Best waterfalls yet
28 March 2019
Paul Barker
I have made friends 👫 with and been chatting with 5 Americans for a couple of weeks, because 3 of them did some vital work on the boat rigging. We got to talking about a set of hot spring waterfalls, about 50 minutes drive into the hills. We organised to go up together with a local chap in his pickup truck and his son, we paid him about £2 each for the return trip, we also paid £1.50 each, for entry into the waterfalls.
We walked for less than 5 minutes to the falls with a few of the local kids trying to sell coconuts 🥥 and sweets 🍬to us, the first sighting of our destination was great 👍. The falls themselves, in height or width, were not as spectacular as others that I have visited before, they are about 15 metres high and 20 metres wide, with a small cave system at the base, which you can go into. The water 💦 is flowing in at different temperatures from cool to unbearably hot 🥵 (you cannot touch it at the top of the falls) but there were already around 40 or 50 other people there, enjoying the water 💦. I started at the lower and shallower end, as I edged and swam my way up in the water I noticed the entrance to the low cave networks, I ducked under then swam in, it had an eerie sort of feel, I could see and touch the small worn stalactites. There were about 10 others inside with me, all of them very friendly and we tried to chat with each other. Opposite the falls there were positions where we could jump in the highest point was over 3 metres, I had a couple of jumps, whilst others were doing backflips.
I had a climb up the root system alongside the waterfalls, because I was wearing my swimming 🏊♂️ leg 🦵 it decided to fall off when I was about 4 meters from the top, so I had to continue up, one of my friends carried it the long way up to me.
I also found (I wasn't the first tho) another 30 metre cave network that had different cascades of water both hot and cool. It is not normally accessible if the water is at its usual height, there is very little light except for what filters in from the entrance and exit, this was the best part of the falls by far.
There was a Guatemalan family sat next to us who invited us to join them. They then gave all 7 of us a large plate of bbq'ed, beef 🥩, rice, salsa and 2 litres of coke, it was so nice of them, they wouldn't accept any payment from us.
The drive back was fast with all the men sat outside in the back of the pickup, our day ended with us all having a lovely dinner and a couple of beers 🍻 in a small restaurant in town. Today was a great day.