Marc De Ver­teuil

The Caribbean Sea col­lides with the shore. Each wave gives a last shout of sur­prised agony as it too com­pre­hends that there is an fi­nal­i­ty to the sea's end­less­ness.I sit on a rock and scan the hori­zon. From side to side my sweep­ing gaze scans the im­pos­si­ble bright white foam of crash­ing waves. Un­ceas­ing­ly. Wait­ing to spot my quar­ry. It is a game of pa­tience, some­times a game of chance.

The hu­man eye evolved to de­tect move­ment. Some­thing moved. Or did it? I can't tell what. Peer­ing in­to the dusky sil­very shim­mer of moon­light, eyes wide to catch the moon­beams. There, it moves again.

Out of the ag­o­nised dy­ing waves emerges a rit­u­al of life that has con­tin­ued un­in­ter­rupt­ed for 110 mil­lion years. The speck of move­ment is a 600-pound leatherback tur­tle, heav­ing her way, flip­per stroke by flip­per stroke, up on shore. Her species is the largest of all liv­ing rep­tiles. Moon-and starlight re­flects from her wet leath­ery shell. She looks like a crea­ture from an­oth­er era, an­oth­er di­men­sion. Her species has seen the rise and fall of di­nosaurs. This time and place with her is like pierc­ing the fog of time. Hu­mans are younglings com­pared to her kind.

Many Trinida­di­ans think that leatherback tur­tles on­ly nest at Matu­ra Beach and Grande Riv­iere. The truth is that they nest at all North Coast and East Coast beach­es. I have even seen leatherback tur­tle nests on Trinidad's South Coast.

This night I am at Grand Tacarib on Trinidad's vir­gin North Coast. It is here that Trinidad's Jura­sic age north­ern moun­tains touch the Caribbean Sea. In this place there are no hous­es and no roads. To get here you walk. Oth­er­wise take a pirogue from Blan­chisseuse or Matelot and then brave the un­pre­dictable surf.

Those dy­ing, tor­tured waves can cap­size a boat in the hands of an in­ex­pe­ri­enced sailor. Make sure your skip­per has salt in the blood. My trust­ed Blan­chisseuse boat­man is Cleve de Ver­teuil. His is my pump­kin vine fam­i­ly. All Trinidad De Ver­teuils have one com­mon an­ces­tor.

I walked here from the Catholic Church in Blan­chisseuse. Ship bells hang in the church­yard. One was cast in 1835 in Bris­tol and the oth­er in 1878 in Ly­on. They stand as sen­tries to the mem­o­ry of the treach­er­ous­ness of the sea. They are an­cient by the stan­dards of post Colum­bus Trinida­di­an his­to­ry.

The jun­gle path on which I soon walk is much old­er. Orig­i­nal­ly this was an Amerindi­an foot­path. Their feet smoothed a nar­row high­way from the for­est ground. Lat­er came the Eu­ro­peans and their slaves. Slave labour widened the trail to a bri­dle path. Earth had to move to make this pass­able for mules. When­ev­er the trail be­comes painful just think about the pain of the slaves who built it with noth­ing more than hand­held tools. If your feet blis­ter, think of the sores on their hands. Our is­land's his­to­ry is beau­ti­ful but al­so trag­ic and vi­cious. Re­mem­ber that in a place like this.

The first beach is breath­tak­ing. They all are. Pointy rocks pierce the sea. One rock has a co­conut tree on it. If you Google "co­conut tree on a rock" its pic­ture ap­pears.Far­ther along Tur­tle Rock is a rocky fin­ger of land that juts out from the coast. Its beau­ty is psy­che­del­ic. Seen from the side the rock looks like a tur­tle head pok­ing out of its cara­pace.

Af­ter some more ups and downs there is Paria Bay. From here you can ac­cess Paria Wa­ter­fall. Beau­ty lies in the eye of the be­hold­er but this is eas­i­ly my most beau­ti­ful wa­ter­fall. Swim be­hind the cur­tain of wa­ter–there is a hol­low there.Co­corite is my friend. He lives at Paria Bay. He is the ar­che­typ­i­cal bush man. Dread hair sur­rounds his head like a ha­lo or a mane. He lives off the land and sea. He al­ways has some co­conuts ready for me.

The path con­tin­ues across the Paria Riv­er. Sud­den­ly a man in boots ap­pears. There is a shot­gun slung from his shoul­der. He strides to­wards me. We greet po­lite­ly. Friend­ly even. He's just an­oth­er trav­eller trekking through the jun­gle. There is a man with hunt­ing hounds. It is al­ways hunt­ing sea­son here.

Night falls. The jun­gle dj turns up the vol­ume. In­sects scream and hum and buzz and beat. Frogs chirp and whis­tle. I keep my eyes fo­cused on the beam from my head­lamp. It is al­ways good to keep an eye out for the fer-de-lance. That is the ul­ti­mate pit viper. I see none tonight–like most nights.

I don't see any kind of game an­i­mals ei­ther. No deer, no agouti. Maybe they in­stinc­tive­ly avoid the path. Hu­mans have been walk­ing here for thou­sands of years.Around 8 pm I step out in to a clear­ing. Moon­light falls on tin roofs in a dip in front of me. I have reached Lester's jun­gle lodge. Lester does not ex­pect any­body so he is al­ready asleep. There is no elec­tric­i­ty here, no TV, no cell phone sig­nal, noth­ing to keep him awake.

I call out. Al­ways the per­fect host he smiles and shows me to my cab­in. It is just a sim­ple shack with a foam bed. Life could not be bet­ter. This is Eden again. Let the tur­tle watch­ing ad­ven­ture be­gin!