Day Four, Dominica

Dominica, "discovered" by Christopher Columbus in 1493, colonized by the French in the 1600's, and under British rule from 1805-1978 when it gained its full independence, was our second port of call. I had never even heard of Dominica before we started planning this trip. Our first stop was the Emerald Pool. Our van climbed up, up, up over the pothole filled road to the tour-bus-filled parking lot of Morne Trois Pitons National Park. We took a short hike through beautiful rainforest and scaled some rocks to get up close to the waterfall. The falls would be a very different experience on a day where there were no ships in port (we were there along with a Celebrity cruise). You can tell which ship people are on by the color of their towels - buttercup yellow is Celebrity, navy is Carnival.

This spot was too crowded to deal with taking a plunge so we just enjoyed the view before hiking back out.

Here is Juliet showing off her dance moves by the souvenir stands. She holds her arms out and spins around, practicing to be a prima ballerina. She also does a mean moon walk. She is so proud of herself - I think hearing how cute she is all the time is going to her head.

From the Emerald Pool, we made our way back down the mountain toward the capital of Roseau, then back up through the valley past the sulfur springs to Trafalgar Falls. We had some lunch at the snack area there and Mike slurped a fresh ginger-tangerine drink - yum. I was not adventurous enough to try the "snout and beans" listed on the chalkboard menu and went for the fish sandwich instead! I couldn't help but wonder what the "tea for men" is on the menu below, hmmm:

After lunch, I hiked with a sleeping monkey on my chest to the lookout point to view the falls. The path beyond was way too sketchy to navigate without having all of my faculties, so I let Mike carry on without me. I missed out! The two waterfalls fall into separate pools that stream down separately, and then eventually join together a hundred or so yards away. One of the falls is refered to as the mother fall (it is the shorter of the two and is cold water) and the other is the father fall (it is the taller of the two and is made up of hot water from the sulfur springs), so one can cool off in the cold pool, then jump over to warm back up in the pool of warm water, and so on. This was one of Mike's favorite places and probably would have been one of mine if we hadn't been there at nap time. Juliet woke up to a rain storm (we were in the rainforest after all), so Mike hiked back up from his swimming spot, we stuck her on my back, took some pics waiting for the rain to die down a bit, then hiked back out.

In the Botanical Gardens we saw the schoolbus crushed by a tree during Hurricane David (1979). The tree fell onto the empty schoolbus, crushed it, but keeps on growing right on top of the bus.

We found a well hidden play area on the ship that Juliet just loved. It had little houses to play in, a slide, and a kiddie pool (we weren't the only ones who pretended that we didn't see the sign that said "no swim diapers".

After all of the action, we even made it out for formal night (much to Michael's chagrin). The waiter kept pushing the tomato sauce for Juliet's pasta, but I thought the white dress from her Auntie Aleesa would fare better with butter and parm!

After a long day, it was time for a bath in the blow up tub we brought along for bathing and for playing by the pool. Then goodnight and off to the next port!