Yesterday I promised to investigate things a little more thoroughly and here is some feedback. The Hyatt Hotel, Port of Spain, is a beautiful hotel and certainly the best that we have stayed in so far. Both teams are here as well which tells us we are moving up in the world! Situated on the sea front overlooking the harbour but with no beach as such, one can see as many as 25 tankers and cargo ships at any one time. Along the front of the hotel is a promenade rather than a beach.

Being a smart establishment, it follows that prices are pretty smart as well. Drinks at sundown yesterday set the benchmark for me and I shall be looking for other nearby watering holes for the rest of my stay here. The currency is in TT$ (Trinidad & Tabago dollars) and my round of drinks last night consisting of 2 margarita’s, 1 beer, 1 rum & soda, 1 bottle of water (for me of course) and a diet coke, cost me the equivalent of R450!!

These sort of bar prices will tell you that the hotel laundry is not going to be cheap and to have a shirt washed and ironed will set you back R60. It would be cheaper to throw it away and go and buy a new one! So, prompted by Nick (graphics) we set off on a mission this morning to find a launderette would suit our pockets better.

After walking into town and discovering that the nearest launderette was 10 minute taxi ride away we spent the next 40 minutes visiting three different launderettes that all assured us that they could help but we wouldn’t get our clothes back until Friday afternoon!! Today is Tuesday but yesterday was a holiday and so is Thursday so the backlog plus the upcoming holiday meant a three day delay in operations. No thank you very much, we just can’t wait that long and so it was back to the Hyatt and the prospect of using their service and just suffer the consequences.

This is where the taxi driver came into his own as he pocketed the morning’s fee of TT$120 and suggested casually that his girlfriend would happily do the washing. Negotiation over the phone resulted in TT$100 per bag, wash and tumble dry only. A steal when you come to think of it as I had a minimum of six shirts in my bag which would have cost a total of $230.

Okay, so you are way ahead of me. What about the ironing? Well, each day I spend time relating what has happened during my time on this tour so an account of my efforts to iron these items tomorrow morning should be worth waiting for.