Day 16 – Is the Risk Worth the Reward?

Today the answer was yes. Let’s not rush the story that inspired the title just yet.

We had rainbows this morning for my coffee with a view post. Nice way to start the day.

We decided to give Mike a break from driving and me a break from panic attacks on these roads. Our decision was to hike a mile and half away from the house.

We hiked the Lamothe River Pools. We only found one description of it and as trained librarians we scoured the internet for more. This is NOT a popular hike and I would say you need some hiking skills before attempting this, due to not having a marked trail.

We let our caretaker know where we were going and what time to expect us back. As we lacked detailed information we wanted to make sure someone knew where we were. Lucky for us he is very familiar with the area and didn’t worry about us.

We parked the car and started our trek along old estate tracks that were overgrown.

Along this section we met a man and his tied off goat. Goat was sitting on the trail minding his own business.

After this part, the trail looked more like a bushwack to a patch of land that was being farmed. Then it was a slippery muddy slog picking our way through the jungle to the river.

Once we made it to the river we followed it upstream picking our way over and under branches around slippery rocks, deep holes in the water till we came upon the first pool. We decided this was a good spot to stop for this adventure.

You know we had to act like little kids again in nature’s playground.

Mike did a little more exploring upriver. He discovered more, taller waterfalls spilling into a pool. We decided to skip them today, but will have a return trip before we leave.

We only had to consult our gps once getting back to the orchard. Once we reached that destination, two men were working on clearing it. This place was deep in the forest and it didn’t seem they had an easier way to get to it than we did.

The path back was much easier to follow as it all stood out now.

The house we parked at had a tremendous view from its back porches.

So was the risk of our first jungle, follow the river unmarked trail worth it? You betcha it was. Our reward was well worth the risk.