Thick and Beautiful Tropical Forests!

A great view of the river we arrived at at the end of the trail.

We take a break from hopping around from beach to beach today and instead, delve into the deep forests of north eastern Trinidad where there your troubles are washed away in cool refreshing rivers and drowned out by the sounds of pure unadulterated nature! We head to Matura National Forest Reserve on what was about a one hour hike through thick jungle, across babbling and relaxing streams to bathe in a cool and refreshing river!

We headed to the Salybia, a town in north east Trinidad and parked the car as close as we possibly could have to the entrance of the trail in a place that would not render us getting stuck in the mud! It was quite rainy earlier that day and so that meant that the terrain was quite muddy. We were not at all deterred by this though we would later regret it, as you will soon see!

These paved pathways that you see are still not at all part of the hike. We had not even gotten to the entrance as of yet! The only reason we parked that far back was because there were no other places that we could safely have left the car.

This winding bamboo pathway was so beautiful and relaxing and the nature walk did not even start yet! This meant that we were quite close to the beginning of the trail and the excitement built up. The rainy weather had everything look so moody and amazing and we were thrilled to see what the forest looked like in the dark moody weather.

Then, all of a sudden, there it was, in a large clearing. The beginning of the trail with large bins and unkempt and unmaintained benches.

The largest sign heralded in the middle of it all the beginning of the trail with the name of the national park as well as some of its history and interesting facts! I recommend you zoom in on the image to read as it is quite interesting!

I managed to take a photo of the line where the paved road stopped and the natural trail began. This marked the end of easy walking and the beginning of harsh, rough terrain that puts your hiking shoes through its paces. My shoes actually literally fell apart and had to be thrown away by the end of this!

Almost immediately, we were thrown into dark lush and thick forest but that was still easy walking, trust me, you'll see. We heard a cacophony of sounds form animals, insects and other things all around us, it was soothing yet initially jarring because of the uncertainty of what they were but after a while we got accustomed.

Then the factor we forgot about hit us right in the face but luckily it was just for this little part. The mud and fallen trees. I would not lie, at first it felt sort of as if we should turn back but pressing on is what we do!

Here is a closer view of one of the fallen logs we had to literally crouch under in the mud to get past. It was quite fun for someone like me who loved to play survival video games and I imagined myself right smack dab in the middle of one!

It sort of looks like my friend could not walk here but trust me when I say, we were trying our absolute best to jump along rocks or buried logs that stuck out from the mud to avoid falling in the thick wet mud. If this was a sunny day, it would have been walk able! It was quite fun to jump along like that. Thankfully no one had any falls in the mud.

It was much like a puzzle where we had to go one by one, taking a few seconds between each movement forward, pausing to think about where best to place our feet next for this part of the trail. It was fun but once we got to more solid ground where the roots and fallen leaves prevented muddy pathways, we were quite relieved!

From here on out it was just about walking and enjoying the best that nature had to offer and try our best to not get into any accidents or injuries as it is quite easy if you are not paying attention in this type of jungle where there are steep drop offs at times. Even in the photo above, if you are not paying attention, you can go off trail as shrubs grow into and in the trail and we had to actually look for it!

One of my friends found a large stick and used it to help her walk and keep stable on the trail as it got more and more rough as we went along. We giggled at her at first but later realized how much of a wise decision it was! As long as there were no more muddy pathways and we could walk with a quick pace, we were otherwise happy.

We got to a length of the trail where it seemed almost impossible to walk without twisting your ankle and I did a few times without getting hurt. It also became a very steep climb that set our legs on fire! This was indeed the hardest part of the nature walk and I was thinking around this time when it would be over!

The thick forest here was amazingly breathtaking and the sounds of the animals and insects that we could not see were deafeningly loud. It seemed that every inch of forest had something there! They say a city has noise pollution but this was so noisy, it could actually compete on decibel levels, yet the sounds were so calming and soothing like nothing I had ever before experienced.

The ferns, trees and dead leaves with their greens and oranges/ rustic browns respectively were so pretty to look at that I almost got left behind by the company while I was busy and distracted taking pictures! Luckily I was able to catch up as they waited for me.

We arrived at a clearing where a large river ran through the trail and we had to cross it to get to the other side. The above shot shows the view on the left side of the downstream peppered with large rocks and surrounded by beautiful forest.

This is the right side view upstream with some fallen logs but much less rocks. The river here was quite shallow yet it was still forceful enough to make us think twice when we were crossing it! This was most likely because rain had fallen.

This was a beautiful shot I got just before getting to the other side of the stream and it was one of my favorites because of the moody lighting and the rocks, the ferns and the moss. It just never fails to make me feel just as it felt in that moment!

It was not long again before we came across another river but this time we had to travel along it downstream to the place we wanted to get too which was one of the pools where people bathed and so on. Before that, the photo above shows how beautiful the canopies of the forest looked and I cannot describe well enough how magical this whole place was!

We travelled downstream for a little while. It was quite easy and fun walking wound the stones and through the much calmer and trickling waters. It felt weird at first to get your shoes wet but this was what it was all about! I could not wait to get these sweaty clothes off and submerge my whole body into these cool waters!

Finally, after a long but breathtaking walk, we got to our destination, one of the pools for bathing! No one was there and it was as if we had our own private nature tub just for ourselves!

Here is a drone shot I decided to take flying along the pool as we bathed! The drone cam brightened up everything for automatic exposure but as you can see in the photos it was much darker.

The sunlight filtered in from above in patches and created magical feelings within our hearts we we bathed and enjoyed the natural sounds and relaxed the world's troubles away. We set our things down on the banks of the river where there were natural benches provided by fallen logs and jumped into the rejuvenating, pristine river! The water was so cold yet refreshing it made us giggle with glee. After walking in humid jungle for so long it felt like heaven!

This was one of my most favorite experiences for the year with magical forests, amazing natural sounds that peppered the way and cool life giving waters to bathe in after a long, hot exhausting walk! The only thing was the walk back! I really loved the dark, moody, magical forest I managed to capture on camera and that makes it even better! Thanks a lot for coming along with us, Cheers!