We had an early start on Day Two and were heading north at 7am in order to climb a volcano before the day got too hot.

Our journey took us past the new international airport that is nearing completion and which has been a huge engineering and construction project providing plenty of much-needed employment. We also drove through many small hamlets where the children were waiting for the school bus to pick them up. They all looked so smart in their pristine uniforms with starched white shirts.

At the end of the Windward Highway, we turned left and followed a very holey, single-track road through banana plantations to reach the start of the trail, where we had some breakfast that we had brought with us to fortify us for the climb ahead up to the crater at 3,000ft. We had been told that it is recommended to hike the volcano with a guide and there was a guide there but he was waiting for some guests to arrive and said that we could go ahead on our own, which is what we did. A guide is a good idea because the hike is isolated and the trail has steep drop-offs in parts. The area at the top of the mountain is also home to the illegal marijuana farms and on our way up and down we were passed by some of the ‘special’ farmers. One guy was jogging past with no shoes on and another was balancing a large and heavy sack of fertilizer on his head and they all carry the customary huge cutlasses but we exchanged hellos as our paths crossed without issue.

The vegetation changed dramatically the higher we got. At the base was thick rainforest. This was followed by towering bamboo, then enormous palms and then the plants became much smaller and wooded as we reached the top and finally looked down into the smouldering crater 1,000ft below, which had last erupted in 1979.

It was very difficult hike because of the steepness and of the heat and humidity and I nearly gave up on a couple of occasions but, with Chris’s gentle encouragement, I made it and was so pleased that I hadn’t given up as we ate our picnic at the top looking across both sides of the island. We were lucky with the weather as low cloud is a regular feature but we were able to see everything clearly.

The climb down was strenuous too but taking our hiking shoes off at the end was a just reward!