Position 14:28.20N 60:52.10W
Freewheel
Julian & Anne Whitlock
Sun 21 Nov 2010 21:19
Marin/Martinique 12-15th
November
It has been some time since we last
explored Martinique so we pulled into the marina at Marin
on the south east corner to hire a car and
renew our acquaintance. We soon recalled the horrendous
driving standards peculiar to this island
and the traffic jams but as we progressed further north
the
roads became less busy although the driving
no less aggressive. Our first stop was to do a hike in
virgin rainforest near Morne Chapeau
in the Pitons du Carbet. Having not used our legs for a week
or
so climbing nearly vertically up for over
1000ft in 85f proved quite a challenge. However it was
worth
while and we felt ok at the end. Important
because our real challenge was the next day when we
set
ourselves the climb up Mount Pele. We had
done this climb 5 years earlier when Natasha and Tim
were with us. It was particularly gruelling
because there in no shade and when one finally reaches
the first caldera you see that you have to
descend steeply again 300+ feet before tacking the next
stage - an even steeper 500ft ascent. Even
that is not the end - two further mini calderas require
you to descend before once again climbing.
The summit is at 4600 ft and whilst you start the hike
at 2000 ft the additional ups and down
mean you feel as if you have climbed the lot! Well
after
an early morning start we reached the
summit in 2 1 /2 hrs. Fortunately we started in cloud so
it was not too hot but we felt a
massive achievement that two, recently become 60 year olds,
could
still get to the top. We felt totally
exhausted by the time we regained the car and don't feel we
will
be doing another climb like this for a
while. We did take a number of photos to prove we
achieved
the summit but alas - whilst in Antigua a
week later and before downloading the pictures
our camera
was stolen off the boat so for the
foreseeable future our blogs will be sans
pictures...
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