So Much Goodness

There is just so much goodness about being submerged in creation. So much goodness in clambering up the rocks of a mountain and exploring new terrain. So much goodness in standing under the frigid water and lifting up your face while it splashes and cascades down your body. So much goodness.

We embarked on our adventure to Haiti's most beautiful waterfall shortly after lunch yesterday afternoon. The Water and Adventure Fanatic Kathryn Wong met with The Tropical Wonderland of Watery Awesomeness. Three Haitian guys from GLA, Steeve, Wilmo, and Steevens, took me, Mikayla, Ganene, and Beka. Although I've ridden in the back of a pick-up truck many times since getting here, it is still such rip-roaring, hair-raising, mind-blowing fun to stand in the back of the truck while it veers and bounces and tips and while the wind pounds your face and the sounds and smells and sights have you on sensory overdrive.

After a bit of time sloshing through muddy roads and jouncing over piles of rocks, we reached the foot of the mountain. It was, as Beka said, like a desert – though the mountains were lushly green, the ground around them was a valley of white rocks stretched far and wide. Soon a trickle of clear water sprung up from the ground, the trickle bulged and became a stream, the stream accordingly lengthened and deepened until it might almost be called a river. People were in the water, some individually but most in groups of four or five, doing laundry and bathing. By the end of the trip, I was almost accustomed to seeing completely naked people of all ages splashing in suds under the wide open sky as if it's the most natural thing to be doing, but it's just not something I can say that I typically witness!

The terrain reminded me of the rocky beaches along the shores of the Great Lakes. I leapt from rock to rock, sometimes pretending to be at Cedar Campus where it is quite necessary to be a pro rock-leaper. It was not ten minutes of climbing along the stream up the rocks when we reached the first section of the waterfall. We would continue on from there, scaling rock walls, shimmying along mossy, slippery rock formations, bounding from rock to rock, and delightedly discovering a new waterfall every few minutes, always idyllically framed by rocks, ferns, blossoms, trees overhead and vines reaching low, surrounded on either side by the tall, tall walls of the mountains. Some of the waterfalls emptied into deep pools.

How can one describe the sheer exhilaration of pulling oneself up on a rock at the top of a waterfall, and then, poised for action and prepared for the shock of cold water, jumping, springing, flying off the rock and into the depths below? It is, I assure you, the epitome of awesomeness itself. Every now and then when the steep uphill climb leveled out, we would walk through another batch of clothe-less people washing. I turned to Mikayla, who also just graduated from high school, and we emphatically concurred that this beats college. By a long shot.

I felt a jolt of sharp pain from below, and I looked down to see a steady stream of blood cascading down my foot, indeed it was not at all unlike a waterfall (hence my terminology) (i.e. steady stream, cascading). Naturally, the sight of blood and the idea of being mortally wounded only served to heighten greatly the legitimacy of the adventure.

Then, after maybe thirty or forty minutes of intrepid explorations, the water ended quite suddenly and we were in the middle of the mountain in another rocky valley. This rocky valley was apparently used as an outdoor restroom facility; it reeked of human feces and pockets and piles of waste abounded. The water had not necessarily ended, but Steevens and Wilmo informed us that it had gone underground. After a bit of deliberation, we determined that this would be an appropriate place to turn around and head back.

And so back we went. Down, down, down the stream. Down, down down the waterfalls. Down, down, down the mountain. We stopped every now and then to jump into the pools of water, or to have who-can-hold-their-breath-under-water-longest contests. We got attacked by some fire ants, further enhancing the legitimacy of this grand adventure. At last we reached the climatic ending – we were back at the first waterfall, and this waterfall is good for sliding down. And so down we slid. The bottom was a bit shallow, and the experience might have been somewhat improved if there hadn't been so many rocks waiting to greet us, but that did naught to mitigate the sheer thrill of sliding down a waterfall. I mean really, how great can life get? I won't say that it was the best thing ever for fear that some may accuse me of exaggerating (ahem, ahem), but sliding down a waterfall in the midst of a tropical utopia on a mountainside is pretty great. I got to the bottom, turned around, climbed up the rock wall (climbing up the rock wall soaking wet is lots harder than climbing up the rock wall when you're more or less dry. I tackled the rock wall solo before the wetness, but in lieu of the wetness, Steeve had to give me a hand multiple times...) And then I did it again. And then again. Apparently it was the first time anyone had actually wanted to turn around and climb right on up and slide down again. And then I sat in the water. Or rather in and under the water. And then it was time to go.

But the awesomeness didn't end there. The waterfall was only awesomeness part one. Steeve kindly took us up the mountain to a lookout spot where there is a spectacular view of Port-au-Prince and beyond it the ocean. We sat in the back of the pick-up truck (but it was way more exciting than just sitting in the back of the pick-up truck, because we were sitting on the metal bars on the top of the pick-up truck which basically makes you feel like you're sitting on the top of the world.) I honestly don't know what life with seatbelts, traffic regulations, and paved roads will be like when I get home. It's vastly more exhilarating to be sitting or standing out in the open while the vehicle goes careening down mountains and swerving round corners and bends with an occasional need to duck down as branches threaten to smack you in the face. I was utterly riveted by the landscape – by the tin shacks sitting dilapidated by the side of the road juxtaposed next to elaborate mansions standing proudly on the top of the mountain overlooking the ocean. Fascinated by each face I saw, of children and of old men, of mothers and of babies, of groups of friends chatting under a tree. Fascinated by each spectacular view of the valleys below, by each roadside stand, by each tree and bird and flower.

And then at last we returned home. I ruminated upon the fact that exactly one year ago, I was visiting Grove City College. I doubt I'd believe it for a second if anyone told me that instead of being in the midst of the beginning of college that I'd be frolicking in Haiti's waterfalls in a year.