The island of Dominica is a volcanic land of great beauty, where you’ll find tropical woods, where thousands of birds live, spectacular cascades, lots of rivers, and also a lake of boiling water (map)

In the novel “Wid Sargasso Sea”, from writer Jean Rhys, the main character, mister Rochester, climbs the hillside of a mountain in Dominica, where he is having his honeymoon, when he stops regretting, and saying: “Too much blue, too much green. Flowers are so much red, the mountains too high, the hills so close”. Maybe what this man was trying to say is, that the island was “too beautiful to be real”. But not only fiction characters have been impressed by its beauty. From Columbus in the XV century, to the British imperialist J.A. Froude in the XIX century, and writer Patrick Leight Fermor in the XX century, many are those who have spoken wonders of this place.

Located between Guadeloupe and Martinique, Dominica (25 x 46 km), is the largest Windward Island. From the air, has a dark aspect, with the peaks of the volcanic mountains surrounded, almost always, by clouds, the hillsides covered by exuberant vegetation of tropical jungles, and the valleys crossed by lots of rivers going to the sea. The winding highways go parallel to the coast, where live, especially at the Leeward coast, the majority of its 70,000 inhabitants, though there is also some population all around the mountain chains.

A Natural Paradise
Dominica, also called “the island of adventure”, is an authentic natural paradise. Its uneven geography prevented the island from suffering massive exploitation, since European colonists and adventurers, almost never found plain places for plantations.

Though colonists expelled from the Leeward coast, the native Caribbeans, these found refuge in the remote mountains north of the island; in fact, Dominica is the home of the last Caribbeans. In the XVIII century, the thick jungle of this island, served also as refuge to the cimarrones (fugitive slaves).

At the end of the XVII century, the first Europeans arrived in Dominica. They were French people from Martinique that came to trade with Amerindians. First they established small tobacco plantations, and later of coffee and cacao.

In 1783, the British defeated the French, and dominated the island, though battles between both parts continue during the Napoleon wars. The British introduced sugar seeds, then limes and finally, bananas. Already in the XX century, and more specific, in the 1960’s, the banana industry in Dominica had a spectacular development, to the point that this fruit began to be known with the name of “green gold”. Now is facing serious problems, due to the competition of the great banana producers in Latin America. Though, agriculture is still the main economic activity in Dominica, the Government that achieved its independence from Great Britain in 1978, is trying to impel tourism, with the intention of converting it, in the principal source of income and jobs. However, and different from the neighboring islands, in Dominica, there are not, at least now, casinos, nor great multinational resorts, but a unique landscape. Here, instead of laying to take sun in a white sandy beach, tourists can dive into a natural pool at the foot of a water fall, or swim in an idyllic river. Visitors can also practice trekking, through the many roads crossing the tropical woods of the island.  

At the Shores of the Roseau River
Roseau is the capital city of Dominica, built in the delta of the river with the same name, and 8,000 people. Every Saturday, from sunrise to noon, is market day, with stands showing the fertility of the island; from fragrant white lily bouquets to coffee grains, avocado boxes, watercress, coconuts, and endless products, among a festive mood. When you walk through the market, you have to admit the national motto, printed in the Dominican shield, “Apres Bondie Cest La Ter” (after God, is the land), is not bar beyond reality.

In the middle of the city, is the French quarter, with buildings dating from the XVIII century, surrounded by streets with stone and wooden houses, with precious balconies and porches that go back to the XIX century. The port has been enlarged recently, with the construction of modern buildings at the Bay Front. The old port administrative offices host now an imaginative museum (open from Monday to Saturday; entrance fee). Today the middle class (known before as gros bourg) prefers to live in the outskirts of the city, which, unfortunately, is causing the demolition of many of the ancient buildings and parks, to be replaced by tall, modern constructions.

Still in place, however, are the wonderful Botanical Gardens (open daily, free entrance), despite the damage caused by hurricane David that reduced the 16 has. of the park to a “destroyed branch trees deposit”. In fact, the rests of a school bus, can be seen next to that of an uprooted baobab tree. The gardens, northwest of the city, have a cricket field, a magnificent tropical flora collection, and a exhibition of two parrot species, which actually are facing extinction, and that only can be found on this island: the sisserou (or imperial), and the red neck parrot (or jacquot).