I have neglected my little blog, I know. Here is what we did in Costa Rica
My family and I just got back from Costa Rica. It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Here is some of our adventures...
Day 1: Sunday - We flew from San Francisco to Dallas. In Dallas we were only supposed to have a 2 hour lay over and leave at 4 pm. At about 3 pm an employee of American Airlines comes on the loud speaker and in a little Texan accent says, " Attention all Flight 2166 passengers, your flight it going to be delayed as as a mail truck has hit the airplane and put a hole in the engine. Your flight will be delayed till 9 pm.. " She apologied for the inconvenience. WHAT??!!! How does a mail truck hit a grounded airplane on the tarmac? We board the plane at 9pm.
Day 2- We arrive in San Jose about 12:30am. We get to our hotel about 1am. Our driver Stuart is the scariest driver on earth! Anyway we fall asleep and have to wake up a 5 am to get ready for the driver to come pick us up for our full day rafting trip. On the Pacuare River we encountered class two and three rapids. We rafted to a Jungle Lodge that you can only get to by raft. We took a "short 10 min walk" that turned out to be a 45 minute hike uphill thru mud. Yikes. But we ended up at a beautiful swimming hole. We came back down and had a yummy dinner and some Guaro (sugar cane liquor).
Day 3- After breakfast (like 6am) we took a 15 minute hike to the zipline. It was one of scariest and funnest things I have done. It very much emphazied the crotches of our guides. Yummy. We took off for class 3 and 4 rapids. It was sooo fun.. I was so proud of us since none of us fell out of the raft. Well my sister's boyfriend fell out in a class 1 rapid right after a class 4. We were dropped off at a country club hotel in Limon after rafting. We swam, had dinner and drinks...We ordered a picture of margaritas and got a confused look and then got a half filled picture of margarita mix, triple sec and 5 shots of tequila. Ewwww.
Day 4- Went to Tortuguero National Park and kayaked on the Colorado River. I hate kayaking now. My sister and I decided on tandum kayaking and with the river level so high flew down the river and had a hard time keeping control of the kayak. I have scratches on my arm from where we met some branches. We stopped for lunch in the middle of the jungle and 2 little stray dogs showed up and we fed them our leftovers. The male was sooo skinny but was quite ballicious. Got to our Hotel. The river on one side and the Caribbean Ocean on the other. The Ocean was too dangerous to go in. The hotel has is own Frog sanctuary. We also saw 3 foot Iguanas, Jesus Christ lizards, and huge grasshoppers.
Day 5- We got up a 5 am and took a boat tour around the national park. We saw monkeys, river turtles, river otters, tons of birds, slothes, more iguanas.. We then went for the 2nd day of kayaking where I kayaked in my own boat. We were going upstream and I hit a current that put me into some branches and put my about 40 feet from a cayman. I paddled away just to hit another current that flipped my kakyak. The guide led me to the shore and we pulled the kayak up and dumped out the water, which led to a branch breaking and termites falling on us and in my boat. Apparently the monkeys across the way were interested in us and come across the river to check out what we were doing. Scary... We kayaked some more and then floated back down the river to the boat (my favorite part).
We were then taken to our lodge by Volcano Arenal. We got changed and took a bus to Tabacon Spa. We enjoyed the natural hot springs and some walking around. At dinner the volcano started spewing rocks and lava and we could see it from our table. It was sooo cool.. We got back to our hotel and from the hot tub we could see Arenal's show.
Day 6- We got up real early to go caving. We got there and about 10 steps into the cave came across a huge spider, a taranchula, and a crab. Then we went spelunking and climbing up limestone walls. It was soo fun. Although I slipped a little on the wall and have a huge bruise on my arm.
The back to the hotel and more swimming and volcano watching. Our pool had a swim up bar.
Day 7- More swimming.. We then get picked up to go back to San Jose. It started raining. Then the roads start overflowing with water. Then the freeways start overflowing with water and ambulances started having to rescue cars from the roads. The water was up to the bumper on the small sedans. Turns out it was a small tropical storm.
Day 8- Saddest Day- We go to the airport and pick up souveniers. Then we fly home. About 30 minute delay in Dallas.