15:34.009N 061:27.713W
Whisper
Noel Dilly
Thu 7 Feb 2013 21:35
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"Prince Rupert
Bay, Portsmouth - 4th February"
We were very surprised and quite touched when Eric Spaghetti arrived to take us to Customs for Clearance, he presented us with a gift of fruits from his small garden. There were grapefruit, bananas, passion fruit and limes. The grapefruit are full of juice and so very sweet and extremely delicious; the passion fruit have a lovely sharp tang to them and the bananas are short, fat and full of flavour, we are enjoying a feast. After clearing Customs, who were both surprised and pleased to see us back so soon, we walked into Portsmouth for a few bits of shopping. After lunch we went for a short walk around agricultural farm land, which started just beyond the beach road. We saw orchards of mangoes, coconut and passion fruit. We met and chatted with the farmer who appeared to be cutting firewood and checked that it was ok to walk along the track across his land. He said it was alright but that when we got to the wider track we should not go that way, gesticulating to the right with his right arm, but that way, gesticulating to the left with his left hand. Well at least there was no confusion between left and right, remembering how often I say 'right' when pointing to the left! It was noticeably warmer in land than on the water even though we were not far in land at all. We passed a tree full of blossom and had the pleasure of watching five or six hummingbirds feeding on the nectar from the flowers. They were so tiny, about the size of my thumb and very quick so that it is quite difficult to be able to identify the colours, other than they were dark and iridescent with a long curved beak to enable them to reach right inside the flower whilst hovering close to it. As we walked along the road to the beach, we met a young man who had partaken of one to many rums! We wished each other a good afternoon, but he wanted to talk about why we liked his country. Noel explained that amongst many things, we liked the people of Dominica. He was very happy with this, and tottering a little said "Regardless of the colour?" "Of course", replied Noel, "colour is irrelevant". This pleased him even more and taking hold of Noel's hand, he kissed the back of it saying "I love you man, colour is irrelevant, I love that word, IRRELEVANT! No matter the colour, we are all one!" he slurred, at which point a second kiss was planted on Noel's hand, this time Noel reciprocated the gesture. After a few repeated "farewells" we eventually went our separate ways. 5th February We had arranged to go on a guided bus tour of the island today and were collected from Whisper at 9am. We had thought that we going around the island, but in actual fact we only covered one tenth of it. It is a magnificent island, the forest is a garden of Eden, fruit trees grow in abundance. Everywhere you look, there are banana trees, mango trees, breadfruit trees, coco trees, sour sop trees, passion fruit trees, cashew nut trees, orange trees, just to mention a few, all growing in the wild, not growing in orchards in organised lines like sentries, but all intermingled and gloriously covering the mountainous terrain in many shades of green interspersed with patches of the blazing red blossom of the Flamboyant trees. We learnt that these trees are often used to mark the boundaries of plantations. Pineapples also grow in the wild, not on trees as we thought, but as small bushes about 2ft tall with the fruit growing out the centre. We past a banana plantation, where all the trees had blue plastic bags covering the hands of bananas to protect them from the birds and insects ensuring them to be suitable for exportation and a coconut plantation where we saw the workers stripping the coconuts from their outer shells, evidently each person can strip around 600 coconuts per day! The island does not grow sugar cane any longer, the topography of the island makes it too difficult to be successful and production was stopped back in the 1800's. Bamboo also grows on the island, it is the worlds fastest growing plant and in Dominica it is used for building houses, making furniture and also for weaving hats, baskets and local crafts. In some areas it is planted close by the road as it stabilises the ground. We passed through many villages, the houses often so tiny and derelict but their small gardens full of wild fruit trees and planted rows of vegetables. We stopped several times to enjoy spectacular views over the Atlantic Ocean on the east of the island and the Caribbean Sea on the west and had lunch at a small restaurant on an idyllic beach where the Atlantic waves rolled in before crashing onto the shallow beach and rocks. We also visited a very small fishing village with a tiny slipway and learnt that is a port of entry to Dominica simply because of trading fish with the French Islands of Guadaloupe and Marie Galante. The highlight of the trip was a visit to a remote waterfall high in the hills. We were lucky to be able to visit it because the last village which we had to pass through "had the road up"! They were having running water piped to them so that they could have taps in their houses. Not only was the dirt road dug up along one side for the main pipe, but each house on the opposite side of the road had a small trench dug across the road for its own smaller pipe. Our guide drove very carefully across these open trenches, whilst the workers who were digging the trenches, stood back leaning on their spades, no doubt enjoying the short break forced upon them as we bumped along the road. Finally, we left the minibus and began the trek down towards the falls. I tried not to think of the hike it was going to be back up to the bus, we seemed to be walking down for about 30 minutes and that is a long way up! It was worth the effort, the falls were not particularly high at this point but the pool was deep and safe to swim in and it was possible for the brave to jump in. Most of us chose to enter sedately, joking about the hot water as the cold mountain water crept over us. Once immersed it was glorious and quite a work out trying to swim against the flow. Our guide, who had jumped in, then clambered up the rocks on the opposite side and slid down the water fall chute, the thought of bumps, bruises and grazes was a great deterrent to that challenge. We all thoroughly enjoyed it and were invigorated for the climb back up. Fortunately, we were taken a different way back to the bus, it was much steeper but shorter and we all survived! Dominica is a poor island in contrast to the neighbouring French islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique who receive financial help from France and The EU. It is independent and therefore does not receive any financial help, but it is rich in spirit and charm and the people are working hard to promote the island and encourage other nationalities to visit and enjoy their islands natural beauty. Photographs: "Spaghetti's Gift" "Bamboo Fence" |
