The Rainforest

We visited the rainforest on our last day there.  We heard about the place when we reached the top of Diamond Head, which is this really big mountain top that you have to climb hundreds of steps, through dark caves and two spiraling staircases in pitch darkness.  I will tell you about that once the film develops.  But this guy at the top tells us about this rainforest with a fabulous waterfall at the end of the tour, and it sounded like a great way to end our trip.

Unfortunately, the guy told us that there was an 8:45am tour, and although we hadn't done all our souvenir shopping, and we had partied hard the night before, we woke up at 5am.  Actually, I woke up at 5am, and tried to wake up everyone else until 7am!  We were practically running to the appointed pick-up zone, scarfing down some Jack-in-the-Box breakfast food.  And we waited there until 10:00.  We found out later that there was only one tour on Saturdays, at 2:45pm.  Needless to say, we were pretty pissed off about it, but we still decided to go since we had already had our hearts set on going.

 This rainforest is full of rare plants, flowers, and (unfortunately) mosquitoes!  I didn't notice the bites until I had returned back home.  Our guide was very informative in telling us about the tourist tidbits of information that most of the natives either learn in class or refuse to hear from a tour guide.  Just like with Diamond Head, make sure that you wear the proper foot gear!  The "trail", if I could call it that, was full of mud and slippery stones, and stupid me, I brought along my new pair of white Adidas sneakers.  But the view at the end of the long excursion was worth all of the trouble we went through.

This is only one of 7 waterfalls there.  This is a far-off view of the one we were allowed to visit up close.  The other waterfalls are approachable only by thin rope-bridge or rock-climbing.  Here's a closer look at this waterfall, taken from the bottom looking up. At the bottom of this waterfall, there are several huge boulders, which came from the top and came crashing down!  The place really feels like walking through Jurassic Park or some jungle movie set in Hollywood, so if ever you get a chance, check it out!