El Yunque, Puerto Rico

El Yunque (pronounced Junkay) is a rain forest and another US National Park which makes it easy to explore. It covers a range of mountains on the east of the island that reach 3500’ high (1067 metres if you’re metric) and is said to be the home of the kindly Taino spirit Yuquiyu. 100 billion gallons of rain fall here every year – making the average Brit feel right at home!

We expected to do some serious hiking and duly gathered together walking shoes and socks, rain gear and loads of other heavy stuff. In the event, our visit was dry and the National Park trails could probably be attempted in stiletto heels (only kidding). (Our last rain forest walk in Dominica had been on a park trail but was pretty challenging and very wet!)

We visited the El Portal Visitor Centre first, the entrance to which is a canopy walkway which gives you a bird’s eye perspective on the forest. The Visitor Centre is architecturally beautiful and a pleasure to wander round. We sat through a short video about the rain forest: the species, including the endangered parrot of which there are about 40 left and whose numbers were halved in the last major hurricane; the archaeology, including the petroglyphs and artefacts left by Taino Indians; and the importance of the water to Puerto Ricans.

But eventually we couldn’t avoid hiking anymore, so we got back in the car(!) and headed for the first interesting looking landmark on the road through the forest. This was the Coca Waterfall. We parked, got all kitted up and then discovered that there was no actual hiking to be done – you simply walked up a pavement to the waterfall which is by the side of the road. The kids and Chris did scramble up the rocks beside the fall to fulfil a photo opportunity, but we still had to go find a real trail.

We did. This was a short hike of around 1.5km down to another waterfall which you could swim in (if you could tolerate Arctic chill). It was a beautiful trail with a thundering waterfall and fast flowing stream as a reward. We were working on the senses in Alex’s English-- sight, sound, taste, touch, smell -- and here’s the result of our work.

Sight:
Smooth roundness of a snail
Light and shadow, bright and dark
Big spider
Roots lying on the surface
Huge leaves, lush green, broad and fern
Bright red soil
Boulders that look like they’ve been thrown by rock giants
Steep edges
White water, scattered like running deer

Sound:
The call of a frog that sounds like a bird -- Co-ki
Birdsong
Rush of water
Rush of wind
Trees creaking

Feel:
The sharp sting of spray in your eyes
Water as cold as an Arctic wolf’s nose
Soft, mossy rocks and cold hard rocks
Rubbery leaves
Slimy snail

Taste:
The moisture in the air as you got nearer the waterfalls

Smell:
The scent of wild ginger
Musty smell of decaying leaves

The waterfall pool was breathtakingly cold: we scrambled down to it and the kids took off shoes and socks to go in but it was even beyond them to stay in for more than a few seconds at a time!

We started the hike back and Alex went on ahead. About 1km later and with no sign of Alex, we started to get a little anxious – not that he could get lost but he could fall off the trail which had pretty steep sides. We started calling and calling to no effect and even Jamie (older sister and therefore arch enemy) got a bit panicky. Chris eventually took off and hot footed it up (really quite up) the trail. Jamie followed him and I followed behind more slowly (did I mention I managed to break my little toe in Antigua and it was still wasn’t runnable on?) I emerged from the trail to find red faced, exhausted husband and cool looking kids with Alex gleefully telling me how much quicker he’d got to the top of the trail than I had. Hmmm.

We left the park and headed west to Arecibo for the next day’s sightseeing. This involved navigating through San Juan, finding ourselves static in a traffic jam to do with a big game of some sort, surrounded by heavily armed police and noisy supporters, and arriving at a very unprepossessing hotel right on the highway with no visible sign of life. However, don’t judge a book, as they say, the hotel was clean, comfortable, had TV (kids ecstatic) and high speed wireless internet, a small pool, friendly staff and great accessibility to everything we needed.