Steve and Cathy's Blog

Steve is up at 5:20; Cathy at 6:00am. We are right in the port, and apparently at the dock by 6:30, but, because we are on the port side, we don’t realize it. Steve only discovers that we are docked when he ventures up to Deck 10 around 7 to see what we aren’t docked. Hmmm, we are! He takes a photo of the town of Roseau to show Cathy that we are indeed here.

Cathy has checked the Currents, and notices that many of the tours are by 8:15. She deduces that, therefore, the outdoor area of Terrace Café on the stern should be empty at 8, so we arrive at that time. She is quite correct. Steve takes a photo of what we consider to be a strange sight on an island that celebrates its environment as much as Dominica: smoky fires on the beach. We can only guess that they are burning trash, because in a couple of hours, the burning is done.

We have wanted to visit this island for some time, given its reputation of being less developed and covered with rainforests. Our excursion, Easy Dominica and Rainforest Drive, begins at 10:20. In our reading in preparation for this visit, Wikipedia has provided us with this information, from which we are liberally paraphrasing:

Dominica’s name is locally pronounced with emphasis on the third syllable, following the Spanish pronunciation of its name given to it by Christopher Columbus.

The island was settled by the Arawak arriving from South America in the fifth century. The Kalinago displaced the Arawak by the 15th century. Columbus is said to have passed the island on Sunday, 3 November 1493. He named the island as Dominica, after the Latin term dies Dominica for Sunday, the day on which the Spanish first saw. It was later colonized by Europeans, predominantly by the French from the 1690s to 1763. The French imported enslaved people from West Africa to Dominica to work on coffee plantations. Great Britain took possession in 1763 after the Seven Year’s War, and it gradually established English as its official language. The island gained independence as a republic in 1978.

It is the youngest island in the Lesser Antilles, and in fact it is still being formed by Geothermal-volcanicactivity, as evidenced by the world’s second-largest hot spring, called Boiling Lake. Dominica first emerged from the sea during the Oligocene era approximately 26 million years ago, making it one of the last Caribbean islands to be formed by volcanic activity. … Known as “The Nature Island of the Caribbean” due to its lush scenery and varied flora and fauna, Dominica is largely covered by rainforest. Within its borders lie two ecoregions: Windward Islands moist forests and Windward Islands xeric scrub. The most mountainous of the Lesser Antilles, its volcanic peaks are cones of lava craters, the largest of these being (north-to-south) Morne aux Diables, Morne Diablotins (the highest on the island at 1,447 m).

Dominica is especially vulnerable to hurricanes as the island is located in what is referred to as the hurricane region. Tropical Storm Erika devastated the island in August 2015, killing 30 and causing severe environmental and economic damage. Dominica was again struck on 18 September 2017, suffering a direct landfall from Category 5 Hurricane Maria, which caused losses of approximately US$930 million or 226% of the island’s annual GDP. 

Our tour begins adjacent to the dock at 10:20am. Essentially, we will visit three places: Jacko Falls in the middle of the island in the rainforest, the Dominica Botanic Garden in Roseau and Morne Bruce where we will be able to overlook the west side of the island.

Our guide introduces herself, and Steve fails to write down her name. She is very formal at first, and, while she does impart a great deal of information, it is fairly rapid-fire and the bus is bouncing so much that Steve can’t take notes. We start out making our way through the capital city of Roseau, which has a population of around 20,000. The entire island population is 69,000. The streets are narrow and crowded, and there are no traffic signals. Everyone seems to have learned how to maneuver without them, however, and drivers seem quite polite to one another. Our progress is slow but steady. We wish we had time to explore the town. It looks intriguing.

Soon we are on the main road heading north out of Roseau. We pass the container port, and one of the ships we shared dock space in Barbados is there, the self-described “ultra-luxury expedition ship” MS Evrima. We chuckle that they ended up at the container port while our much more ordinary Insignia is at the cruise terminal in the heart of Roseau.

In a few more minutes, in Canefield, we take a right turn on to the Imperial Road. Immediately, we begin gaining altitude and encounter one hairpin turn after another.

In just a few minutes, we are in the rainforest. Here are a few factoids from our guide that we hear on our journey:

• 75% of the citizens of Dominica are Roman Catholic, a legacy of their French heritage.
• The island is 16 miles wide by 29 miles long and is the most mountainous of all the islands in the Caribbean. Given what we are seeing, we can easily see how it would be considered so.
• 65% of the island is rainforest.
• Average yearly rainfall along the windward east coast frequently exceeds 5,000 mm (196.9 in), and exposed mountainsides receive up to 9,000 mm (354.3 in), among the highest accumulations in the world. Totals on the leeward west coast, however, are only about 1,800 mm (70.9 in) per year. [Actually, while our guide referred to how rainy Dominica is and listed some stats, it was impossible to write down what she said because of the twisting, turning road, so this info was taken from Google].
• 60% of the electricity used on the island is produced from hydro, with the remainder from diesel motors.
• This road, the Imperial Road, was one of the first built to reach the middle of the island, and was built by slaves in the first half of the 19^th century. It must have been a monumental effort, given the topography.

When we reach what must be the middle of the island, the road is a bit wider and there are now very interesting street lights. Our guide says that that these were donated by another island after Hurricane Maria devastated the island in 2017. They are powered by wind and solar. (Some guy behind us thinks this was a waste of money, but we hear his know-it-all comments throughout the trip. We think the lights are a godsend in what must be incredibly dark night).

At 11:15, we arrive at what is referred to as Hibiscus Falls, but all the signs say Jacko falls. Our guide explains that our tour company is named Hibiscus Tours, so, quite confusingly, they call this by the tour company name. Whatever. 

This morning, our tour was rerouted a bit so that we would arrive at this time because there is some kind of professional “photo shoot” going on previously. Well, it’s still going on and will be for another hour. Fortunately, our tour guide and driver know of an alternative just five minutes away, so off we go to Spanny Falls, and will return to Jacko Falls later when this film outfit is done.

We are indeed there in five minutes, and we drive down this one-lane road into the woods. [Mr. Know-it-all says “I hope this driver knows what he’s doing.” What a jerk]. We have come to admire our driver’s skills in maneuvering this bus on the roads, and are sure that he indeed knows exactly what he is doing. In about a quarter of a mile, we come to a place to back into and park the bus. Our driver leaves us all off, and our guide, having described that there will be many steps on our way down to Spanno Falls, leads us on. Cathy is a good sport about this and both of us join the group.

The rainforest is amazingly lush and green. In may spots, we can barely see the sky. It’s beautiful and characteristically humid. There are about twenty-five of us, and we step our way carefully down the many concrete stairs.

We estimate it was probably ¼ mile and took twenty minutes, but at the end is a beautiful open spot with a thin waterfall about 50-60 feet high emptying into a shallow pool. We are surrounded on three sides by walls as high as the falls, with a brook leading from the pool surrounded by rainforest on the fourth side. 

We spend about fifteen minutes there admiring this enchanting location, taking photos and just taking in the peace and quiet of our surroundings. Sometimes there are deviations from a planned tour that turn out to be even more special that our intended destination, and Spanno Falls may be one of them. It takes about ten minutes to retrace our route back to the bus. 

We return to Jacko Falls, and the photo shoot is finished. When we ask what it was for, we get a vague answer and are told that whatever it is will be published in April of next year. All we can think of in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, but who knows. It would be fun to see, though.

Cathy has wisely decided to sit out this hike to Jacko Falls. We are told that there are 63 steps and some additional walking to reach them. Steve and some others venture down the trail.

Truthfully, he finds this trail shorter and easier than that we traversed at Spanno Falls, but the beautiful, lush rainforest still amazes. Jacko Falls is approximately 30-feet high, and empties into a crystal-clear pool. The topography can only be described as a grotto, with high walls on three sides and a beautiful brook leading away from the falls. Stunningly beautiful place to be, but, alas, we are on a timetable. 

Back up the trail to join Cathy at the outdoor café for the promised rum punch.

She has of course been chatting it up with others who stayed behind. She has a rum-less punch but Steve indulges in the high-test version. In about ten minutes, it’s time to hit the road. Other buses have arrived and the place is getting crowded. 

We wind our way down from the hills. We actually come to a roundabout right in the middle of the rainforest. It’s a four-way intersection. One road to the east heads towards Melville Airport. We continue on straight via dozens and dozens of hair-pin turns. It’s an incredible road in an incredibly beautiful forest. Now we understand why Dominica is described as “The Nature Island of the Caribbean.”

Thirty-five minutes later, we arrive at Dominica Botanic Garden for a nice walk. Because of our deviation to Spanno Falls, we are way behind schedule and cannot spend much time here. Our guide points out many interesting plants and trees. One is a paperback tree, whose leaves are used as a cold remedy. The leaves smell really good. Not part of the park’s collection, but still fascinating, are some 6-inch-long, colorful caterpillars in some bushes. 

Then she takes us a by a massive 375-year-old African Baobab tree. During Hurricane David in 1979, an enormous branch of this tree had fallen on to a small school bus, crushing it to half its original height. Thankfully, no one was in the vehicle at the time, but it still makes quite an impression.

Off to our last stop, Morne Bruce, which is right behind the Botanic Gardens and accessible from the eastern gate. It’s both an exclusive residential area of Roseau and the viewing spot to get a great look at Roseau and the Caribbean Sea. There are a couple of souvenir vendors up there, including a mom and her young daughter. Steve goes looking for photo ops, and also some last-minute souvenirs. The young lady says hello as he walks near their table. That’s all he needs to be convinced to check out what they have. Well, they do have some adorable magnets for sale. He intends to buy two, but is offered a bargain – three for ten dollars. Sold! 

Now our guide – and us guests, as well – are ready for the excursion to end. It was to be a three-hour tour, but it’s 2:00 now, almost an hour longer than scheduled. We think that it was very resourceful of our tour guide and her driver to have been able to add Spanno Falls to our itinerary when the scheduled photo shoot at the other venue ran long. It only takes about fifteen minutes for us to reach the pier. 

The ship departs Dominica promptly at 4pm. Steve goes up to the fitness track to get some final photos of the many mountains on this beautiful island.

The visit was too short to really learn all we wanted to about Dominica, but perhaps we will pass this way again. There’s way more to see and learn about a place we’ve waited for thirty years to see. As we have said before, one disadvantage of seeing a place on a cruise is the tight schedule the ship is on. We are leaving wanting to see much more.