Dominica

We arrived to Dominica on Sat night but we weren't allowed to get off the ship till Sunday morning :( But did it feel good to stop moving! Sunday morning we woke up at 7:30 for the most amazing breakfast- they had all local fruits and hot chocolate croissants for us on the ship before we all left for our outings. My day trip that I signed up for was through semester at sea- it was exploration of the emerald pools and water tubing. Some other trips included Trafalgar falls or snorkeling in the Champagne reef. We left at 8:15 with about 30 SAS kids all eager and excited for the day to come! Dominica was beautiful... extremely green and luscious. The town was full of bright colors and everyone was so happy to have tourists because that is the majority of the income for these people. There were stray dogs and kids running through the streets and it seemed relatively clean. The bus ride took us to a rain forest about 30 min into Dominica. We walked about a mile deep in the forest to see the most beautiful waterfall and it almost did look emerald! The trees and greenery reflected so beautifully on the water and the sun was shinning through the bamboo. It truly was beauty. We swam around and took lots of photos before we were back on the bus to go to the water tubing site! We all got in individual tubes with the Wacky Riders and coasted down the river with some occasional rapids. This was really fun and was a great icebreaker for some of the kids. We ended to fresh sugarcane and pineapple and again took tons of photos! Sorry again I cant post many photos :( It exceeds our Internet which we only have 2 hours of for the entire semester! We then met up with some other kids on the boat and went to a black beach called Mero Beach to have some drinks and enjoy the rest of the day. Back at the ship later that night everyone was very excited to go out because we haven't in so long it felt like! No one really knew were to go because being Sunday, a holiday in Dominica, everything was closed! But of coarse... we made them open this place called Crazy Coconuts just for us and I bargained the cover from $20 to $5 :) Everyone had an amazing night drinking the local rum called Red Cap or the local beer called Kabuli. The club was beautiful and everyone was drenched from sweat coming back to the ship later that night.
Early morning once again today.. awoke to a pounding on my door at 8am. About 20 of us decided to get in a cab with a local who was going to bring us to a waterfall in the middle of Dominica. It was kinda of rainy this morning so it felt good to be in a cab just looking out the window at all of the beauty in this country. Thomas our guide was the man. He had this adorable cracked tooth smile and told me he was into red heads? He brought us to this snack shop and we all ventured into the forest to find this rain forest. (Thanks Omi for that emergency poncho- really came in handy!) So when I say this was the most amazing waterfall Ive ever seen.. its an understatement. The fall was about 50 ft into a pool that you could climb around. It came from a huge wall which enclosed the entire pool with so much greenery and vines surrounding it. There were birds above us, rainbows around us, and we loved it. We then scaled some rocks to get to the other side where there were 3 more waterfalls! I mean it was breath taking... all of us were in awe and stayed there for a couple hours just messing around and enjoying life. When we got back to the snack shop we danced and drank for a while till we got back into the cab and brought to the market. We bought some local food and gifts and decided to head back to the ship since we all have to go back 2 hours before- so we don't get dock time (kinda like a time out for the next port if your not back on time)! Buuuut before we got back I got a hair wrap which i have decided to put a bead or shell in with every port- then cut it off for my scrap book! I thought this was pretty clever :P SO back on the boat we all went to the top deck and tanned and relaxed until the most amazing thing happened. There was a double rainbow over all of Dominica. It was breathtaking. The sun started to set, it was hot, it was misty, and everyone was shocked. You really felt spoiled. This port was amazing and we made such good friendships already- i cant believe I've only been here for 5 days it feels like forever! Well its around 8 now and we have just left for our journey to Brazil- approx 7 days. And i have to write a 3 page paper and read 4 chapters... i totally forgot i was in school??