December 22, 2023

This is our first time in Dominica. Roseau is the most important port for foreign trade which included many fresh vegetables and fruits. The Roseau river is among the largest rivers that flow through any Caribbean capital. It is independent now but in the past has been ruled by the French and the English. People speak Creole, English and French. The island was “discovered” by Columbus and he named it Dominica which means Sunday in Italian.

Here are some pictures of the island after our arrival. It is mountainous and does have a volcano which last erupted in the 1800s.

Mark arranged a private tour with Hot Pepper tours. After we disembarked and waited for our vehicle and guide, another couple, Larry and Pam joined us and were quite excited because their last name is Pepper! They were hoping for some company t-shirts but they don’t have any for sale.

Our guide was Georgina and she was very interesting and kept us engaged during the trip. She shared a lot about the 2017 hurricane Maria which really devastated the island, over 90% of the houses and businesses were destroyed and not all have been rebuilt. The population of Dominica is about 71,000.

The one who really deserved a lot of credit was our driver, Ken. The roads into the mountains are very narrow and wind a lot, and they drive on the opposite side of the road (from what we are used to in the US). He was amazing in navigating it all safely.

After a long drive up through the mountains and the rain forest, we arrived at the Emerald Pool in the National Park. It was a walk on a pretty rocky path to get down to the pool, and to swim required walking on slippery stones, so some of us, including me, just put our feet in the cool refreshing water. The waterfall and the whole area was very beautiful.

After the hike back out of the pool area and the forest we traveled over the mountain to another part of the island, the beach where we spent about an hour. We stopped at an overlook point for the lovely views. Ramsay and I enjoyed the swim and Norm and Adam hung out. The water was very refreshing.

Our last stop was the botanical garden. We saw this “cake” topiary, the bamboo “forest” where many weddings take place and the vines to swing from. Mark was the only one brave enough to do it. We also enjoyed some rum punch which was good but pretty sweet.

We returned back to the ship where I enjoyed my third cooking class, and if I have had a favorite so far, this is it. The rest of the family went to play trivia – sorry to miss it but the class came first! It was called Harvest Unleashed and was a plant based class. We paired dishes with two wines.

At the end of class, Noelle lines up all of the completed dishes, wines and some of the ingredients. Norm did come to do some tasting. We decided to go to the terrace cafe for dinner since this class was 4 – 6 PM and I was already pretty full after sampling. I just had a small bowl of soup! Adam is really enjoying the pizzeria at and after dinner so he opted for just a few things from the buffet and pizza.

After dinner we saw Alex Yost for the second time. His show tonight was Buble to Broadway. Two of the onboard singers did duets with him. He does have a great voice and we enjoyed the show.

Tomorrow we will be in Barbados.