The park covers about 6,857 hectares in the south of the island — that is roughly the size of 9,500 football pitches. It is named after its highest peak, Morne Trois Pitons, which means 'Mountain of the Three Peaks' in French. The mountain rises 1,424 metres into the clouds, and mist often wraps around its upper slopes.
Inside the park you can find an extraordinary mix of landscapes in a very short distance. Tall old-growth forest gives way to open meadows of giant ferns, then suddenly the ground steams and hisses as you enter a volcanic valley. There are five volcanoes within the park boundaries, along with more than 50 fumaroles (gas vents), hot springs, and mud pools.
Because Dominica gets enormous amounts of rainfall — sometimes the most in the Caribbean — the rainforest here is thick and layered. Enormous trees form a canopy overhead, with smaller trees underneath, then shrubs and ferns below those, and mosses and fungi on the forest floor. Each layer is its own little world of insects, birds, and reptiles.