Top Dominica travel tips for seeing the best of the island

With our top Dominica travel tips you will see how we travelled around the Island seeing the best Dominica has to offer.

Let’s go…

Dominica is a mountainous Island situated between Guadeloupe and Martinique . I always thought it was pronounced Dom-in-e-ca a bit like the Dominican Republic without the “n” so was surprised when I heard people calling it Dom-i-ni-ca another thing I learnt on my travels ha.

The island is known as “The Nature Island “As It boasts dozens of waterfalls, nine active volcanoes, lush forests and coastal woodland. It can often be overlooked by tourists, as there are no typical Caribbean white sandy beaches.

With only one day to see Dominica we did a lot of research and booked our tour with “Bumping tours” (www.bumpiingtours.com) before we left. They do special one day tours for cruise ships so you don’t have to worry about being back on time, they make sure you are. This was an amazing tour and loved every minute of it.

After meeting up with our tour guide outside the cruise terminal we jumped in the mini bus with a small group of people and headed 20 minutes from the capital Roseau to our first stop “Champagne reef” and before you get all excited thinking you are going to be swimming in champagne.. Your not!

It gets its name thanks to the champagne-like bubbles that burst out of the seabed ( all down to the island volcanic activity ) and up to the surface, and there’s me looking forward to champagne!!!

I’m not actually a big fan of snorkeling, having snorkeled in the amazing places I came to the conclusion it just didn’t impress me, I know I know I’m a bore ha Myself and Brody sat on the beach or should I say rocks, whilst Paul went for a snorkel. He adores snorkeling and said it was one of the most amazing things he has seen!

Ti Tou Gorge is a deep river gorge at the beginning of the boiling lake hike and is only accessible through swimming. It takes only 5 minutes to swim through the series of rooms and pools all formed by high cliff walls and canopied by trees, but beware the water is freezing!

There is a hot spring just outside the entrance, which is lovely after the shock of the freezing water. We felt the water was was too cold for Brody as he had developed a cold from the flight over so we sat and observed the hilarious reactions from the people entering the gorge, including Paul!

The Gorge was extremely busy due to numerous cruise ship tours and if your afraid of spiders don’t go in the bathroom, or as Brody refers to them “skinny legs (every parent of a 3 year old will know that reference but if you didn’t its off the amazing Peppa Pig).

After a cold drink on the mini bus we headed to Trafalgar Falls, referred to as the “father’ to the left and ‘mother’ to the right. Is only a short walk from the visitor centre to the view point which was empty when we got there, which is very unusual as it is a place tourists love to see.

Tropical Storm Erika changed the look of the falls as she came through in 2015, causing boulders to move at the bottom of the father fall, this actually unveiled hot sulphur springs that had been buried by a rockslide two decades ago.

The falls are only 20 minutes from Roseau and well worth a visit. Brody loved looking for the huge land crabs that live in the area, much to his disappointment we didn’t spot any.

On our way to Morne Bruce viewpoint we had a flying visit through the botanical gardens. Unless you are an avid gardener I wouldn’t spend too much time here as it’s very small.

The main attraction is a large Baobib Tree that was blown over during the Hurricane in 1979, that fell on a school bus and crushed it, and the tree continues to grow over the top of the school bus. So there are a few good photo opportunities here.

The last stop is Morne Bruce viewpoint which is located just above the Botanical gardens and is a short ride up some windy roads. It is very peaceful up here and great panoramic views of Roseau. There are some small vendors here selling handmade goods, there are also  snacks and drink available. They are not pushy at all so you can totally relax up here take in the views.