After Maria’s Devastation, Can Dominica Be a Destination Again? The hurricane did deep damage to homes, roads, forests and trails. But waterfalls, hot springs and helping out are good reasons to visit.

After Maria’s Devastation, Can Dominica Be a Destination Again?
The hurricane did deep damage to homes, roads, forests and trails. But waterfalls, hot springs and helping out are good reasons to visit.
By Matt Gross
March 19, 2018
Hurricanes Irma and Maria devastated islands in the Caribbean last September. Six months later, how are they recovering? To find out, writers for Travel spent time in Vieques, St. Martin, St. John, Dominica (below) and San Juan, P.R. (coming tomorrow).

The hike to Middleham Falls took precisely 45 minutes, just as my guide, Dylan Williams, had predicted. In that time, Dylan, his girlfriend, Miriam Ormond, and I had marched a mile and a quarter up and down (and up and down) the hills of Dominica’s Morne Trois Pitons National Park, starting on a well-cleared trail through rain forest brush — tree ferns, rubber trees, shaggy epiphytes — and finishing with moderate scrambles over damp rock and down slippery wooden stairs. But finally, we stood on a sturdy platform gazing at the island’s highest waterfall as it thundered 200 or so feet down into a broad, inviting pool.

Between us and the pool, however, stood a field of water-slicked boulders. Suddenly, I felt every drop of my trekking confidence evaporate. I wanted nothing more than to bound over the rocks, as dreadlocked Dylan was doing in Converse low-tops, and dip my feet in the pristine water, but those feet, I was now irrationally sure, would fail me, and I’d slip, fall, dash my brains out below. Nature, until a moment ago so lovely and generous, had turned threatening and dark. Who was I to risk her wrath?

Nature’s Janus-faced narrative also happens to be the fraught story of Dominica, a mountainous little island of 73,000 plopped in the eastern Caribbean between Guadeloupe and Martinique. (Don’t confuse it with the Dominican Republic; the name comes from Christopher Columbus, who sighted it on a Sunday — Dominica in Latin.) For centuries, during which the island was ruled by the Spanish, French, and British before winning independence in 1978, Dominica was a rugged place, fertile but, because it was so consistently hilly, relatively underdeveloped.
In the last decade or so, however, travelers had begun to discover the English-speaking island, arriving by boat or prop plane to dive, snorkel and, most of all, hike the untrammeled topography of what was dubbed “The Nature Island.” Local developers established boutique resorts, like the chic cliffside villas of Secret Bay, and international chains such as Marriott and Kempinski announced plans for their own. In 2016, the government unveiled the Waitukubuli National Trail, a 115-mile, 14-segment path — free of venomous snakes and spiders! — that led from the southern tip of the island all the way to the north. In a world where travelers are always seeking the next unspoiled destination, Dominica, was set to dominate.
And then it was all undone — overnight. On the evening of Sept. 18, 2017, Hurricane Maria hit Dominica with 160-mile-per-hour winds, damaging or destroying the roofs of an estimated 90 percent of buildings (including the prime minister’s residence) and toppling not only power lines but some of the thickest, strongest, oldest trees in the forests. Maria’s rains triggered landslides and transformed the island’s 365 rivers into raging tendrils that washed away bridges and crops and slashed deep cuts along what had been well-laid roads. At least 31 people were killed, and thousands more left homeless. Everything lay in shambles.

Five and a half months later, I arrived in Dominica, my flight from Barbados banking down the steep slope of a lush hill to land at the brief runway of Douglas-Charles Airport. I was there for five days to find out how the island was recovering, and frankly, I didn’t know what to expect: My pre-trip research kept hitting dead ends — websites not updated since before Maria, emails and WhatsApp messages unanswered, Google Maps now outdated. Secret Bay and Rosalie Bay Resort, beloved by friends who had visited, were closed. Would I discover an island back on its feet or struggling through each day?

Immediately after I left the airport — in a minivan taxi driven by Daniel Didier, a seen-it-all 69-year-old — the scale of the devastation was obvious. The winding road across the island to Roseau, the capital, was generally excellent, but there were sudden patches, some a couple of yards, others much longer, where the smooth surface gave way to rocks and rubble. Windowless, rusted-out cars and piles of thick logs dotted the roadside. Blue tarps covered the holes in roof after galvanized-steel corrugated roof. One huge fallen tree hovered nearly horizontal, high in the air across the road, propped up by its fellows, ominous.