myTobago – your questions, review and comment about Tobago

Well well ... how very really to see this interesting article ...

http://www.thetobagonews.com/news/Isaac ... 21731.html

What a load of absolute goonish bonkers (say hello to the boys for me Gracie) utter stupendous utter utter nonsense !!

By all means seperate Tobago from Trinidad because I agree that most of the tourism does actually go to Tobago ... but the travel advisories will oblige with a whole set of new warnings about Tobago ... what a pointless exercise to suggest that Trinidad is affecting Tobago's tourism ?!?

Fact 1 ... Trinidad's admittedly high crime stats rarely involve tourists.

Fact 2 ...Tobago's admittedly low crime stats involve alot of tourists.

The Powers that be are being run by a bunch of muppets that seem to know less about their own country than the average tourist. I remain hopeful that an inspirational individual will come forward and deal with the crime in Tobago against Tourists.

Or am I going mad?

Regards

Paul,
I agree with you totally!! Whatever happened to the "Tourist Police"? I remember seeing them once at Stone Haven and that was at least ten years ago,and the THA specials were a joke!
David

The overall high murder rate (is it now higher than Jamaica per head of population?) of both islands combined only impacts the vacation planning of educated tourists, who know the islands are a twin state, and who even know that Tobago is in the Caribbean. But mass tourism, with which Tobago briefly flirted circa 2004-6, is a different market and it seems it is this which they are hoping to suck back, eg by targetting middle class Brazilians etc.

Back in those "boom" days, I would regularly collect Brit tourists from the airport who really had little or know idea where they were, but had simply booked a cheap last minute package holiday on teletext or the web. Some thought that it was one of the canary islands and were surprised when they heard the local language was english and driving was on the correct side of the road.

One english family (from sone rustic part of the midlands) were alarmed to see so many black people, and their little daughter ran out of the supermarket in fear, when the friendly smiling local faces alarmed her (there are more ethnic minorities all across england 10 years on, so no doubt such ignorance would be rarer now).

In theory the strategy to target mass tourism markets of more "edgy" countries like Brazil is sound, since they would be safer as they would "know how to move" in a developing nation, to avoid making themselves victims. I suspect the lack of fun activities and water parks/sophisticated nightlife and first class service, might put them off coming. But it may be the way to go, as nowadays the mass market Brits are too broke to come after all the APD and high air fares etc are considered, leaving only the educated Brits, who usually do their research, hear about the highest crime rate in the Caribbean and move on.