Barbuda - a Hideaway in the Middle of Nowhere

 

Rocking the night away at Shirley Heights

Wow ..what a night! Now we can say we have been there, we have done this; we can tick the box X partied and participated in Antigua's nightlife.

We hiked up a steep hill and really deserved a drink once we reach the summit.  When we reached Shirley Heights which used to be a lookout point for the British Army in 1764, we could not believe our eyes how many people joined us in this idea to watch the sunset from the highest point in Antigua.

First we were entertained by a steel band, but then a life band entered the stage and started rocking the crowds. I haven't experienced anything like that since I went to a rock concert as a teenager. I dance away all night and had the time of my life!

The trees of life

Treating trees with the respect they deserve: a whispered compliment, a gentle touch or even a share of your water will ensure that the spirits are satisfied.

 Held sacred by the ancient Mayans and being of great spiritual importance to the people of Antigua is the imposing Silk Cotton or Ceiba Tree. In the forest at Walling you can spot the huge, buttressed trunk and broad, flat crown of horizontal branches. From December to February you will see dense clusters of whitish to pink flowers that bloom before the leaves appear and that are followed by long elliptical fruits that burst to reveal the cottony fibres that surround the seeds. This fibrous floss known as kapok is a common stuffing in furniture and mattresses and in life preservers.

This morning I took my Yoga practice onto land for a change. It was nice to feel grounded while doing the downward dog and to feel the earth underneath me.  Be surrounded by the history of English harbour while moving in and out of the warrior sequence. Feeling deeply rooted to the whole universe while standing in the tree pose. Feeling connected to the spirit of the trees while my mind and heart is expanding to my breathing.  I have noticed a change in my yoga practice lately, lots of heart opening postures; leaving me wondering whether this is preparing me for our move to become landlubbers again, a change in season or a spiritual transition inside me. Whatever it is I will continue to observe, trying not to analyze it too much and simply be the witness without judgment for the things to come. This morning I enjoyed for relaxation to sit in the roots of a beautiful tree embraced by nature and its beauty.

When Christopher Columbus visited the New World in 1492 he was impressed by the huge Amerindian canoes, or Ceiba Trees; some big enough to carry 100 men. They were hollowed out of a single piece off the trunk of the Ceiba tree. Many ceremonies preceded the choosing of the tree and permission from the tree spirits was sort before its felling. Nowadays the tree has lost much of its commercial importance but it is still held in reverence and even fear for its spiritual properties. In some Caribbean countries it is call “God Tree” or “Devil Tree” and it legends and strange tales have been passed down through the generations with many people still believing that the tree has a soul or resident spirit. Even today, people have stories of extraordinary personal experiences over Silk Cotton Trees in their gardens.

The elixir of Life

Coconut water can also be called the elixir of life. We have been unfortunate enough to find this elixir of life in every Caribbean Islands that we have visited so far.

It is delightful to stand in the shade of a tree or in the middle of the market under the sun after a day of sightseeing and to drink a freshly opened coconut. Picking the coconut you desire from the overloaded pickup truck, is already the start of an adventure in itself.  The locals are very skillful and fast when they open up the coconut with their huge machetes. Once your mouth is touching the raw open coconut, you can already feel the water of life flowing down your throat to refresh and rejuvenate every cell of your body .

The average green coconut holds about 750 ml and is fat free, naturally isotonic and has the same electrolytic balance as our blood. Did you know that it contains anti-inflammatory nutrients, including vitamin C, selenium and folate and is rich in B vitamins as well as the minerals potassium, magnesium, manganese and calcium? It has cleansing properties for the major organs and aids the digestive process. Coconut water, siphoned directly from the nut, has even been used as emergency plasma in transfusions for wounded soldiers during the Second World War.

 

Antigua - in amongst the big ones

We are in Antigua. Its different to what I expected ..... well the masses of tourists from three big cruise ships certainly don't help to paint a picture of a secluded island in the Caribbean...

 

Guadeloupe to Antigua

It was windy, the sea was high and it was rough and luckily after 5 hours we arrived safely in Falmouth Harbour in Antigua.

French little Island group - Les Saintes

The wind has dropped a bit on the day we leave Dominica, we use this small weather window to sail further up north, our destination Guadeloupe. As usual we are leaving the harbour early and by the time our eyes are wide open we can already see Les Saintes, a group of French Island 5 miles before Guadeloupe. The wind has picked up again and so we decide to take shelter in between the island and to stock up on Baguette, French Cheese and Red Wine to wash it all down. There is no space to anchor and we have to take a mooring ball. We had heard that you have to come early to be able to get a mooring, and we are in luck. Unfortunately it’s one on the outside of the mooring field and so we catch the swell and have a very rocky day and night. As we are getting ready to leave the bay after breakfast, we see that a mooring close to land gets free, we race to the front of the Catamaran and Sven switches the engines on and off we go and motor to the free mooring. Yeah….we made it and what a reward, there is no swell, we are lying calm, like on a duck pond...we decide to stay a few days longer....the ice-cream here is extremely delicious :)

 

We are just about to leave Dominica....

Wow, we are still in Dominica. What an island, what a place to be. We just wanted to stop for a night, but have been captivated by the beauty of this island with the ancient name of “Waitukubuli” meaning standing tall in her body. The last two weeks we have been busy exploring the island by bus from the north to the south, expanding our discoveries with friends from the east to the west driving a rental car. We saw nearly all of the 365 rivers, and visited a numbers of waterfalls and completed this experience to the fullest while soaking in the hot pools in a little village called Wotton Waven. Sitting in the iron tubs in the middle of the jungle, surrounded by cold and hot natural showers, mud pools and hot springs has probably been the highlight of our stay here.
Below you can read about our adventures as we are getting the boat ready to leave to Guadeloupe....pictures will follow in the next harbor....big hug to you all

A little piece of heaven - Dominica

On our first trip around the island with Alec, we hired a bus and were driven around. Our first couples of impression of Dominica haven’t been that great so we wanted to give this island another chance to put a spell on us. It worked. Wow, it worked! What we saw made us wanting to stay longer to deepen our experience and to get to know the island with its friendly people. Everywhere we went people were waving and welcoming us to their country. Our first stop took us to Roseau the capital of Dominica. Roseau is a busy, crowded little town and we have been here before. So we only filled up our gas bottles, investigated the prices at budget marine, bought a nice chocolate croissant and the best bread in the Caribbean in the Petit Paris Bakery.

From here we decided to go to the Trafalgar Falls, and hiked to the mother and father waterfalls which are impressive and next to each other. The water is cold and we had a refreshing dip in some of the waterholes created by nature. While exploring this territory we stumbled across some hot water springs, and enjoyed soaking in this water, which is said to be healing for skin diseases and other sorts, we simply enjoyed sitting in the hot water. Our next stop was the emerald pool which was set deep in the middle of the jungle, crystal ice cold water with fresh water prawns. Our next stop took us over to the East Coast which is the home to the last of the indigenous Caribbean people. Nearly 3500 of these mixed descendants of the Kalinago live in eight villages on a 3700 acres National Reserve, which became their land over 100 years ago. The Kalinago people continue to farm and fish and practice traditional skills such as basket making and canoe building.

 

We could tell as soon as we entered the Reserve, it looked clean and lots of colorful flowers and plants were embracing the roads. We drove along the East Coast through interesting villages, some looked completed deserted and some neatly nestled along the Atlantic Ocean beaches which was rough and wild in its presence. When we arrived back in Portsmouth we decided to expand our stay a bit longer to explore the island a bit more, to experience and maybe make friends with the friendly Dominicans.   A few days went pass and we hiked up to Forth Shirley with some friends and explored the nature and history of this fort with Dagmar and Frank from the SV/Highflight. We bought an Eco site pass which allowed us to visit pools, parks, trails and waterfalls unlimited times within a week. Sven refreshed himself with the award winning locally brewed Kubuli beer, while we enjoyed the taste of different fresh homemade juices.
My favourite juices are Guava with ginger and Sorrel, which is made from local plant. Fascinated by the taste I bought the seeds on the market and made my own home brew with plenty of ginger and sweetened it with local honey; delicious and refreshing after a day of homeschooling, swimming and exploring. We went to the local BBQ on Sunday, enjoyed the company of local food and rum punch, joined the crowds for carnival, had another wonderful music session on board of Cool Change with friends from SV/ Kia Ora, danced through the night, sang our heart out and listened to an amazing ladies voice during a little concert on the beach. After that we were ready for another tour to see what Mother Nature has to offer on Dominica.

To deepen our experience and to make the most out of our time here we hired a car for five days. On our first day Bjoern joined us from SV/Tauranga. We went up around the top of the island and were immediately blown away by the views over to Les Saintes, Guadeloupe and Maria Galante; the Atlantic Ocean on our right and the Caribbean Sea to our left. The top part of Dominica is 1968 feet above sea levels and here you can find all sorts of agricultures, every inch is filled with produce that we find on the markets in Portsmouth and Roseau on Saturdays. We wanted to have lunch at Calibishie which is said to be inhabited and influenced by Europeans, however did not like the prices there and ended up enjoying delicious local food in Wesley. We wanted to show Bjoern the Kalinago Reserve but missed the turn off  to the coast and ended up in the middle of the Island at the Layou River. We were all a bit confused at first that we miss the turn, however it turned out that we discovered a part of the island that we might have missed otherwise and this put the icing on our cake. We stopped in the middle of nowhere and hiked to the Penice Spanny Falls; a lush, green well maintained walkway led us to an amazing waterfall and pool to cool off after that long drive in the car. Carlos and I explored the second waterfall, by climbing up the rope and some abseiling did lead us to another stunning waterfall, adventure pure. On our way back to the East Coast we drove along the Layou River which was mesmerizing and if we counted right, the 187^th river that we passed or crossed throughout that day.

On our second day we decided to explore the south of the island.  On this little expedition Dagmar and Frank from Germany joined us. Our main aim on that day was to find some hot sulphur springs to soak our bodies in some hot water. We went right down to the bottom of Dominica; Soufriere and its endless hot springs. We were a bit disappointed what we found, but pressed on with determination to find some hot pools. We did find some hot springs on the beach, which was interesting to have the hot bubbles coming up from the grounds while sitting in the Caribbean Sea. We took a picture of the most photographed church on the island. We started to hike up the mountain to find the boiling lake, only to realize that it would take us three hours one way, so we decided against it, however along the way we were still treated with a unspoiled nature trail and great scenery including patches of bare smelly sulphur grounds. This area reminded me very much of back home in New Zealand, it was also interesting to see how different the environment from the south to the north of the island was.

We hiked a bit more along the Titou Gorge, but decided against a breathtaking swim in this ice cold water as the current seems very strong that day, probably due to all the rain that we had during the day. We slowly made our way back to Portsmouth along the West Coast. In Portsmouth we treated ourselves to the touch of a European dish and indulged in a Shawarma and a Kubuli. There is a setting of little restaurants  close to the US based Ross Medical School, which is a great income source for the area with its 1700 medical students from all over the world. The next day we wanted to show Dagmar and Frank our favourite spots on the northern part of the Island; this time we wanted to include the Kalinago  Reserve. I don’t know how, but once again we missed the turn and ended up driving along the same road as on the first day. No worries; we saw different things, took different pictures, stopped at different  locations, met different people, ate the most amazing octopus chowder in a little village near St.Joseph and it was another beautiful trip around an amazing stunning Island.   

For our next trip with the rental car we asked Bjoern to join us again. This time we wanted to drive right around Dominica and see the places that we hadn’t seen and that included the lower south East Coast. That day we did a lot of driving, and the southern side of the East Coast seemed totally different to the rest of the Island. The scenery was still stunning, but the people did not seem that friendly and seemed to be wondering what we were doing on that side of Dominica. The roads and country side was rugged and rough and very much “el natural”, lots of waterfalls along the way and we also found a little charming riverside café where we had a drink and rested for a while. This tour involved a lot of driving and I had to admire Sven for his patient, he only moaned once when I asked him to stop the car for the 66^th time so that I could take another picture of the breath taking views, the stunning nature or something odd that I had seen as we were driving along. We ended up driving for nearly 9 hours non-stop, stopped only for a drink, taking pictures and lunch in a local restaurant where we have eaten before. We came home exhausted and I believed toured out and filled to the maximum of impressions, experiences and discoveries. It was time to bring back the car and take the next few days to relax back on the boat with a swim or two, reflect on our trips and to rejuvenate our brain cells with some quiet time. 

I had promised Carlos and Julia to find some natural hot pools and to have some family time, so for our last day with the rental car we decided to go by ourselves and only do hot pools; I also have to admit we were all pretty pooped from all the driving and sightseeing. I packed some salami sandwiches and had researched in details where to find the natural hot pools. We went to Wotten Waven to find some hot sulphur springs and we did. We went to the Ti Kwen Glo Cho, sounded already exotic and exciting before we got there. They had advertised unique Victorian bathtubs, mud baths and a beautiful waterfall in a very secluded setting. We were lucky, no one else there and we could enjoy the pretty gardens, sat in the Victorian bathtubs and had a relaxing family time…just what we needed.

Back on the boat I went through the map, crossed off what we have seen and was satisfied and happy what we have explored and experienced.  As I was reading through the guidebooks and information that we had gathered throughout the last few days, I discovered another area  that might be of interest and it was not too far away from Portsmouth. The Morne Diablotins National Park is home to one of the highest mountain of the Caribbean.  I persuaded Sven to take a little trip up the mountain before we return the car to the Silver Lining rental car company. We invited Bjoern to join us on our last action with the rental car and drove up the into the mountain territory of Morne Diablotins. What a treasure to be found, wow we were greeted by a green plateau of fresh produce of all kinds. Coffee bushes lined the road, Pineapples fields and trees full of oranges, grapefruits, Avocados, Bananas, Guavas, Papayas and tall Mango trees. Vines filled with Passion fruits, Sorrel Bushes and patches of Sweet Corn and Wild mushrooms. Now I believe that we have explored every inch of the island, did not leave a stone unturned, crossed most of the rivers, saw small, wide and tall waterfalls, met beautiful people and believe that we could picture ourselves living here and making Dominica our home. Who knows what the future will bring it will definitely be marked as a hot spot on our world map.