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STRAIN HUNTERS LIVE THREAD! - TRINIDAD - St.VINCENT


franco
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DAY 6

I wake up really early, in full-power mode, I am excited about the day ahead. In my room there is a kettle, so I warm up the water and pour myself a cup of decent instant-coffee while I smoke a joint of Green House Cheese, kindly left by our contacts last night. We are checking out from this hotel, where we spent less than 7 hours! We load the pick-up trucks and we drive in the first lights of dawn. Direction: the bottom of the volcano, the beginning of the trail that takes all the way to the top; it's normally a 3-4 hours walk, but we will have to stop along the way for filming, so it's going to be very long. The day didn't even start yet, and it's already very hot, surely close to 30 degrees Celsius. During the drive we stop at 3 spectacular locations along the road to film great panoramas and the car driving. Anywhere we pull over, children come greet us and people are curious about who we are and what we do. We are now traveling with a large group: it's Arjan, Simon, myself, 3 camera-crew, MisterX the photographer, Dr. Green and 4 local contacts, who are from the area, so we never have a problem. People are very friendly, and smoking weed in public is apparently not a big issue here. There is always somebody from our group rolling or smoking. The weed is actually low-grade, quite harsh and bitter, but that's the kind of grade the island is mass-producing and exporting to most other Eastern Caribbean islands. Locally, it's sold in "bombs". A "bomb" is a rolling paper full to the max of crumbled weed, rolled up into a round ball-shape. The lower the price, the more leaf, stems and seeds are in the mix. A good "bomb" costs normally the equivalent of 1 Euro, and it rolls a massive joint, or a couple of regular spliffs. Everybody sell "bombs", at every corner, at every bar, even in shops or restaurants. Ganja business is surely the most diffused street -business here. After an hour and a half we reach a small village close to the bottom of the volcano, where we pick-up some more people who will help carrying our equipment up the mountain. After another few miles we leave the cars and get ready for the walk. The first part is a smooth stroll on the beach, crossing a river, then we head inland following a dry riverbed. Nature is amazing on this island: we walk through caves full of bats, then through thick bush and forest. After half an hour the path gets steeper and steeper, and the heat begins to be a real issue. We are carrying over 5 liters of water per person, but soon it becomes evident it's not going to be enough. We are sweating beyond normal, and every 20 minutes to half an hour we need to stop for a short rest. The walk is so hard we decide to avoid stopping to film plants on the way up; we will film the walk, reach the top as fast as possible, eat something there, then walk down stopping at various fields along the way. Our contacts have linked with many planters on this mountain, and some of them are very eager to show us their genetics and their crops.

When we look at the top of the volcano it is surrounded by fast-moving clouds, a sign that the wind is strong up there. When we reach the 700 meters on the sea level the jungle stops, and the mountain is steep, covered in grass, rocky.

As we reach 800 meters of altitude we notice the smell of sulfur in the air; we are getting closer to the top. I am really tired, even after the Red Bull and the 5-hour Energy that I consumed along the way. When we get to the top the view is astonishingly beautiful, on both sides: behind us the panorama of the island, all the way down to the sea; in front of us the crater: huge, deep, and visibly active. We rest a bit, we eat some food and we smoke some good weed before filming. It's around 1 in the afternoon when we start walking down; now we really wanna see plants, and we walk really fast until we reach the first field. It's a large one, on a hillside, facing south-west. Plants are sativas, tall and long-branched. Some are starting to flower, others are half the way and starting to ripe. The smell of some plants reminds of carrots and celery, and mint and pine; the more sativa phenos are very tall and lanky.

After filming, we head to the second field, a few hundred meters lower on the hillside, hidden in the thick jungle. These plants are similar, but they are further in flowering, almost finishing, and have very large buds. They look amazing in the sun, the resin shining like diamonds. Once we finished filming, and running around smelling the plants, we are guided to a third field a few minutes away. Here the genetics are more mixed, with crosses that show more induce traits. Unfortunately it's getting late, we have to walk down and reach the beach before dark.

While we walk down the volcano our contacts explain that the growers here plant all year round, so there is always some fields to be harvested, and some just planted. It's a constant production cycle that never really stops. Each field has a "shanti", a small shack built with wood and waterproof covers, where the planters live while tending the crop. The shantis are also used to dry the crops after harvest, and to prepare the bales of weed to be transported down to the beach for loading on the smuggling boats. This island produces and exports weed, more than any other island in the Eastern Caribbean, and people are proud of it.

Once we reach the beach the sun is setting, the sky is red and purple. I am hot, dirty, sticky from the walk. I jump in the sea to wash and freshen up, it's lovely.

The speedboats that we contracted arrive on time, and everyone is really happy to see them. It's time to board and go full-gas. After 45 minutes of high-speed bumping on waves we reach our destination: a smaller island, where we rent a large villa for a few days. It's going to be our base, from where we will depart every morning by boat. This is the safest way to operate, because the country is too small to sleep and work on the same island for 5 days. We would be attracting too much attention…

As soon as we get to the villa we meet the staff, Gerry and his wife, who help us carrying our stuff from the beach up the steep hill where the villa is located. When we arrive we have a good look around the property: this is really new for Strain Hunters! A luxury-accommodation! We really spoil ourselves with a jump in the swimming-pool and a few really big spliffs before it's time to crash. It's now way past 1am, I better get some sleep! Tomorrow we will have a more relaxed day, we need to rest our legs a bit after the climb of today...

Here are the pics, enjoy!

The drive up to the volcano:

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... and the preparation before the walk:

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Here we go! The first part of the walk up the volcano, along the beach:

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And now we walk inland, following the shortest path up the mountain:

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Finally we get to the volcano top!

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And here we go with the descent, and the cannabis fields...

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And here we arrive back down at the beach, where the speedboats pick us up.... we are tired but really, really happy!

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good morning from the Craibbean!!!

It's an amazing morning here! Sun is shining, sky is blue, I got a thick joint in my hand and I'm taking it super-easy after that killer walk we did yesterday.

WOW that was hard walking....

Now time to enjoy our villa, and the swimming pool, before breakfast is ready.

Today we are going to see some good fields, and hopefully the walk is going to be much shorter.

I will be online again tonight for the usual day-report!

;-)

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