Mount Liamuiga — Attraction in Saint Kitts

DO NOT TAKE THIS EXCURSION FROM ROYAL CARIBBEAN!

I hiked this volcano.

I am in good shape. I exercise for an hour or more 3-5 days a week. I lift weights... I am athletic. I hike. I usually go trail hiking in the Appalachian mountains.

The volcano trail itself, on the volcano is about 2 miles and then the trail to the trail to the volcano is about a mile. In total the hike is about 8 miles, according to the pedometer on my phone.

Royal Caribbean schedules the excursion for 6 hours, which stresses the tour guides, because they have to be on time. The tour guides will rush you on a treacherous and muddy trail that is often 6 inches wide at places, with huge boulders as well. it is not mountain hiking, it is mountain climbing. The degree grade is about 30% if I had to guess. sometimes, it probably pushes 70% especially the last half mile toward the summit. Making that ascent and descent at that speed on that trail is not safe for amateurs and should only be done by serious mountaineers and not by children. Children can become exhausted and can suddenly experience cardiac or respiratory complications and radical decompensation (shock). This is not a safe excursion during rainy season. Subtract 2 hours for travel, one hour each way. You must complete this 8 mile round trip in 4 hours with minimal breaks. The beginning of the trail is humid and is very taxing to start a mountain climb with few breaks, that last about 30 seconds. The humidity in the beginning makes the rest of the ascent that much more challenging.

The trail is not as well groomed as I would expect. It was more overgrown than I would have thought. With such a popular trail, I would hope that they errect some more stable and permanent assistive structures (IE a railing) on the trail, instead of slack and knotted rope.

The tour company handed us cold cut turkey sandwiches on white bread for lunch with a 2 oz Dixie cup of lemonade. Not worth $129.

G-d bless my guide. I would not have made it to the top...

First off. Unless you have endurance, and are relatively in shape, do not try this climb. 3 people that started with us made it only 20 minutes before they gave up. It is one heck of a journey to the summit, which was totally worth it once I got up there! It's also a mountain climb, not a casual walk through the rain forest. Be responsible for your own well being. Use hiking shoes/boots...running shoes will be ruined. Bring an extra snack and some water (from the ship if you're on a cruise). The guides, who do this climb up to 4 times per week, are great people. The two that stayed with our group after the sweeper had to stay back with the 3 people that couldn't continue, were awesome. They were informative, had great senses of humour, and most importantly they were patient with the slower section of our group. I was the go between as I was with 4 others, 2 in the quick group, and 2 in the slower group. I got the nickname mountain goat LMAO because I was jogging in between the groups. You see so much flora and get to listen to the birds in the canopy. If you're lucky you might get to see a Vervet Monkey. We saw one and a few mongoose 😎 We were given a light snack and some small glasses of a frozen pineapple drink just over halfway up. Both were very tasty. Once we reached the top there was plenty of time to absorb the views and snap some videos and pictures. The climb down was a little quicker of course, but just as technical. Once we reached the bottom we had sandwiches and a drink. We had the option of a beer for $2, which I indulged in. The drive back was quick as we got stuck in some rush hour traffic, and we were literally the last people back on...

Kid friendly? Yes, probably, ages 8+ and up that are athletic and listen to instruction. It's a ~1100 ft elevation over three miles on slippery terrain.

A "Type 2" fun hike.

We did a tour of Mariner of Seas with RC. Paul, "the mountain goat" and team led the 30 person group over 3 hours to up and 2 hours back down. We got rained on 5 times. The lower park area is dense humid. The crater base cools off as you gain elevation. It was a lovely strenuous hike, highly consider you physicality before going on this. We've done six colorado 14ers, rock climb, caving, and it had us huffing mid hike.

Bring minimum 1.5L water per person. Hiking snack good idea. Have proper hiking boots that can get wet. There's no bugs or biting critters beyond occasional spider web. 95% of hike you're in shaded canopy as it relates to clothing and sunscreen concerns.

Animal wise occasional anole lizard, Patridge, and otherwise sparse on animals. We saw no monkeys.

There's an offshoot path at crater saddle to a higher point which is sketchy and a sketchy rope into crater that adds ~60 minutes to trip. At casual pace it took group 4.5 hour to traverse with breaks. It could be done in probably 3 at a...