Lob Blog
San Jose-Tortuguero 13-19th Sept 2011
Do you know the way to San Jose? Those words by Dionne Warwick will stay etched into our minds forever as it seemed Sena had been reincarnated as a kamikaze bus driver. Nutter. We checked into our hostel called Tranquilla in the Barro Amon area of San Jose, which was clean, tidy and looked well visited given the thickness of the guest book and foreign coins trapped underneath the glass desk top. We decided to check out the night life and were met by a number of sex care providers...hookers. Our hostel seemed to be in the red light district. On enquiring whether or not they take washing in, I noticed one of girls / boy was wearing nothing but an onion sack with a rat in it. I guess less is more ?
The next morning we moved on to Monteverde, a small town surrounded by cloud rainforrest, 15,000ft above sea level with an annual rainfall of 3m. The rainforest lived up to it's rep as the heavens opened and ribbons of water cascaded from the shacks and hammered the ground. It was as if Jose and his twin brother Jos B were washing down our tin clad hostel. Fire out! We plucked up enough courage to take to the tree tops and undertook some extreme zip lining. This entailed strapping on a harness, pulley and helmet and then jumping off a series of platforms into the tree tops. When our instructor was fitting my helmet he commented on the size of my head. I could tell he was thinking 'el Sponge Bob Square Pantos'. Even strangers take the piss out of my oversized bonce! In some places we were around 50m from the forrest floor, zip wiring lengths of cable in excess of 150m!
The following morning we hiked through the rainforest at Santa Elena. This reserve has been saved from development by the children at the local school, so when you hear about fundraising for children to save the rainforrest... It actually exsits! Trekking along the jungle tracks, we stood still for a few moments its inhabitants delivered a musical masterpiece. We managed to spot lots of insects and birds but no snakes or bird eating spiders.
Day 16 and we catch a jeep-boat-jeep to La Fortuna. The previous nights rain fall had left the roads with a glaggy topping much to the mini bus drivers entertainment. En route we spotted a local man picking a snake up off the road. We stopped to take a closer look and Lucy decided to take an even closer look by gently taking the meter or so long snake into her arms. She then asked if it was venomous. Luckily it was't and she let it go.
La Fortuna is a town next to active Arenal volcano, which spits out magma and lava from it's crators on clear nights. We visited the hot water springs at Baldi heated by the volcano a stones throw away. Some of the pools were so hot that a black mineral loving algea line the tiled bottom pools.
Another attraction near la Fontana is a 70m waterfall, we decided to walk the 5 or so kilometres to the entrance through the outskirts of the small village and agricultural land. On the way there we spotted two young boys launching themselves into the river from a rope swing. We couldn't resist a go or two. However, one of the little angles had been trying to pursued us to swing out in tandom. We did and for the few seconds we were under water this gave him an opportunity to pinch Lucy's phone. What they didn't realise is that we had been taking pictures of each other and we had caught them in the background. This gave the police enough to go and find the light fingered monkey. Lucy was eventually reunited with her phone. Very fortunate!
The waterfall was epic and you could hear the water piling into the pool below from a far. Lots of climbing plants and carpets of moss had grown into platts which also allowed water to find it's way down. Defiantly worth a visit but keep an eye on your belongings.
Day 18 and we travel to Tortugero which is renowned for it night time turtle tours and wildlife watching in general. Tortugero village is essentially a small remote island surrounded by the Caribbean sea on one side and the Tortugero river on the other, with only around 400 inhabitants including tourists. We slipped up straight away as we didn't realise there wouldn't be any atm's. The locals are more than aware of this and charge 18 to 25 per cent commission for cash back.
That evening we embarked on a turtle tour after I'd taken care of the turtle head which was popping out. Sorry, I was excited... The tours consist of watching turtles delivering their cargo of eggs before burying them and sliding back into the sea. There are four species which chose the black volcanic sands; the Logerhead, Hasbill, Green and Leatherback, which is the largest and can weigh up to 250 kilos. The moon lit tour was fascinating. With out getting all David Attinbrough, the process of the female green turtle delivering her eggs begins with her dragging her body out of the surf on to the beach. She excavates a nest where she then extrudes the glossy ivory coloured ping pong ball like eggs. She can lay anywhere between 90 to 120 eggs in one sitting and normally around 500 eggs throughout the season . She will return to the same beach each time, which is also where she hatched. Whilst 98 per cent of the eggs hatch and make it to sea in a dawn or dusk dash, only 1 in a 1,000 make it to adulthood. During the incubation period of 60 days, the temperature of the nest determines the sex of the hatchlings. As the green turtle is on the endangered species list a conservation programme has been set up to monitor and protect the nesting site. I thought the whole experience was great although on one occasion that night another group had disturbed a nesting turtle and she had returned to the sea without completing her drop. Saying that, our guide called Bizmark explained to us that many turtles are poached and sold on the black market. It therefore seems that tourism generates money to fund the coservation programme which is actually helping to lift the green turtle off the endangered species list.
Our next excursion was with Edwardo in a canoe around the small tributaries of the river. It was an early start 05:30 but we were rewarded for our efforts. The boggy banks and lush vegetation absolutely teams with life. We saw the lot! Cayman, white faced monkeys, howler monkeys, lots of birds and spiders. However, the stars of the show where the otters. We didn't see them at first but we could hear a muttering noise and a high pitched squeaking. It was a mother with her two pups. We watched her showing the pups how to dispatch shellfish. Given the setting, it was like ring of bright waters meets jurrassic park. Edwardo did a great job even if he did make me paddle back!
We spent the rest of the day lounging in our beach fronted hammock, cracking open coconuts for their delicious milk and walking along the almost deserted beach. Rounding off the day nicely we saw some baby turtles scurrying to the sea from their nest! Bonus!
Costa Rica so far has been... Humid! However, it has also been fantastic and certain parts doesn't seem to have been touched by the rest of the world. That said, can anyone let me know what's happening in the World Cup?