Picture of Brightly painted tap-tap in the capital, Port-au-Prince (Haiti)

Colourful tap-tap full of love in Port-au-Prince

Send image of Brightly painted tap-tap in the capital, Port-au-Prince as a free postcard
Download picture of Brightly painted tap-tap in the capital, Port-au-Prince
Purchase Brightly painted tap-tap in the capital, Port-au-Prince (Haiti)

Slow, colourful, painful, but also probably one of the best ways to see Haiti: tap-taps come in many sizes, and are invariably overcrowded with Haitians with whom you can easily get into touch.
One of the memorable tap-tap rides we took was from Cap Haitien to Pignon, on our way to Hinche further south. We waited more than 3 hours for the tap-tap to leave, and made the mistake to discuss a price before: it is better to just get on and pay what the others are paying. We knew we would leave when full, but "full" is defined differently here in Haiti: we counted 23 passengers only in the back of the pick-up truck when we left! Passengers were clinging to the back of the truck, children were invariably parked on the floor of the pick-up truck with some luggage. Most luggage was tied to the truck from the outside, while live stock (mostly chicken) were put on the floor under the seats (and, we thought, sometimes also under the luggage). Then there were passengers standing in the pick-up truck, and some more sitting on the roof of the cabin. A heavy overload, and we saw some pick-up trucks almost falling apart. The real journey started when the road turned into a dirt track and the driver had to navigate his truck as if he were riding a boat on a wild sea. We turned, swayed left and right, often felt like capsizing, were launched into the air whenever there was a deep bump in the road, the truck complained by moaning and cracking, but everytime we thought that it would break or we would not be able to go on, we amazingly did.
Read more about: Tap-taps

Tags for this picture:
| | | |

american face bus gondola Central&South America North America Haiti Saudi Arabia orange silver painting sculpture people hat purple green streetvendor market Tap-taps Shwedagon Pagoda

Around the World in 80 Clicks - All rights reserved - www.traveladventures.org - 1999-2008 Share your comments