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Pulled into Monteverde by mid morning after our classic backpacker transfer fondly known as the jeep-boat-jeep.....a four hour journey across the misty Lake Arenal and a very bumpy drive up into Costa Rica's famous cloud forest. Found a homely hostel - desite tales of tarantulas hiding out in beds- owned by a super friendly Ronnie and his cute family. And he was a total legend after it turned out that the well dodgy owner of the Lonely Planet recommended hostel in La Fortuna had ripped us all off by $50 each by not booking the Montezuma famous canopy zipline adventure.
Dozens of angry phonecalls ensued with threats of police involvement and a return trip to La Fortuna to wreck furious vengeance followed by the all too cliched bad language and hang-ups. Me and Tim decided to cut our losses and headed off on the tour anyway seeing as we'd been banging on about the Costa Rica zip lines since leaving home!
The ziplines were amazing....and they were by far the longest and highest we've ever done. The longest was over 750m from one side of the valley to the other!!!! Pretty mental....! Speed demon Tim got scolded by the oh-so-serious American guide for failing to break and hitting the tree while I managed to spin 180 degrees halfway across the big one and ended up almost coming in backwards! Also did a crazy rappel from the top of the treetops where the guy in charge just dropped us super fast....before getting all harnessed up for the truly mentalist Tarzan swing! We got strapped in, climbed up onto a platform before the guide unceremoniously kneed you in the arse. A few seconds of terrifying freefall followed by a the biggest swing through the trees! Jungle calls mostly included swear words, high pitched screams and oooomph.
And after a fab afternoon we were super chuffed to discover on our return that in the wake of Jodi and Ronnie's combined stern efforts, the thieving Noel had returned at least some of our cash via a travel agency in town. Yay!
All celebrated with bottles of red, platefuls of cheese and plenty more unnecessary spider chat with hero of the hour Ronnie and some fellow Brazilian travellers with a manicure from his 6-year-old daughter chucked in for good measure!
Worn out from the previous days excitement, we spent the next day mooching round town and a tasty pizza in front of the TV after rain called play on our planned night-time tarantula walk. (Secretly pleased..although apparently there are still plans afoot to do this in Belize instead) Forwards into Nicaragua....
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