Our first night’s sleep in Costa Rica was punctuated by fireworks going off at 10pm (OK) and then 4am and 530am (Not OK). The only reason given by Charles is that there is a firework factory nearby – not sure of that marketing strategy.
After an amazing breakfast – fruit, eggs and potatoes we started out for our 3 hour drive to Fortuna. The roads were really busy because it was the Black Madonna public holiday. The roads reminded us of NZ – hilly and windy. And slow. But it was lovely countryside to be driving through although it got a bit dodgy when we hit a really foggy patch at the highest part of the journey. We stopped for a coffee in a little town on the way and to get a break from the really slow traffic. We finally arrived in La Fortuna about 1.30pm and spent a fair bit of time trying to find our backpackers – Hostel Packpackers La Fortuna– basically because they have 3 hostels in the town. The hostel was pretty cool, you are given a wristband which then gives you access to the facilities at all the hostels which include a pool and a hot pool. We unpacked and them grabbed a feed at the bar across the road. I ordered a local beer thinking it would be cheaper – no luck, $9 for a pint. Amazing how expensive everything is – most people coming to Costa Rica are from the US, Canada and Europe. They usually come for 2 weeks and pre-book everything so are not really noticing the pricing. We on the other hand have been backpacking through cheap counties and have got used to those prices. We decided after that to cook more of our own food while here in Costa Rica.
We booked our canyoning for the next day – US$80 each. On our way to dinner we met a local with whom we had a bit of fun with. A few games of cards and some rum/wine before we headed to the pool table to teach the other travellers ‘NZ rules’ at the pool table. We were tucked up in our beds by midnight ready for our early start. We were picked up by Pure Trek Canyoning at 7.30 – and they arrived on the second. Deryn assumed Costa Rica would be similar to our Colombian experience – we now know different! It was a short drive to the start where we changed into our wet weather gear and given a helmet and a heavy duty set of gloves. Our adventure included 4 rappels (3 waterfalls and 1 rock wall), monkey drop and a rock climb. The first rappel was over 50 metres so it was in at the deep end! Being dropped into a pond and rappelling through waterfalls was pretty amazing but there wasn’t really the fear factor Deryn and I were expecting. They wanted US$30 for the photos they took, but the twotightnomads just couldn’t spend the money. The bus took us back to their head office for a traditional Loi local meal – beans, rice, salad and chicken, topped off by this incredible sauce called Lazana Salsa.
After that excitement we headed back to our backpackers for an afternoon chilling around the pool before driving 5km north of the town to some hot baths. It was 5000 colons/US$10 to enter but the facilities were pretty good. Including a couple of water slides that Deryn and I had a go on. There was only 1 really hot pool, the others ranging from tepid to cold. Still it was a couple of pleasant hours – would have been amazing if Arenal volcano has popped through the clouds for a bit longer.
We headed out for an early meal before getting back into the routine of a few games of cards and the rum/wine. We popped out and saw our new local friend after a couple of hours but were in bed by 10 as we planned a hike the next morning. We picked the Arenal 1968 walk (that was when it last had a significant eruption – its been erupting regularly every few years since – nothing as major though). It was a 35 min drive from La Fortuna, and then US$16 each for the hike! We got there at 9 to it wasn’t too busy. It was a 5.1km walk around a lake and then up to a lookout where you had a great view of Arenal Volcano (assuming there is no cloud). We saw a few birds, but the highlight were these inedible ant trains carrying chopped off leaves as fuel for the fungi in their nexts. Amazing. The walk was OK but sorry to sound like a stuck record, but not worth the US$16 each. The walk was basically natural with very little human involvement – be good to know what they do with the money?
On the way back we stopped at the Scratch River for its famous free hot water pools. It was really busy so you had to use some local parking lads who charged you a fee for their advice and to clean the river. When asked how much he said between 3000 and 5000 colons (US$6-10). I gave him 1400. You had to walk under an over bridge to get the pools but it was definitely worth it. It was busy – the damn Black Madonna – but still easy to find your own spot in the river. We hung there for 30 minutes to so before heading back to our backpackers. We chilled for a few hours before heading out for dinner – Dits did a scout run returning empty handed saying she would rather buy some pasta in the supermarket and cook it ourselves. Which is what’s we did and it was really good!! Then it was back to cards and rum/wine. I ran out of rum around 10pm so we headed out to buy some more and had a bit of wonder around town. There were quite a few weirdo’s out and about, including a very pissed local who enjoyed a swig out of my bottle of rum. We got quite a few offers of cheap cocaine from various drunk locals. Thanks, but no thanks.
It was a bit of a slow start the next morning but we managed to get away just before our 11am checkout time for our 2 hour drive to Monteverde. Amazingly the town was 26km as the crow flies but over 110 km by road. It was a lovely drive around the western bank of Lake Arenal and then into the hills of The Children’s Eternal Rain Forest. The last 45 minutes was on dirt roads which made for slow going. Monteverde on first impressions was a lot more laid back than La Fortuna. Our hostel, Cabinas El Puebla, was near the centre of town, and given the prices we had been paying in Costa Rica, incredibly cheap at $26 per night. We had our standard Costs Rican lunch of cheese and salad sandwiches in the hostels cute kitchen and then chilled for a few hours. Deryn booked us a zip lining session the next morning with Extremo Canopy after which we headed out for a late meal (for us) at 7pm. The place was packed with northern hemisphere tourists so it took 4 goes before we could find a place we could eat.
It was a 20 minute drive to Extremo. We got there at 10.55 to be greeted by 20 people standing in the queue to check in and another 10 or so already checked in. We had read about the crowds but hoped for better. We finally got checked in, got our harnesses on and the went for our briefing. One for the English and the other Spanish. There was about 20 in each group. The Spanish finished first but waited for the English group to go first – tourists are more likely to complain on social media? I made sure I got to the front of the queue so for all 12 zip lines it was Deryn and I first and second! It was a real blast. 4 of the lines were over 400m, one superman line was 750 (you lie down with your feet in a harness for the superman zip). A couple of lines Deryn and I went together. We finished with a Tarzan swing where you are 100ft up a platform and drop into a huge swing. A real adrenalin buzz and not too bad value at $50. We met a young English couple – Jack and Yasmin – who had a phone and took some photos of Deryn and I. In return we dropped them off back at the village so they didn’t have to wait 45min for the tour bus. Before we left a couple of Scarlet Macaws took a liking to Jack and chased him around the Extremo office. Hilarious.
We spent the afternoon investigating some free walks in the area but nothing was that inspiring so decided to flag it. I headed up the the very popular Taco Taco Taqueriato grab an outdoor table about 5.30 to wait for Dits while she did her daily yoga. Tried a few local beers and then a spicy margarita – nearly blew my head off. The meal was ok – not sure why the place was so popular? We managed to get away reasonably early but had to detour to a local cafe to access wifi so we could cancel our booking in Playa Hermosa as it was the wrong Playa Hermosa nearly 300km from where we wanted to go. We found a place in Jaco and headed off.
The drive was pleasant – again the roads reminded us of the back roads in NZ. We stopped briefly on Crocodile Bridge over the Tarcoles River to marvel at the many very large crocodiles cruising in the muddy waters below. We arrived at our Beach Break Resortin Jaco just after midday. The place was very ‘resorty’ but perfect to chill for a day before we headed up to Manuel Antonia National Park. We headed into town for dinner at the famous Ridiculous Burgers before heading home for a Netflix movie.
The next morning it was a buffet breakfast with the American tour groups before Deryn headed off for the oldest surf group lesson ever. I finished “The Power Of The Dog” (incredible read) and chilled by the pool after a quick dip in the very warm sea.
