Hi there guys!
For all of you who didn’t know, we have lived on a small Caribbean island called Curacao for two years. Curacao is located just above Venezuela and is part of the Dutch Caribbean islands also known as the ABC islands. Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao.
Curacao is the largest of the three islands and has the most inhabitants. About 160.000 people live there. The island is mostly focussed on tourism since it has some stunning places to visit.
One is these places to
visit is called Mnt. Christoffel
Mnt. Christoffel sounds like a real mountain…., but yeah it isn’t haha!
It towers only about 372 meters above sea level. The nice thing about it though is that the rest of the island is pretty flat, so you have a great view all around you. The Summit is definitely one of my favorite places to be in Curacao. The climb will take about 45 min if you are a average joe with a average stamina.It’s only a 1,5 km long trail from the trail head at the parking lot.
A good friend of mine and i used to be running up that mountain to see who could get up there the fastest. Unfortunatly the record still isn’t on my name but on his haha. We used to do it not just once a day, not just twice, are daily record is five times on one day! That equals to well over 1500 meters of elevation gain in just under 15 km’s of running!
Since it is always hot on a caribbean island, we bring a so called “Camelbag”. A small backpack with a blatter filled with water. I drink about 2-3 liters of water during this one exercise. I probably sweat out even more, so eating and staying hydrated is important. Even if you ever plan to take this hike yourself just once, be sure to take some water with you. It gets hot pretty darn fast. You do not want to stuck there somewhere on the side of that hill without it.
I love exploring my body’s limits and see how far i
can push myself
We use Strava, a social fitnes tracking app that allows you to participate in leaderboards in segments that have been made by yourself or other people. It’s a awesome concept since it gives you a competition element even though you could be just by yourself.
Have you ever heard of Strava or used it? I recently made a Strava community on Steemit, a place to share your Strava workouts, you know what they say. It didn’t happen if it’s not on strava! Haha
Click the following link to go to his community and become a part of it!
One of the other amazing parts of exercising and running up this mountain is the fact that it’s usually pretty crowded with people taking this hike. This makes for a lot of people cheering and support you when you run past them, that makes you run that little bit faster! Most people take it really easy going up, just enjoy being out there. There are several benches located along the hike up and down. So lots of places to take 5 minutes rest or have a sip of much needed water.
Most of the tourism and highlights in Curacao are on the East side or middle part of the island. Mount Christoffel is located at the far west side of the island, conveniently called “West Point”. The mountain is located in a national park called the Christoffel park.
The park opens at 06:00 in the morning and closes at 14:00 in the afternoon. I would advice you to be there as early as possible. After 10:00 in the morning you are not allowed to go up there anymore. And you shouldn’t want to either, be sure to start walking around 06:00 so that you’ll be at the summit just when the suns starts rising.
So! Be That Early Bird! Get a sunrise you will not forget!
There are a lot more things you can do in The Christoffel park. Things like, visiting Shete Boka (seven mouths, a ocean inlet that sprays up sea water), visiting the Savonet museum, or go on a Jeep safari through the park.
The entrance fee for adults is 14,50$ and 4,50$ for children between the age of 6-12 years. Children under the age of 6 have free entrance. If you buy a entrance ticket to the park you get free entrance to the Savonet museum as well.
Hope you guys enjoyed! Don't forget to upvote and follow, i will leave you with some more photography from Mount Christoffel.
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