The Only Tropical Rainforest In The US | El Yunque National Forest In Puerto Rico

One of the most famous destinations in Puerto Rico, for good reason, is El Yunque National Rainforest. This magical place is the only tropical rainforest in the U.S. park system. Fulfill your childhood dreams of visiting a rainforest as you take in the fresh cool air, sounds of tropical birds, and mesmerizing views. After you go through the main entrance, the first sight you'll see is the majestic La Coca Falls to your right. Then to your left, you'll soon find the Yocahu Tower, which has amazing views of the mountains, coast, and the city. This morning we're going to be exploring El Yunque National Forest. It's the only tropical rainforest in the national park system. And today we're going to explore the Mount Britain Tower Trail. And see if we can go all the way up to El Yunque Peak, if we don't get too tired. The trail we're going to do, the Mount Britain Tower Trail, is in my opinion the second best trail after the La Mina Trail, which is actually closed. Ever since Hurricane Maria, it's still closed. If you want to come to this part of El Yunque, the La Mina area, on the weekend, just remember to make a reservation at recreation.gov. This is El Baño Grande. It's this wonderful pool that was built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps. And you can't swim in it right now, but it is so pretty. Well, we made it to the sign. So we made it to the trailhead for the Mount Britain Trail. We had to walk 15 minutes up the road to get here because the road is currently closed for construction. And I'm super excited to do this trail because it's been over 5 years since I've done this trail, since before Hurricane Maria. So let's get started. What a weird, cool plant, right? What's that? I don't know, but it's cool and weird. It's like my favorite part about El Yunque is you can see so many cool plants. And if you're lucky, you can find a big stick insect. So we have to go all the way up there. Gotta get better in shape. So now we're going to start the jungly part of this trail. And it's going to be so much more fun than walking up the road as far as we did. And I'm so excited to go see all the beautiful plants and see if we can find some fun animals, too. Look at this beautiful little hut we found on the trail. Such a nice place to relax and take a water break. And it would be a wonderful place for a picnic. So I definitely have learned over the last four and a half months the importance of staying in shape when you're pregnant. It can be really hard to exercise because you're so tired, especially if you're working a lot. But it's so important to stay in shape and exercise every day because your heart has to work even harder when you have a baby in you. So yeah, definitely. Now that I'm out of school for a little bit and the orchestra season's over, my goal is to get fit again and enjoy hiking this summer. We're going to hike a lot. We made it to the top of Mount Britain Tower. The hike was so beautiful and this view is spectacular. So now we're hiking the Los Picachos Trail to meet up with El Yunque Trail and go down through that one so that we can see a different trail on the way down. And it should dump us down on the road not too far from where we're parked. So I'm excited because this trail is so beautiful and it's so fun to be going downhill. So we've definitely decided that the El Yunque Trail is a way more fun way to get to the tower than the Mount Britain Trail. For some reason I thought that the Mount Britain Trail would be easier because most of it is paved road. But I think that El Yunque is a little bit easier because it's so much more fun to just be in nature on this rugged trail. And the flowers are so pretty. So we are loving this hike. Super fun. We've got to save this worm. It looks like he might have taken a little bit of a stomping earlier in the day. So for the last part of our hike we're going to go down the Camiteo Trail. We made it to the bottom of the trail. The trail was a little longer than we expected but it was really beautiful and super fun. It's a great adventure. So now we're going to walk to the car and get some food. So after four and a half hours of hiking we're super hungry. And we just stopped in El Yunque Treehouse Restaurant to have a wonderful lunch. We had an amazing morning hiking in El Yunque and then a great lunch at El Yunque Treehouse. And met a new little friend here. Thanks so much for watching this video. We hope you enjoyed it. Please remember to like and subscribe. We'll see you on our next adventure. Mola! Thanks so much for watching. And please remember to like, subscribe and share this video. The world is an amazing place. Live, explore and create new memories that will last a lifetime. See you on our next adventure.