I moved to St Croix in the early nineties to start a business with my brothers, it was called Caribbean Provisions, and the idea was to bring fresh food (dasheen, yams, breadfruit, banana, plantain, fish, etc) from the down island of Dominica, up to St. Croix, Antigua, St. Thomas, St. Martin and so on. These islands where known to have large populations of ‘down islanders” from Dominica, St. Lucia, Trinidad, and etc.)…and wow, do they love their provisions (food) – dey all luv da food and ting!
The concept started out simple, but by trial and error, we learned how, what, where and who. We shipped food to our retail headquarters of St Croix first, then spread out to St. Thomas, Antigua and St. Martin…St.Croix ended up being our powerhouse.
My brother Greg worked Dominica, and I stayed on St. Croix..he would go out late at night and order the food from the local farmers; no phones, no faxes, no email - he would jump in the truck and drive to every single house. He would then load up the plane early AM, get everything ready and our pilot, Fabian Lopez, to fly a load (about 3,000 pounds at a time), return, refill, and off to another location…kept everyone busy as we did this 3 times a week.
Fabian arriving in St. Croix…ready for pizza!
Full load and a half – at the STX airport after arrival with our Rasta man “Al Baptiste”, son of the World famous “Pappy” Baptiste…Al’s in the back to hold the food down.
Our Caribbean Queen-Air Excalibur plane was wicked - quite the ride for sportin’ round the islands!
Dominica is a very primitive island so many things we take for granted in the US are a luxury down there, even the airport being built on the edge of the ocean is quite an experience; coming in from over the mountains full of banana trees, ya have to drop fast to catch the runway, and hopefully STOP before the end. See the end of the runway? Taking off “heavy” was a thrill (for the pilots), NOT ME…anyone who flys will know exactly what I mean. LOL!
Leaving Dominica and on our way to St. Lucia…Dominica grows straight up out of the ocean and is one of the most beautiful sights in the Caribbean!
Everything was going very well, it took some time for the islanders to get used to a white man running a down island “provisions” store – actually kinda funny.
We became “THE” place for most down islanders’ to get their fresh food. And after a while, we started bring up many of the other things they liked; other foods, supplies, cutlass’, medicine, fish from the local waters, coal pots and whatever…and we even started to send stuff back down to their family’s. Hell, we even flew several relief missions to get emergency supplies into the islands after a few storms.
But wait, there’s more…everything was going great…cash flow was strong, the people started lining up for our plane loads and in the season (Thanksgiving to Christmas), we would ship 5 days a week, and sometimes 2 flights a day!
Then, after all that hard work we experienced 3 catastrophic events in a 5 week period. And I can’t make this stuff up either. I will skip over the BS and cut to the chase.
We had purchased another plane, a Merlin / Metroliner, basically a 19 passenger plane that was specially converted for our people/food needs. We had the Navajo sold and the Queen Air had a contract on it waiting for us to finish the Metroliner conversion. So, blue skies away, right?
Right before we had the chance to fly the Metroliner to St. Croix, the Queen Aire was on a trip, she lost power on the return flight, and crashed into the Caribbean Sea, I think it was off the coast of Puerto Rico. Fabian was rescued 8 hours later beating off sharks that were feeding on his vomit. He said it was absolutely the scariest thing ever… I agree and do not need any more than that.
OK, we needed the new Metroliner down there ASAP. We had to make a few charter flights until the plane could be transported down. Once we got her to St. Croix, good ole Hurricane Luis formed. We flew the new Metroliner down to South America as the entire line of Windward Islands were on alert. Hurricane Luis annihilated our Antigua store with up to 140 mph winds, and then decided to wreak havoc on St. Martin, just GREAT.
Then closely behind Luis, we had Hurricane Marilyn, she ripped through St Croix with a bad attitude and did some serious damage – most everything we worked to build was destroyed.
The St. Croix operation would take time and investment to build it back up. The Antigua and St. Martin operations were no longer there. It was time to start over…the question was, should it be here on St. Croix or where? My wife and I choose to move back to the US, reformat and get a different game-plan going. St. Croix was becoming a dirty and rough area with lots of crime…so the decision wasn’t too difficult…so, there is how it all started. Now, it’s time for fun! I mean seriously, ya can’t even make this crap up!
Next, check out our Idea!
Just passing by.Btw, you website have great content!