Hola familia y amigos! Escribiendo de La Fortuna, ole!!
San Jose was an interesting experience but was basically a dump. I´m glad we stayed there though because the hostel was super chill and there were people from all over the world there. Although it seemed pretty poor and dirty, all of the people were genuinely kind to us. We ventured out downtown for dinner and we thought that the cab driver said it would be 11,000 colones, which equals about 22 bucks for a 3 minute drive. It wasn´t until later that we realized it was 1,100 colones, which is about $2.25 haha. I guess we deserved it for our slow money math converting skills and being rookie travellers. Lesson learned. After dinner we headed back to the hostel just in time to see the fire show. This Tico had devil sticks that were lit on fire at both ends and was throwing them into the air. As he was doing this, this French chick was playing a bongo. I thought that was cool, but what was cooler was what happened a few minutos later. A group of the most random people formed a cirlce and starting singing and playing musica. The fire guy, some tall white English speaking guy playing the guitar, and a group of 3, as Ian says, ´yo boys´ (who you really wouldn´t think would take a vaca like this), and the long gray haired hippi fellow got together. North Dakota white boy played the guitar, the yo boys started singingreggae freestyling (they actually had amazing voices). Long Haired Hippi was sitting on the wall doing some sort of hippi dance that involved slapping his leg followed by throwing a punch to the ground and ending with a ´Chhhyeaahh!´ and a fist pump. Ian and I went over to listen but then they ran away from us. As they played, however, a hippi chick with dreaded pigtails came over and started moving around to the musica and they didn´t run from her. Lesson learned: having dreads and the ability to fist pump will make you friends in foreign countries.
La Fortuna: Breathtaking. San Jose was not really what I thought Costa Rica was all about, but this little town is exactly what my mind conjured up when I would think rainforest, volcano, hotsprings, etc. Originally, we were to stay at Arenal Backpackers Resort, another budget hostel. As we drove around town and couldn´t find it, we decided to check out Tabacon Thermal Spa Resort. Ian will continue from here...
HOLA!!! Although we have mentioned it before, words cannot express how great of a decision it was to get the GPS. I am not sure if we brought this up before, but no streets, highways, or anything has signs. Plus Lisa has a picture of what the GPS map was showing us and it basically looks like a spaghetti noodle all crinkled up. So we venture into La Fortuna and cannot find the place we are staying. Also the clouds are covering the top of the Volcano. So we decide to hit the Tabacon Hot Springs which are natural springs that flow from the volcano so they are heated. Since we can´t fine the hostel nor see the volcano we decide that we deserve to live the lavish lifestyle for two days. Makes sense. So we decide to book rooms as the resort. I won´t get into it too much, but the room has a jacuzzi, a back deck overlooking a rainforest, and also hot water which was a significant upgrade from previous experiences. We deserve it.
I´d get into more detail about Saturday´s adventures, but we went to the amazing hot springs, went to dinner, and then decided to take a quick catnap around 7. I woke up at 4 a.m. Maybe this is that jet lag thing all the people talk about. So after about 20 minutes of deciding what our vacation options would be at 4 a.m. we decided that it may be best to just let this sleep thing keep on goin.
My writing skills will not be able to do justice for our adventures today. You´ll have to see the pictures. Around 10 a.m. we took a zip line canpoy tour that took us high up on a mountain and featured 16 zip lines all the way down. This was amazing. These lines took us over canyons, rivers, etc and ranged from 100 meters to over 500 meters long. I´d convert that for you, but that would assume i knew something about how long a meter is.
After another quick stop at the natural hot tubs, we ventured about 2 miles to La Fortuna Falls. This is by far the highlight. There is about a 1 mile drive along what may or not be described as a road, followed by about a 10 minute hike down to the falls. This waterfall spills into a quary where people swim at the base. The falls were touristy enough that there was a beaten trail, but still maintained its natural environment. If anyone has seen the Robin Hood with Kevin Costner it kinda looks like the scene where Kevin Costner is taking a bath. Only in this case everyone was treated to my behind instead of his. I am not sure if this was an upgrade for all involved or not. I´d like to think it was. As we dive into the pool at the base of the falls the skies opened up with a huge downpour. However all those involved ( Lisa, myself, a German couple, and 3 dudes trying to swim under the falls) just threw our hands up to welcome the rain. It was amazing.
On the drive back we stopped at a local merchant who we thought was selling hammocks. Just thought it was an interesting shop. Upon walking in we were greated by an exciting individual who proceeded to show us his ¨office¨ where he made all of his hammocks and jewelry. Basically my man just hung out, listened to tunes, and made hammocks on his porch. I am buying a hammock from this man. So taking a quick mental measurement of my back deck I purchase a hammock that will certainly get some use when we get home.
We are now on our way to dinner, night time at the hot sppring spa, and an evening at the local ¨Discotek¨. Sounds good to me. Hasta luego.
Back to Lisa: Mis amigos, te amo mucho y pura vida!!!!
