This entire day has been a dream. I was exploring the rain forest in Roseau, Dominica. It was EASILY the best day of the cruise so far. My day started off with me opening the curtains and just saying "Wow". I mean really, this was my view:
We weren't even planning on doing an excursion but ended up getting a private tour (not through the ship) for 15 BUCKS. I don't understand how people can live off of that-its way too cheap! Just getting in a van and driving through this place is amazing. First off, this entire island doesn't have a traffic light. People just kinda ease toward each other until one gives up and the other is free to pass. Seriously, the traffic on Dominica is INTENSE. It takes about 2 minutes to go 20 feet because you have about 20 cars trying to communicate and agree on who can merge in or turn. On the way up to go hiking in the rain forest, we stopped at a stand manned by just one guy who seemed to really enjoy his job, letting us eat all of his fruit! He had mangoes and pineapples, bananas, guava and coconut. ( I realize coconut isn't a fruit...or is it?) It was soooo good and fresh-something a lot of people don't realize they're missing when living in America. It's no wonder why Philbur, our tour guide, told us that the island has had about 10 centenarians, 2 of which have been ranked as the oldest living people. The oldest person in the world lived here until 128 years old! So technically, I have about 105 years left. 
When we continued the tour, we stopped at a sulfur spring that was BOILING. It was something like 160 degrees Celsius which is 320 degrees Fahrenheit. And then, like in all rain forests, the sky opened up and POURED. It was at this convenient time that we had to climb our way to Trafalgar Falls- beautiful twin waterfalls, engulfed by the wild.
NOTE TO SELF: DO NOT WEAR FLIPFLOPS WHEN CLIMBING IN THE RAIN FOREST. I also brought my bag (which had my camera, sunblock, whatever) as if I was just going to be casually walking through the mall. DURRRRR. I managed to make it up and down steep terrain until we actually got to the falls. I handed off my bag, took my flip flops off and proceeded to explore on all fours. Seriously, for my clumsy ass, that is really the only way this could have been done. Not to mention that it had just down poured, so all the rocks were slick as hell.
In all seriousness, this was one of the most adventurous days of my life. There was just a feeling that existed on this island and by those falls that totally over took me. I was courageous-I was eating leaves off the trees for Christ's sake! (For the record, I was told I could, and they tasted like sour apple-it was a Willy Wonka moment.) It was so so so so sooooo unique and new to me, that I came full circle and I was just...comfortable.
After we trekked through and stopped to buy some souvenirs being sold by a few locals, we made our way back down the mountain and visited the botanical gardens. To be honest, especially because we couldn't get out of the car for this one, there wasn't much to see...except this:
You might be asking yourself, 'Ummmm, what the hell might I be looking at right now?' The answer is: a school bus. Oh. with a tree on top of it. This was caused by a hurricane a few years back (no one was in the school bus) and they can't lift it off, so the tree still grows. But now it just grows sideways...on a school bus.
This day was absolutely awesome, in the truest sense of the word. I loved meeting the locals and being barefoot in the rain forest. I felt free. I really did.
No comments:
Post a Comment