Turks and Caicos

Our guide Elvardo

The island landscape of dense bush.

Kyr checking out old plantation buildings

Limestone bat caves

the north coast of Middle Caicos island

The beautiful turquoise waters

Loving the sea and sand

Young handsome beach bum

Our guide Elvardo piloted the rented Jeep along the narrow, tarred limestone roads of North Caicos island like a benevolent, drunk captain of a yacht. Gently correcting the steering only if the Jeep veered fully to the wrong side of the road. As we swayed back and forth along the centre line, Elvardo happily turned to the backseat to expound on all the island lore. The poor passenger in the front stared straight ahead as if to inspire Elvardo to keep his eyes on the road.

Turks and Caicos is very unusual mostly for its small population – just over 30,000.  It consists of series of islands that are limestone accretions of a coral reef. Historically it is the result of a land mass breaking off Central America and plopping here on the edge of the Caribbean. The locals are quite adamant that they are on the Atlantic, not the Caribbean. Having so few people means that things that I ordinarily worry about like environmental destruction – don’t seem to loom large here. The reef is a protected environment and despite the plethora of resorts along the coast of the most populated island Providenciales (pop 30,000) the reef according to Elvardo who grew up here, born in the 80’s, is not much different from when he was young. I hope he is right.

Elvardo took us on a 30 minute boat ride from Providenciales to North island. We passed many mangroves and little islands, some that are the  private vacation hiding-grounds of celebrities. He gave us the most edifying tour of the North island (population 1000) because it is his home island.  His parents emigrated from Haiti before his birth. The entire landmass is quite flat and covered in dense bush with a few roads. There is not much livestock to be found and very few cleared areas. The bush is so dense that I can’t see being able to navigate through it. When I asked Elvardo what do work do people do – he said that they don’t need to work. There are no taxes on property except purchase tax. They can fish and grow things in amongst the bushes and that would be enough. The things he listed were weird things to solely subsist on in the modern world – corn, potatoes, taro, some type of pea, coconuts etc. but he seemed quite satisfied with the list. Practically the only cleared patches aside from people’s yards were some areas that were cleared by a cow that one of the islanders owns – the sole cow. He just ties it to spots in the bush and the cow gradually decimates the foliage – only eating the bushes. I was intrigued by this cow and got to glimpse her chowing her way through the trees. She looked pretty normal, but very tiny.

Turks and Caicos original native inhabitants were wiped out by disease in the 1500’s. After that it was colonized by disgruntled British loyalists who left the US after the war of independence. They attempted to grow cotton on plantations and ship it to England but after only 30 years, the enterprises failed because of cotton pests and the abolition of slavery in Britain. The Brits left and the slaves stayed on and grew things in the old plantation areas until a huricaine in the 1960’s destroyed most things. The original slave families still populate the island and Elvardo said it was hard for anyone but him to find a girlfriend because they were all somehow related.

We toured the old plantation – the ghost buildings of stones and cement made from conch shells and limestone still stand. Walking around the curly tailed ghekos jumped off the path like popcorn. We then tried to see flocks of pink flamingos in a pond area that they love – I just saw blurs of pink through the binoculars.

After driving along a recently constructed causeway that links the North island to the Middle island , Kyr became exhausted by his role as front seat vigilant passenger and promptly fell asleep(much to Elvardo’s amazement). Luckily he woke up in time to tour a limestone cave filled with 4 species of bats – 2 insect and 2 fruit. No rabies apparently. The caves used to be a lucrative supply of guano for fertilizer and explosives. The journey through the caves was about a half hour. I felt triumphant being able to navigate with only flashlights because there were sometimes narrow bridges between the columns and pools of sea water beneath.

We stopped at a beautiful isolated beach after lunch (I bravely ate fried conch –one of the islands historic main exports – quite tastey)  and revelled in the surreal colours that the ocean has to offer. It truly is a turquoise mecca – subtly shifting on the horizon from turquoise to a beautiful mauve. The oceans have been quite blustery – wave action intensely digging out deep troughs in the fine sand so that it is quite perilous to navigate both in and out. The water temp is nice. More chilly than Mexico. Everyday it has sprinkled a bit of rain but it doesn’t last long. The temp is in the mid to low 30’s.

We finished the day back at club med, having heard the local gossip that this club med location is closing soon. Kyr and I were shocked because you haven’t seen anything like the manic energy of the GM. I can’t imagine anything closing with that dynamo at the helm. Kyr thinks it may be like a captain going down with the ship. I hope not.