Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Day 9, Saturday 12th
Today was one of those early starts for a jam packed and fantastic day...the start was a little inauspicious as we got up early expecting Debbie and Steve's guide, Giovanni, to arrive with us at 5.30. closer to 6 debbie arrived to tell us he'd meet us in La Fortuna, which was a bit of a bind. So we got in the car and scurried away, anxious to get an early start to see the best of the animals. We packed some kind of inadequate breakfast down us in the car from our stocking up at the Super**** supermarket on top of the hill (yes I'm sorry I take it all back, it's a great place for a supermarket, perfect in fact when you're 10k from anywhere down a dirt track at 2 mph!)So when we got to La Fortuna and met up, it was a bit disappointing to hear that we should stop and have breakfast as it wouldn't really matter... anyway it was not such a bad idea, it was pouring and none of us were really relishing the idea of 3 hours hiking in the downpour. We set off eventually, but Derry only made it 100m before her anti-bird watching gene kicked in and Suzanne regrettably had to entertain her while the rest of us trogged on.
The hike was faster than it would normally be - terrible rain meant the telescope fogged up and we couldn't see anything, and the forest was marked in its silence as all the animals said 'sod this I'm hunkering down' and hid in their trees. Undaunted the intrepid crew of 4 carried on, and as the morning wore on and we all got bored of being wet, we did see lots of animals - howler and white faced monkeys, 2 toed sloth, white faced coti (anteater type), plus an array of birds - aracari which landed on bushes 10 feet away from us (big toucan type birds), an owl, green parrots, toucan and a motmot - all of which added up to a successful morning. It was funny watching the American tourists pass us by at light speed right under a big troupe of monkeys without even spotting them!
Siena Finn and Alan were soaked through, the other girls hadn't had the best of times. So we dropped Giovanni off and then went in search of a drink. Funny how even though we were wet to the skin, we weren't really cold and could happily walk around outside. It was starting to dry out a little...
We stopped at an art gallery and souvenir shop, then grabbed a coffee and fizzy drink in a local cafe before heading off for the main event of the day (yes the bird watching was just the starter!). Pure Trek canyoning was our target, where we watched videos of what we were about to do with a mixture of trepidation and glee. After a spot of rice and beans - which needed to be supplemented from our food store, as it wasn't universally liked, eh Finn?! - we headed off in the minibus, then 4wd trucks (trailing with an impressive 11 people plus loaded trailer up some fairly hairy off road terrain). Eventually we arrived at the gear station, where we harnessed up, got into our crazy clothes and set off along the trail to the first rappel.
Somehow Finn and I had got to the front of the line - all that mountain goat walking showing its true value - and we were quickly latched on to the safety rope at the top of the first waterfall. I looked over before the safety briefing, and had a moment of 'aaargh'!, and would have been fine if I then hadn't had 5 minutes learning about everything that can go wrong! Anyway, brusque briefing over we understood most of it - just hope the important part - then we were extremely rapidly manoeuvred into position and manhandled off the top without pause for thought. I guess they do that intentionally, to stop people wavering, but it meant that Finn was the first to actually leave the station and he panicked a little. Most of the work is done by the guides, they control the speed and movement if there's any doubt about your ability, and that's fair enough but you don't know that and for all Finn knew he was plummeting towards a wet end. Siena also had a panicky moment, and was the last one down, but by the time everyone was down we all had smiles on our faces and were ready to move on. We took a moment to look back at the waterfall, and were very pleased with ourselves. We were particularly proud of the kids, they handle this adventure really well, and make friends with the other people with their attitude, open nature and smiles.
We did 4 waterfalls in this way and 1 dry descent, each slightly different from each other, but all good fun. Suzanne went first for one of the rappels, which was her only small moment of vertigo, but doing it helped her to conquer it a little. All the kids tried really hard to rappel, which isn't easy as a beginner - as we can all testify, none of them just let the guides take the strain. They were whooping and shouting as good as the latinos by the end! Lots of high adrenaline and smiles all the way round, and our 3 entertained the coach on the way back with various rude and silly jokes. No change there then.
We made it back wet, happy and with a new experience under our belts, so we felt obliged to buy the CD of the pictures. Our small camera is on its last legs so took a few shots, but with 5 of us it seemed a shame not to capture the moments.
Without sounding all squelchy, all 5 of us felt a real high, we'd all done something totally new together and come through it really well - just like the white water rafting, and it really helped the mood and atmosphere, making this one of our really good days. Costa Rica is of course everyone's favourite place right now!
There was a unanimous child vote for the same restaurant as last night so back we went to the pizzeria, had a yummy meal especially as it's next door to a Viennese bakery (so the chocolate cake was good!). actually it's worthy of note for the record that the Costa Ricans generally don't go a bundle on desserts - we're not usually offered them, and if you ask to see the menu there's often very little there. Different from all the other places.
Our return home was via leaves and lizards to check on Chewy (the given name for the sloth - well, given by Derry, shot for Chewbacca, and I can see why! He's doing just fine, we chatted for a while and retired... at about 11.30 we finally got a glimpse of the volcano which was clear, and had just had a big eruption - we hadn't spotted the rumble as being from the volcano, so we missed the main event, but we just got to see an orange glow before it clouded over again. I then spent the next hour watching just in case it did it again!!! Actually, I just didn't want the day to end. Btw apparently it got clear about 2 am again, so I'm peeved we never saw it as it should be seen .
- comments