Topas de Collante Tour

We woke up early in order to make the 8:30 bus that would take us on our tour to the National Park in the mountains.  We weren't quite sure what to expect!  Would it be fun, a dud, uninteresting, exciting....

There are a bunch of people milling about waiting for the camion (truck) to take us up the mountain. We are waiting, waiting, waiting, more and more people show up....I guess about 12 all together. 9:00 comes and goes, 9:30 comes and goes...another truck roars by, but not our truck.  Finally, it arrives. We all pile on and head out up to the mountains.

The road we take is towards Cienfuegos and then we veer off and start to climb.  The truck is a modified dump truck.  It's Russian made and the guide calls it a Russian Massage.  There are waist high sides to the truck and pairs of seats on each side with a single bench seat in the very rear.  The sides were too high to hang your elbow outside, so it was a bit awkward.

Our first stop was at a mirador (vista point) and we exit the truck, and head to a covered area where we are met with the question at 10 AM, with or without rum!  There was a fruity cocktail being offered, with rum please.

We then climb up the winding stairs to the top of the lookout and view the valley all the way to the sea.  This is looking south toward the Caribbean Sea.

We pile back into the truck and head up higher on the mountain to the old Sanitarium from the Battista era.  It is now a spa, under utilized from the took of it.  We had a quick bathroom break and a chance to admire the sun dial before heading off to the coffee plantation.

The coffee plantation was packed!  So many bus loads of tourists!  After the truck parked, several of the buses took off, so the wait was not too long.  We had seen a coffee plantation before earlier on the trip and understood what was going to be told to us....this is the drying table, this is the dehusker, this is the roaster, this is the cooling table....

I was interested in trying the coffee.  I order an espresso with a ginger concoction added to it.  It was very interesting.  Bold, Biting, and quite tasty.

We continued up the mountain until we got to the trail head.  Here we disembarked and started our hike to the waterfalls.  Along the way we saw coffee plants and all sorts of bromeliads hanging from the trees.  The area was lush, the sky gorgeous and we met John, who looked so much like a former neighbor, we were staring at him.  Of course, it couldn't have been Tom, but damn, he looked like him. We hung out with John and were yakking away at the back of the line, unfortunately, missing all the descriptions of the birds and plants.

There was a cave, a small one, that we got to explore as we were heading to the waterfalls.

                    

We came to the waterfalls, and you could hear them before seeing them.  And when we reached a clearing, you could see where the water was falling from the cliff face.

We got to admire the falls, but then had to push on.  Several times along the hike we had to cross small creeks and there were log bridges with crude rails on one side.

Here we play follow the leader and hope that we don't set the log to wobbling too much.  Not very likely and even if one fell off, it was just 2 feet to the ground.

Here's Bill showing off his grace and agility!

The next stop was at a water hole where, if you chose to, you could swim.  But what actually thrilled us was that there were little fish that would swarm your feet when you dangle them in the water and nibble at your toes eating up any dead skin.  Sounds gross, but it felt just fine.  We passed up this opportunity in China, so that wasn't going to happen again.

Another couple of km down the path we hit the rest stop where we were scheduled to get lunch.  It was a wide open space with several covered patio area.  All set with long tables waiting for the groups that were eating there.  There were chickens, horses, turkeys, cats, dogs, and assorted other avians all running around calming co-existing.  Above the open ground, I noticed a large bird circling around in the thermals.  As it dropped down to land, I saw that it was a vulture.  These birds are immense!  All dark feathers, enormous wingspan and nasty looking bald red heads.  I understand why nature designed them that way, but yech, they are one ugly bird.

Lunch was quite good, chicken, rice, potatoes, salad, fruit, and a beer!  We all loaded up into the truck for the ride down and back to Trinidad.

After getting back to the town, we asked John if he wanted to join us for a beer at the Iberostar.  He agreed, and the three of us had a couple while we enjoyed the great aircon.

The three of us wandered back up to the center of town and stopped at another place for more brews.  None of us were hungry at this point as lunch was late and quite filling.

Around 10, we said our good nights and Bill and I realized that NOW we were hungry.  We stopped at the Jazz Club Restaurant and had a quick bite.  We both had starchy things. He had lasagna and I opted for a rice-y cheese-y type thing. It did what it was supposed to!

Our casa was across the street, so off we went to hit the hay.