Blogs from Roseau, Dominica, Central America Caribbean

Le 14 mars au matin, nous sommes debout à 05h30 afin d’être prêts pour le départ de la randonnée; Méridien V vient nous chercher en annexe et nous rejoignons les autres au quai de « SeaCat ». Ce boat boy contrôle plusieurs moorings ici, à Roseau, et organise des activités touristiques pour les équipages des bateaux. Les deux autobus partent à 6h30 et nous sommes tous les 16 (14 québécois et 2 français) au début du sentier à 7h10. Nous avons notre lunch et un litre d’eau par personne, un sac à dos chacun. J’ai mis un pantalon capri (genre legging), JP un short, et nous avons enfilé nos bottes de marche. Nous sommes prêts!!! Du moins on le pensait… La marche, pour nous, a duré 9h; nous sommes rentrés les derniers à 16h15. Les ... read more

Waiti-kubuli, “Tall is her body” in Carib (the indigenous peoples of the land), was renamed Dominica when “discovered” by Columbus… surprisingly enough, on a Sunday. Luckily its geography prevented it, for the most part, from the fate of many of the other islands in the Caribbean. With an active volcano and mountainous terrain, the conditions were not conducive to slave-dependent sugar cane crops. And while this island was not completely immune to the woes of colonization, the peoples of Waiti-kubuli were fortunate enough that the rugged mountainous terrain insulated them from many of the all too common woes faced by the tribes of the islands around them. With areas of this small island averaging over 200 inches of rain a year, the landscape is peppered with tremendous waterfalls and 365 rivers winding their way across the ... read more

Last I wrote was a while ago – we were in Bequia – I can’t remember when that was date-wise. I guess I’ve lost that sense of time on the ship now; people speak of time in regards to geographic places, like: “Remember the last time we ran naked with burning palm fronds?” – “When was that?” – “Mangareva.” So where have we been since Bequia . . . hm. Having left the Caribbean a couple days ago and the tropics yesterday (twas a sad day) the islands seem a blurr. After Bequia . . . oh! Dominica! We had a short stop in Dominica which requires MUCH more time to explore beyond the evening and day off I had during our stop there. Dominica is HUGE and LUSH – known for its ecotourism. We luckily ... read more

We drove down the coast road to Roseau on Monday morning, checked into the Garroway hotel and parked our car in a position where we could drive out forwards (reverse gear is still not working – but that's another story). Then we just followed the sound of the music. At 11.30 the T-shirt bands were already pumping music through the streets. We grabbed a rum punch to kick off the day, found some lunch and then joined in the fun. It was great – we popped back to the hotel every so often to chill (and rest my knee) and then back again for another session in the streets. The huge articulated lorries carried the live bands, with speakers piled high on the back booming music to a stream of fans all dressed in the same ... read more

This is my first official post from a port! We arrived in Dominica very early in the morning on the 16th and were cleared by 8 am. I remember looking out my window and seeing nothing but ocean, but soon I realized that my window on the ship didn’t actually face Dominica. I decided to get out to the balcony and see what was on the other side. It is really hard to explain to someone what coming into an island port feels like. You feel so small! You’re in this tiny ship in the middle of nothing but endless water and out of nowhere there is this huge landmass. I've got to admit it felt really good to see land after all the rocking and sea sickness in the past few days (even though now ... read more

Clem drove us to Dive Dominica today. We boarded a boat and went to Champagne Bay. After a couple of hours snorkeling at Champagne, we sailed west towards Martinique to go whale-watching. A guide swam with us in Champagne, pointing the various marine organisms. We saw a sea cucumber, swam over a wrecked British ship, and enjoyed the warm bubbles that give Champagne Bay its name. During our whale-watching trip, our captain would continuously stop the boat and place this device in the water used for listening to whales. He would then follow the direction of their sounds, until we finally saw a sperm whale breaching. We followed her for a while and caught glimpses of what was probably her calf. The first whale was almost 9 m long. Journal Entry 20: 06/13/10 Today was our ... read more