We just got back from a 10 night stay in Dominica. We started in Roseau Valley at Cocoa Cottages for the first 4 nights, focusing on in-land hiking and canyoning for the first part of our trip before heading on to diving. The owner of Cocoa Cottages, Iris, was super-flakey, moderately passive-aggressive, gave us a bunch of misinformation and didn't tell us there was no canyoning available until we arrived there (her partner, Richard, who is the only person who does the canyoning tours, was away). Since this was the reason we chose her lodge above others, we were quite disappointed. If I stay in Roseau Valley again, I'd stay at the Rain Forest Shangri-La Resort. The owner (Fred) is a massage therapist and teaches free yoga classes, the grounds filled with an amazing array of natural beauty and there are some excellent natural hot springs there which make for an excellent way to unwind the muscles after a strenuous day's hike. The hiking was fantastic. Our hike to Boiling Lake (with our fantastic guide from Cocoa Cottages, Jeffrey) was AMAZING. It was one of the most challenging but simultaneously satisfying and fulfilling hikes of my life. Well-maintained trails, amazing views, informative guide, wrapped up with a soak in some hidden natural hot springs/waterfall pools then a swim through the gorge to the waterfall at Titou Gorge. We also hiked to Middleham Falls (most beautiful waterfall in Morne Trois Pitons National Park, per the park ranger, with a glorious swimming hole), Boeri Lake (some balancing acts on slippery moss-covered rocks on this one- be careful!), Freshwater Lake (seemed too easy after the other hikes, more of an easy stroll around the lake than a hike) and Trafalgar Falls (very short, beatiful, some small hot springs as well). We also soaked in the hot springs at Screw's Spa, more of a local's hang-out. He offers you a huge platter of fresh fruit and his special rum punch after your time in his many pools of varying temperature.
Now, to the diving. We dove 3 days with Nature Island Dive in Soufriere and stayed at the Gallette Cottages (run by the dive shop). We dove at Danglebens Pinnacles, L'Abym, Crater's Edge, Champagne Reef, Danglebens Pinnacles other side, Scottshead Drop-off). The diving was fantastic, with your standard array of Carribean creatures (trumpetfish, honeycomb cowfish, squirrelfish, spotted morays, yellow-striped goatfish,flounder, lots of spotted drumfish, spiny puffers, banded shrimp, yellowtail, tunas, filefish, barracuda, fire worms,jacks, trunkfish, harlequin pipefish, groupers, sand divers, lobsters, jawfish, garden eels, mackerel, grunts, damselfish, parrotfish) as well as some more special ones (turtles, lettuce sea slug, octopus, lots of scorpion fish, one crazy bright orange frogfish, giant coubera snapper). We had hoped to see sperm whales but you have to go 5-6 miles out for this and are not permitted to swim close to them. We stayed in-land amongst the amazing underwater topography (pinnacles, drop-offs, at the edge of abysmal volcanic craters, swim-throughs and even active volcanic fumaroles, where you can see the mixing of hot spring water and ocean water and feel the warm vents bubbling up from below). The array of coral and sponges and the immense number of gigantic barrel sponges was awesome. Weefee, the DM, was excellent, attentive to my recently certified buddy's needs and very experienced. The equipment was moderately well-maintained, with some leaky valves on the BCDs or 2nd stage connections and some missing dump cords on the BCDs, but the staff was very attentive towards quickly correcting anything major and we felt very safe with them. Soaking in the shallow hot-spring pools constructed by the locals in front of the Soufriere church was a way to quickly blaze through the surface intervals. The Soufriere hot springs were also a fun little hike.
We had heard from some friends that the South End had the better diving and we'd have to say that our experience was better with Nature Island Dive than it was with Cabrit's (up north in Portsmouth) as well. We stayed at the Calibishie Lodges (a nice treat at the end as it was the most luxurious of all of our accomodations there, and the President of Dominica actually stayed there while we were there!). The drive to the dive shop from Calibishie (approx 30 min) wasn't too bad, but you may want to take this into consideration. We intended to dive two days, but shortened it to one day as we were a bit put off by the lack of attention of our DM and the diving itself seemed a bit anemic after our experiences in Soufriere/Scott's Head Marine Reserve. We went to Five Finger Rock (lobster, channel cleaner crab, spotted drums, sharptail eel, spotted morays, goldentail morays) and Sunshine Reef (giant basket stars, 2 spotted eagle rays, 2 hawksbill turtles, spotted snake eel, arrow crab). On the first dive, our DM ascended to the surface without telling any of us and left me with my buddy and a very inexperienced recently certified diver. While I still had 1500 psi and am usually interested in staying down to search the reef for tiny creatures, I was cold and a little bored by that time anyway, so I gestured towards the others to see if they wanted to do a 3 min safety stop together and then go up. When we got on the boat, we found our DM (John) was up there already. On the second dive, he ended the dive really early too and when I asked him why we all went up after a relatively short and shallow dive when we still had 1500-2000 psi left, he said he wanted to hurry back to the shop for the afternoon dives. Also, the boat was broken so we spent a large amount of time before our first dive watching the captain change spark plugs and try to get the motor started again. When some divers suggested we just jump in, I had to remind them that this wasn't a good idea since it would be difficult for a broken boat to come collect a diver if there was a problem. After a while of choking on sputtering engine exhaust, I asked the Instructor (there with someone doing AOW) if we should call back to the shop and have another boat come and meet us. He replied, "What other boat?" Needless to say, we skipped our second planned day of diving (a RARITY for me as I am a water baby) and just relaxed around Calibishie.
Overall, the trip was fantastic. I'd have to say this was my favorite Carribean Island experience with a great mixture of natural beauty, beautiful lush rainforests and elfin forests, incredible waterfalls, natural pools and hot springs to swim in, challenging but supremely satisfying hikes, good underwater topography with an incredible array of beautiful corals and sponges, and many lovely small sea creatures. We didn't see any sperm whales, whale sharks or dolphins this time, but I doubt it's our last time to the island...
T.
