Great jungle hike to Middleham Falls

It was a very wet and rainy start to the day, the walk today to Middleham Falls was what we were meant to do yesterday, but was cancelled because the steep trail would be too slippery in the wet. We were not going to be put off by the rain today, as we had heard it was one of the best trails. We set off with Wee Fee driving us for about an hour into the interior, along some very steep and narrow concrete roads, they all have deep culverts running alongside making it very tricky navigating passing traffic. It felt pretty remote when we finally made it to the start of the trail which has a reception building, but looks as if it has been closed for ages. Sadly right next to it they are building a new hotel, goodness knows how the busses make it up here, which they apparently do when the Cruise ships are in town. There were a few slippery inclines and declines that our 4×4 vehicle was just coping with.

It was raining at the start so I had to get my poncho on – sweaty business! We had to cross a river shortly after starting, keeping our shoes on as it was so slippery on the rocks. I was very happy to be in my Keens(hiking waterproof sandals), which I had been a little nervous about, as I had left my hiking shoes on the boat, but I needn’t have worried they were perfect. It was a gorgeous dense foliage walk, with loads on ginger lilies and heliconias. We did a steady steep climb initially and I soon had to take my poncho off, the rain had stopped and I was sweating madly. The path was very well maintained and I guess in normal tourist times the trail would have plenty of hikers on it, we had the place to ourselves. Although we didn’t see a parrot we could hear them. After about an hour’s walking we made it to the falls. It is a really high waterfall in a bowl, most probably an old crater. It was well worth the effort.

Wee Fee pointing out the ginger lillies

Gorgeous tree ferns everywhere, they use the trunks for the steps as they do not get slippery like wood as they are fibrous.

This is a section of the Waitukubuli trail

Middleham Falls

The falls are 230 feet tall

The trail is often just a mesh of roots

Tree ferns everywhere

Another volcano

On the way back to the hotel we stopped at the Botanical gardens in Roseau. Loads of trees planted from all around the world which have suffered from the hurricanes. There are two enormous Baobab trees growing very close together, one fell down on the school bus during the hurricane in 1979, thank goodness nobody was in the bus at the time. They have just left it as it fell, all part of the garden’s history now.

Banyan tree

More beautification of the roadsides!

Back at the hotel it was another gruelling evening of a massage followed by yoga, actually I had booked a pedicure that ran over time, so I didn’t make the yoga. Rowan was the only person to turn up and had an hour dedicated to him, which he enjoyed very much.

We discovered earlier in the day that the receptionist Judy, is the Covid queen, so we decided to ask her about getting our second vaccine done. She was so sweet, she said she would sort it and that we could go with a bunch of staff tomorrow morning who are all going for their second jabs.

Good to go to bed feeling we had really had some good exercise today.