Day 4 ... Arenal Volcano trip

Arenal volcano - very lucky to see it without clouds, some of the "cloud" you see is steam from the volcano itself.

  We left very early Wednesday morning to start the 5 hour trip to the central part of Costa Rica to see the Arenal Volcano.  It was 142 miles away ... so you can imagine the speed at which we were driving.  No road here is more than 2 lanes.  The highway is different only in that the two lanes are crowded with trucks instead of as many people, cows, bikes, chickens (there are still people and bikes just not as many!).  We travel with a map, written directions and a GPS and still get lost! We stopped to have a little break after a couple of hours.  It was then John noticed they had a flat tire.  We found a mechanic nearby and Joan negotiated the big transaction to get the tire repaired  -- where can you get that done for $8.00?  Andy says, the guy is just like at Goodyear at home.  You say "we have a flat", he says "yes, there is a screw in your tire."  Difference is there are also chickens running around ... Refreshed, tires renewed, we started out again.  The countryside took on a whole new look.  We left the 'sabanero' country (cowboy country -- in Guanacaste where the house is you see them everywhere -- riding their horses to work, to herd the cattle, to restaurants).  Now the rolling hills became mountains, the foliage was more lush, lots more flowers. The roads were paved, but that didn't necessarily mean smooth riding. The last three hours had us winding around and around the Emerald Mountains toward Arenal.  I mean around and around and up and up.

At our hotel, we had a breath-taking view of the volcano from our individual casitas. As pretty as the place was, we didn't stay put.  Off we went to the hanging bridges.

This is a little park with a 2 mile trail that winds up and down and trough the rain forest.  The trail included many bridges, some almost 100 meters in the air, others were low and just over a little creek.  The high bridges would wobble and shake as we crossed ("stop wiggling kids!").  The 7 of us were totally on our own. Molly led the pack and with more energy than any normal human could have after a seriously long car trip, she'd read the signs before every bridge, then run back and tell us what was coming up. There were 16 bridges in all and the hike lasted 2 hours. We could hear different sounds of the forest, the waterfalls, birds, insects and some heavy breathing (must get back to karate, i am so out of shape!).  There was one beautiful waterfall that was an additional steep hike down.  As we stood there admiring, we looked up up up and there was a bridge high high above us ... we couldn't believe how high we were going to be!  When we got there, Alex laid down on the bridge looking down through the grates trying the see that waterfall far below, we could barely glimpse it.  Alex, molly and Drew were fearless.  Molly was also in a rush to run through the entire thing ...

I keep hoping to see monkeys in every tree but that wasn't to be.  However, Drew spotted the leaf-cutter ants, marching in a long line from a tree to their home in the ground. Each ant was carrying a little leaf (except one carrying a berry. There's one in every crowd.).  They don't eat the leaf; they eat the fungus on the leaf.   We didn't see anything else for most of the hike until near the end (about 4:30-5:00 so close to dusk here).  Molly was in front and first saw a bird (yes, exciting), then we saw a little group of animals we'd never seen before. These raccoon-looking animals with long snouts and long  tails came near foraging for food.  We looked them up later and believe they were coati. We also saw some birds that looked like turkeys that flew up into the trees.

Alex and John on one of the bridges

See the faint line in the center?  This is looking up at the highest bridge from below.

Kids on one of the bridges

The coati - they seem to have amazing camera blurring ability - every pic of them is blurry!!!

The turkey?  Was about the size of a turkey anyway and has a waddle

A cool flower growing on a tree

A 'choza' is a country house and we went to one for dinner in La Fortuna, the town below Arenal.  Well not exactly, I guess it was the toursist version of a choza.  It had big, country-style meals served by the staff in native dress.  Like all the restaurants we've been to, we sat in the open air (almost no restaurant has walls or windows for the seating area although the kitchens are enclosed). 

Back at the hotel, after a long day, John, and Drew and I went to the hot springs, which were on the hotel grounds.  There were lit walks lined with all the beautiful flowers and plants in the area. In the morning we could see everything on the grounds waking up too --  parrots, hummingbirds, and butterflies.