Day 9 -- Long hike from La Soufriere to Chutes de Carbet
Sunday 2/29/2004 (leap year)
This morning we woke up at 5:00AM. Our plan was to visit the volcano (La Soufriere). Bengt and Lotta was asleep. Their plan was to get up to the Chute de Carbet, sometime later in the day. Lillemor packed several snacks for us to carry up with us. We each had a backpack, except for Karl. We left the bungalows at 5:50AM, taking the windy road down towards Petit Bourg instead of the Traverse. To get to the volcano you have to drive around the island until you get to the town of Basse Terre, where you climb up along windy roads until you reach a parking area. We arrived at the parking area about 6:50AM, and were ready to start the climb at 7:00AM. The weather was great. You could see a trail of fumes coming off the volcano.
|
| Sulphur fumes coming out of the volcano |
When we started the trek, only a few cars were parked on the parking area. We could not see anybody around. The hike is somewhat difficult. Erik and Isabella kept good pace, while Karl and Lilli fell behind a bit. Lilli had back pains from the dives yesterday from lifting the tank out of the water into the small boat. After a while up the trail, Isabella found what appeared to be a shortcut up towards the volcano. She decided to take it. Erik followed. In retrospect, this was a bad idea for many reasons. Not only were the attempting to approach the volcano along the side where the toxic fumes were coming off, but we did not give them a walkie-talkie. I did not think much of it at first, but as we continued I regretted having let them off the hook that easily.
 |
| Lilli and Karl hiking up to La Soufriere |
The hike up is supposed to take about 1 hour. After about 35 minutes, I decided to break away from Lilli and Karl and head up to the top on my own. I had a foolish idea that I might meet Isabella and Erik up there. At about 7:50AM I reached the top. I wandered around for a while. I could feel the smell of sulphur from the volcanic vents. I could not see the kids. There were plenty of signs for "Toxic fumes" in the direction where the kids were supposed to come up. I walked near the edges of the top and called on Isabella, but no response. At this time I began thinking I had made a very bad mistake, letting them climb up like that on their own. After a while I saw Lilli and Karl. We hooked up for a brief snack, although I was mainly busy looking for Isabella and Erik. After some snack Lilli took Karl with her to look closer at the sulphur vents. I walked back up to the top of the volcano, once again, and when I got ready to head towards Lilli, the two kids showed up. Isabella was all red-faced from a rapid hike. They told me that had continued up along the steep "shortcut" for a while, but after Erik fell twice they realized it was not a trail. They did find climbing gear used by rope climbers... After that they had decided to hike back down to the main trail again and then continue up the regular way. They had reached the main trail at 8:00AM, about 10 minutes after I reached the top. After that they had hiked up as fast as they could (taking regular drinking breaks). By the time they got up, it was already 8:50AM. We all learned a lesson from this one!
 |
| Top of the volcano: Isabella is looking at the map for Phase 2 of our hike |
After walking around a little bit up there we decided to start heading down and onto phase 2 of this hike. We hiked down with Lilli and Karl until we got down to the main trail. Instead of heading left, back to the parking, we headed right and downward a different trail. Lilli headed back to the car with Karl. Her plan was to drive down and around the island and then back up to the parking area by the Chutes de Carbet. After a few hundred meters we reached a fork in the trail. Straight ahead was one that followed the ridge of the mountains. To the right, we could continue to circle the volcano. That was the trail we wanted. We continued for a while and then reached a second fork. We met some other hikers there who told us there were some problems down at the Chutes de Carbet, the general area we wanted to head. We decided we should be able to handle it. The sign told us it would normally take about 3 hours to get from here to the parking area.
 |
| Just below the volcano and at the start of the big descent |
After about 10 minutes down the trail we met two hikers who appeared to be familiar with the terrain. They also told us about parts of the trail near the second Chute de Carbet had been washed away about one week ago and that they had seen it on TV. They were not sure we'd be able to reach the parking area, where we were planning to hook up with Lilli. We felt adventurous enough to try it anyway. I had a newly acquired large machete with me so I should be able to make my own trail if we ran into problems. At least that was the idea. A little further down we got to another fork in the trail. Here the Karukera trail headed off to the right and the Carbet trail to the left. We took left and started heading down. We had not gone far until we reached what appeared to be a tunnel in the vegetation. Brush vegetation was now replaced by higher bushes. Tall enough to give us protection against the sun. Isabella had to go really bad at one point. We joked about the toilet paper she prepared (banana leaves). Nothing beats a crap in a paradise trail!
 |
| A sign pointing to the DANGEROUS descent we're taking |
We crossed one of the tributaries to the waterfall further down. The rocks in the river were all light brown from mineral deposits. We stopped for a drink. At this point the trail had been rather tough. I had already changed from shorts to longer pants, to protect against cuts. The tough part of the trail is that it was full of vegetation, obscuring the soft versus solid footings in the trail. It was very easy to take a wrong step. So we walked down very slowly. After the river, we soon reached a much tougher part of the trail. This area was marked as "dotted" in our map book. And, indeed, it was really tough. It was very slippery and we had many stretches of 45 degree descent. We had to walk very carefully to not slip. None of us fell hard enough that we got hurt. But we definitely got dirty. We talked about getting ourselves some hiking gloves as a future addition to our hiking gear. For a while we thought we heard voices, but we never saw anyone. They would definitely have helped here. It felt like a long walk but we finally reached the sign that marked fork where we joined the general trail to the 1st Chute de Carbet. If you look at the picture below, we crossed the river above the fall a while back and then descended along a trail on the right side in the picture.
 |
| Premiere Chut du Carbet (115m or ~380ft) |
A little while into the trail we stopped for a drink and decided to call Lilli over the radio. She was able to hear us!! She mentioned that the trail was blocked from below with signs and gates, so she was unable to climb. We decided we were close enough to the 1st Chute so we continued. At this point our legs were really tired. We walked slowly as to not fall. The trail went up and down, requiring big steps on rocks or roots. When we arrived, we stopped for a snack. The fall was very nice. Not a soul in sight. It was mixed overcast. We ate some cold pizza and cookies. I had packed a bottle of strong Gatorade, with added salt. It sounded funny to the others when I mixed it in the kitchen, but it certainly did not taste funny after this long of a walk. After a brief rest we turned around and walked back. We felt a few drops of rain and took out our raincoats. By about 12:50PM we crossed the river. Before that the trail had been re-routed a bit from when we climbed it three years ago, presumably due to mud and rock slides.
 |
| Eating a well deserved snack at the bottom of the fall |
We called Lilli each 1/2 hour to give her a status update of our progress. Lilli mentioned that she had talked to the rangers about our descent, asking if we might be able to make it despite the damage to the trail. They thought it would work just fine. We did not walk very fast because we were so tired. For parts of the trail they had installed wooden walkways, where it had been a mud trail three years ago. It made it easier to go down. At one point we reached a sign saying the trail had been closed. This must be where things had gotten damaged from the rains. We sat down for a brief drink again and then continued. We did not see anything unusual in the trail. I mean, it was hard, but easy compared to the trail we'd taken from the volcano.
We finally reached the bridge by the 2nd waterfall. Once again, signs. But no real trouble. Here we ran into the first people for 3 1/2 hours. They were hikers who wanted to take a look at the second waterfall. We exchanged some information. They mentioned there was a really good 1 1/2 hour trail in Goyave, called Moureau. I did find information about it in the guidebook so this is something worth looking into at another time. Despite having our raincoats our, we did not get rained on. This was probably good because we imagined it would have been much harder if it also had been filled with water and mud. We had to cross a makeshift gate at the entrance of the trail, blocking hikers from entering. There was almost nobody in sight. It had taken us 7 hours from start to finish. None of it was level terrain. By this time we were totally tired. I was happy to let Lilli drive back home.
 |
| We arrived from above the FORBIDDEN TRAIL tape |
When we got home, Bengt and Lotta had not left the bungalows because their kids had not felt well. Isabella did not want to get out of the car. She was so tired. Erik got out but lied down as soon as he got into the bungalow. Lucas was having stomach problems and Louise was feverish. Both Bengt and Lotta had gotten plenty of sun today. We made chicken curry with coconut milk. After it was done, Lilli thought she should have added the milk just at the end, to get the stew a bit thicker. We made two kinds of potato with that. It was good. We went to bed very tired around 9PM.