a straight one and I have come to like that approach. 

Several stops at the fruit vendors followed. Claire has an eye for things that grow on trees. She can spot a douce-douce mango (dudus) from a distance, a special type of flower, a bird’s nest. Allison, on the other hand, you have to bully her to take the picture. She is on the look out for people, what are they doing on this Saturday morning, are they happy, what do they do for recreation, why are the playgrounds overgrown? 

The cutlass mango at left. Who else would see mangoes on a tree in rainy weather, but Claire?                                                                                                                                   

We passed through the borough of Point Fortin and made a hasty exit, because of traffic, via Cap de Ville. Claire had worked at Auto Rentals for three months when she had finished high schooI. The sign was still there next to the market. I showed them the gas station once owned by Subrat Ali, also known as Chinee Boy, a friend of my father. Ali’s son Rasheed had been responsible for bringing a number of footballers from Point Fortin to play at St. Benedict's College, among them Warren Archibald.  

We entered the peninsula at the point where Cap-de-Ville forms a sort of T-junction with the road to Erin and the one which goes all the way to Icacos Point. Our first stop was my brother in Chatham and of course he produced the bottle with the black and white label, from which I am still not partaking. We had a good look at his yard, what was bearing, what was flowering and as Claire said, what will show up on the plants in six months time. 

What kind of orange is this?  
I don't think I was expected to answer that question.

We took a short walk near the immigration jetty in Bonasse where the Venezuelans had entered legally before the borders were closed. I was a bit cautious in the event that members of the uniformed services mistook my companions for visiting neighbours.

The jetty where Venezuelans are processed.

One of my favourite drives is along the stretch to Icacos from the village of Fullerton, where I was born, through the coconut estates of Constance and St. Andrew, past the lagoons, mangroves and down to the tip of the peninsula about seven miles from the Venezuelan coast, as the crow flies. We saw the primary school my brother lobbied for before his retirement, a wonderful sight near the end of the road. My own primary school, Lochmaben R.C. sits on a hill. It was an old wooden building which still features in my nightmares, along with the huge concrete cistern. I remember Ralph Maraj attended our school for a while when he came to stay with his family in the village of Los Gallos at Columbus Beach.

Barracks at St. Andrews Estate

On the way back my nephew Anil was at his new “office” near the junction by Low’s shop, some of the bars further up the road being closed. There was no lunch available anywhere between Icacos and Low’s but we found something left over at the roadside cafe opposite the Catholic Church. I had chicken with fries, but I swear that the wing I got belonged to a Pterodactyl. They were playing soca music and it did not take long for Allison and Claire to show their "Tiny Winey" moves. I ran, as opposed to sprinted, up the slope to the steps of the Church to find that it was also dedicated to St. Joseph. 

Waiting for their supper

We stopped off at Anil’s home to dine. My brother, who I have not seen in more than a year looked like one of the protesting Indian farmers, just home from tending his cattle, just the two he now has remaining. 

We talked villages on the way to  the T-Junction, driving straight on at the Puerto Grande junction where we should have turned left. Our straight road tactic got the better of us and thinking we were on the way to Erin, we encountered some bad roads, got stuck a little in the mud and turned back. If your wheel keeps spinning in mud, the person you need to give you a push is definitely Allison. There was an upside. We met a friendly family of two adult women and four children who had been to the coastline. I also swear that the younger adult spoke with a foreign accent.

Bad roads... no place to go

We drove through the village of Buenos Ayres and surfaced at the Erin fishing port where the tide was high and we got a clearer view of the Venezuelan coastline. It is enough to say that Claire spotted custard apple.

The Los Iros beach facility was closed, a police car in attendance, but no officers in sight. We made a stop at the mud oven shop in Rancho Quemado. The baker told me she is the niece for the former Councillor Sheila Lamorelle and she has a young baker in training. 

From there on it was mainly the drive back through the built-up and busy towns of Siparia and Penal with the obligatory stop at the doubles stall in Debe. I promise that the mention of doubles is not linked to the Minister of Agriculture.

Of course we had to venture into a no entry near the highway at Debe but we escaped unscathed.

It was already night when Claire pulled up again in front of the shrine of St. Joseph. I had refused the doubles at the stall in Debe, but when the girls decided to eat theirs while they were still hot… well Clarence Rambharat won’t get away with that the next time... finery or no finery.