Mayaro/Rio Claro: Trinidad's Long, Quiet Coast

The place of the maya plant

Mayaro's name comes from the Arawak: maya, a plant that grew here in abundance, plus ro — "the place of." Rio Claro was named by Spanish surveyors in the 1770s for a clear little stream. A rest house went up in 1850 when a road was cut from Mission (now Princes Town) to Mayaro; cacao planters settled in, and the railway arrived in 1914. Today Rio Claro is the largest town in the southeast and the seat of the Mayaro–Rio Claro Regional Corporation.

Coconut country

For most of the 1900s, the Mayaro shoreline was coconut plantations as far as you could see. The long lines of palms still standing are the testimony: copra production peaked around 1972 at about 12.5 million kilos, then collapsed to under half a million by 2008. The industry is a shadow of itself, but the palms remain — and the coconut vendors along the beach road are its delicious legacy.

Guayaguayare: first sighted, first drilled

The southeastern tip of Trinidad is Guayaguayare — "Guaya" to locals — a fishing village with an outsized history. It was the first part of Trinidad sighted by Christopher Columbus, on July 31, 1498. French planters and their enslaved workers settled along the bay in the late 1700s. And in May 1902, Randolph Rust and John Lee Lum drilled Trinidad's first commercially viable oil wells here — the beginning of the industry that would define the country's economy.

The oil is still here: the Port of Guayaguayare serves most of the offshore production, and the gas pipelines for Atlantic LNG and Point Lisas come ashore at Guaya. Fishing boats and oil infrastructure, side by side — that's the southeast.

Guaya also gave the country the writer Dionne Brand, born here, and Olympic silver medalist Jillian Richardson (4x400m relay, 1984).

Easter at Mayaro

The great Mayaro tradition is Easter weekend. Every year, families claim their stretch of the nine-mile beach — camping, cooking, swimming, kayaking, bird-watching — in one of Trinidad's most beloved holiday rituals. The beach fills, the grills come out, and for four days Mayaro is the happiest place on the island. If you're visiting at Easter, this is where Trinidad goes. Join in.

The swamp

Inland from the coast lies the Nariva Swamp — the largest freshwater wetland in Trinidad and Tobago, designated a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance in 1992. West Indian manatees, red howler monkeys, white-fronted capuchin monkeys, anacondas, caimans, and more than 200 bird species. The Bush Bush Wildlife Sanctuary is the way in, with guided tours by permit. It's one of the wildest places in the country, an hour from the beach.

What to see

• Mayaro Beach — nine miles of it. Lifeguards patrol designated areas; the surf can be rough, so swim where they are.
• Guayaguayare — the fishing village at the island's tip, where Columbus first sighted Trinidad and oil was first drilled.
• The Nariva Swamp and Bush Bush — manatees and howler monkeys. Go with a guide.
• The beach villages — St. Joseph, Plaisance, Beaumont, Radix, Grand Lagoon, and the rest, each with its own stretch of sand.

Mayaro/Rio Claro is the Trinidad you go to when the rest of the island gets loud: fishing villages, coconut groves, nine miles of beach, and the kind of quiet you can't buy.