Roseau, Dominica

 Dominica

If it’s Tuesday, it must be, wait a second while I consult my daily bulletin from the ship  Ah yes.  We are in Dominica (doh mih NEE kah) today and in the middle of 11 port days in a row all of which find us at a new port except for the one overnight we already experienced in Barbados.  I have no idea where we are tomorrow, and I had to ask where we had been yesterday.  Such is a voyage which has gone on for over two months so far and has changed itineraries multiple times.  We docked in the capital city of Roseau.  This is the dry side of the island and gets only six feet or so of rain annually.  The wet part of the island gets closer to 30 feet a year.  Not a misprint.  Feet.  We were informed it was another bubble tour day last night.  This means you have to have a ship tour, or a tour that is okayed by the tourist ministry to get off the pier.  Today we had a ship tour planned so good on us.  We began with an hour drive from the port across the island.   Our first stop of the day would be the Morne Trois Piton’s National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

This is another up and down island.  According to our guide, Dominica is the most contoured of the islands in the Caribbean and is known as the “Nature Island of the Caribbean.”  The pictures will show it has a lot of contours.  The drive had the requisite hills and views and hairpin turns all from the wrong side of the road.  Yes, all these former British protectorates seem to drive on the left side of the road.  That of course assumes there are sides to these pretty narrow tracks called roads.  The island is lovely, very green, with many things blooming.  We hiked through the rain forest to one of the many waterfalls in the park and some tour members took a short swim in “Emerald Pool” below the falls.   Lovely falls and lovely pool.  The rainforest was similar to all the others we have been walking through.   We chose not to get wet at this time because we knew we were going to get wet in the second portion of our tour.  We didn’t want a long ride in wet clothes.

After the falls we drove back across the island to the Layou River for a mass tubing event down the river.  The company that took us down the river appeared to be pretty much at their limit.  This observation is based on being in the back of the line and receiving the last life jacket which probably fulfilled their obligation to give all passengers life preservers, but had there been any sort of problem there is no way it would have preserved anything.  This did not bother me since I had watched the river as we drove to the put-in point and using all my former skills as a whitewater river guide had determined this was going to be a fun float with no real issues.  Watching the guides piling onto their tubes without jackets and pulling themselves ahead to stand in the river at various points to guide any wayward tubers back into the main channel just confirmed the observations.  We took forty-five minutes to float down towards the ocean.  There were a couple of stops to regather the group together.  There were a few quick sections with tiny rapids.  It was fun.  It rained several times.  We had a mass joke telling session during one gathering moment.  This is how you make a short trip seem a bit longer.  The leader had us connect groups together and literally walked the last few hundred yards pulling his group as we neared the ocean and lost our current.  Upon exiting we had the complimentary cup of rum punch that seems to be offered on every tour in the Caribbean.  Thirty minutes along the coast took us back to our ship.  Jen took some time in the shops that were contained in the bubble near the pier but could not find anything needing to be purchased.  Another very nice day.  Looking forward to violinist Claire Gobin who is the scheduled entertainment tonight.