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Munros? climbed: El Yunque Peak
Munro tops? climbed: Los Picachos
Corbetts??! climbed: La Roca
Can you call it munroing? Let's review that question at the end.
Puerto Rico is a mountainous country - the Cordillera Central mountains stretch the length of the country in an East West direction. The highest peak is Cerro Punta, just shy of Ben Nevis at 4390ft. But, strangely, the Puerto Ricans are not really into hillwalking: you can drive to the top of a lot of peaks (including Cerro Punta - we did); there are almost no trails, marked or unmarked, except in some of the national parks, and you can't really go off track without a machete as the foliage is so thick over a lot of the island; they have trespass law (and most of the country is owned by someone or another); and there do seem to be masts of one sort or another on nearly any lump of consequence.
But, they do have some interesting hills, such as these:
Las Tetas de Cayey (the tits (for want of a better word) of cayey)
Our replica of Las Tetas de Cayey, Las Tetas de Arena
Complete with foliage...
They also have El Yunque, formerly known as the Caribbean National Forest, a mountainous area of rich tropical rainforest which is publically owned, full of marked trails and contains peaks over 3000ft. So on 7th January, we decided to head up there. El Yunque is a tropical rainforest, and the upper slopes are 'cloud forest', and yes, you got it, that means it's almost always in cloud, as seen here from PR Route 3:
Here is a map of the upper trails, with our route marked in yellow (and yes, it's an iPhone screenshot edited in MS Paint)
We set off from the Palo Colorado carpark onto the Yunque trail. This 'trail' was in places a well built 2 foot wide strip of concrete, although for the most part it was your average worn hill path (where the concrete had washed away) - this made it feel more munroish than I had expected (that's 1:0 to Sir Hugh).
And there are palm trees in Plockton, and plenty of bracken in Scotland, so you could say that the foliage is similar! (2:0)
We followed the trail upwards, surprisingly for a Saturday morning not seeing a single other person. At a shelter about halfway up, we saw a fireplace...
January is mid winter in Puerto Rico, and even then it's high 20s low 30s C, so I don't imagine is gets used that often! But that's another similarity: a hill bothy with a fireplace! (3:0 to Sir Hugh)
Do you really need this?
Eventually we came the spur leading to Los Picachos, our first and only Munro 'top' of the day. It's a narrow rocky peak, and helpfully (if rather disappointingly), someone's built a concrete staircase BESIDE what may otherwise have been a tricky and exposed scramble, and a concrete wall surrounding the top. Can't think of an example back home (3:1).
The wife at the top
The clag did tantalize us with glimpses of the land below, much like home (4:1)
The route ahead to El Yunque Peak
After heading back to the main Yunque trail, we headed up the last bit towards the top, bumping into some people (German or Dutch I think...) for the first time all day. "The first one's better", they told us, "that one's all in cloud". More on that shortly...
Reaching the end of the trail, we came out onto a tarmac road, strange for the top of a 3496ft mountain you might think, but remember that this is Puerto Rico. A mountain? Ah let's put a mast on it!
Road on top of munro? Can't think of one (4:2).
Mast? There's one on Cairnwell
(5:2 to Hugh, this is looking promising!)
Cloud on the top...
Going...
Going...
Going...
Going...
...I think we can call that gone! If only those Germans (or Dutch) had waited for 10 minutes.
Los Picachos from El Yunque
A bit less clag this time
Masts
What a view, looking SE
...and NW towards San Juan, the capital of PR
After leaving the summit, I decided it would be nice to take a short de-tour to La Roca (The Rock), a spur off the main route. Finding the route was not that easy, as even although it's a marked signposted trail, it's hidden behind one of the huge buildings associated with the masts, which at the time we were there, was being re-fueled by a tanker. Nevertheless, we found it and started along a narrow ridge covered in what's known as Dwarf Forest, a strange eerie place straight out of a Tim Burton animation.
Eventually we reached La Roca, or atleast, the bottom of it. Getting to the top involved a steep (but not too exposed) scramble - I did it, the wife opted to wait at the bottom.
Me at the top...
...and her at the bottom
On top
Yunque (avoiding the masts at the summit) from La Roca
After returning from La Roca, we headed down the service road and cut across the Mt Britton Trail to the upper car park, before heading back to our starting point for a well earnt dip in the (refreshing but warm compared to Scotland) river, fully clothed, strangely...
A lovely walk overall, but was it munroing? Well the score says yes, and there were striking similarities, but I don't recall ever munroing in January in trainers, shorts and sunglasses before. Still, there's a first time for everything.
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Some of the plants and animals seen on the walk - I can't name many of them, please do if you can.
Amapola
Brown lizard
and a green one
Looks like a red tarantula
There's a lot of this in the higher mountain areas of PR, really pretty
Big leaf
Fungus