Monteverde

A few weeks ago my aunt, Laura and cousin, Kevin visited us from Orange County.



After spending a few days hanging out around Heredia, we all boarded the bus to Monteverde. Monteverde is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Costa Rica. It is a village that was founded many years ago by the Quakers and has since become a favorite place for foreigners looking to stay a few days or expats looking to settle down.

The bus ride was interesting and we spent half the time on unpaved road. When we got there, though, I could tell I would like the town. We stayed in a cool hotel with a tree growing in the middle of it, taking up the entire courtyard.


While we were in Monteverde we did another zipline. This one was CRAZY. And by CRAZY I mean climbing towers, wind blowing, chilly CRAZY. We climbed the towers so we could zig-zag across the canyon. On the first one I really considered climbing back down and walking back to the lodge. I'm glad I didn't, though, because the first on was the worst and they got better. On several lines we had to do a tandem ride because it was so windy that one person couldn't have made it all the way across and would have gotten stuck in the middle ( I had to go with Jordan, I'm sure you can imagine that).



I still don't know if I really like it, but I did it and that's what counts. I will definitely never forget it! It was also a nice bonding time for me and my cousin and aunt. I don't get to see them too often, but when we live in Orange County we will live close to them.

In Monteverde we also took a guided tour at the nature reserve. In the other parks I always see the guides with their telescopes and large groups of tourists and I always kind of giggled at how funny the whole the looked. Couldn't they just walk and enjoy the scenery? What a waste of money. Well... let me tell you- I was wrong! Our guide was amazing and we mannaged to see all three types of monkeys that live in that area, a tarantula and lots of birds. The most amazing part was seeing a Queztal- the Holy Grail for birders in Costa Rica. We watched her sit on the branch and puke up the avocado seeds that she had swallowed hole with the rest of the fruit. It was so amazing!






Other than that we just walked around and ate lots of food. They continued on to Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean before heading back home. It was a fun trip!

Arenal and Cahuita

Sorry its been so long! Our new semester has started and it has been crazy! This week has been especially busy because my boss and his assistant are both out of town leaving me and the other head teacher, Greta, in charge. So far we have had 2 people absent and a million questions. I think we'll be okay, though.

This blog is about the trip I took with my mom and Frank in December and January.

We started by driving our rental car to La Fortuna, the town at the foot of Volcan Arenal. Our hotel there was awesome! We each had our own mini-cabin and the bathrooms were great! It rained for a while when we were there, but that didn't stop us from eating good food and taking some adventures. The picture of the "volacano" is the most we saw of the mountain while we were there.



Our first adventure was ziplining. For anyone who hasn't tried ziplining, I actually recommend it! This might be surprising to some of you who know me and my fears of most things. But, the place we went in Arenal was beautiful and we were in the rainforest for a lot of the time. There was also something called the Tarzan Swing. Sounds fun, right? Um... lets just say after my mom and I watched Jordan go first, we both almost ran the other way. However, we sucked it up and jumped. The "swing" is really more like a small bungee jump and you get a few seconds of free falling before swinging out over the trees. Lets just say, its not something I need to do again.

One day we took a hike to a beautiful waterfall. There was quite a view but the hike was outrageous. It was basically a staircase that you walked down and then walked back up. It was a great workout!





We also took a night hike to the other side of the volcano to see "lava". Apparently by "lava" they mean falling red rocks. It was actually pretty cool to see and somewhat redeemed the tour company from the rest of the horrible trip which included having to ditch the first part of the tour because we were too late to enter the park and having our guide leave most of the group of 25 in his dust as he power-walked through the rainforest on the way back (after dark).

Next, we hit up Cahuita. This is a beautiful town on the Caribbean coast. We stayed at a fun hotel outside of town. While there we swam, my mom scuba dived and we walked in the national park.

Frank didn't get to see his monkeys (that was the whole reason he came to Costa Rice), but we did do something else really cool. We visited one of the few remaining indigenous tribes in Costa Rica- the Bri Bris. We drove out into the middle of nowhere, parked the car, boarded an hour-long dug-out wooden canoe ride and then trudged through the mud to get to the village.

The community started an organization to improve their lives when the men were returning from the banana fields ill due to the pesticides. After babies were born with serious health problems, the women took action. 15 years ago they joined together and started planting organic bananas and cacao on their land. They also built a community building and started accepting tourists to see their land, fields, and village. They now host guests on a daily basis and show all their local crops, give several demonstrations and show how they roast and grind cacao. They send their products to Europe and use the money to continue building their organization. Their area was massacred by the November and December floods of last year and they lost many of their fields as well as many buildings. They are optimistic, though, that they will rebuild and they are using many of the recycled materials to begin the process.

Sorry I don't have any pictures of this part of the trip because Jordan's camera died. I will try to get them to post from my mom.

The rest of the trip is a bit hazy for me because I got really sick the next day. It did, however, include a drive back to Heredia, an earthquake that we didn't feel, moving into our new apartment and seeing my mom and Frank off.



We are now settled into our new place and really happy here!