It's our last day in paradise :(( I'm going to miss Jose, who didn't try to kill us like our busdriver to the rafting place and Luis who rocked in his own quirky way. I'm also going to miss these kids, they have been such a nice and supportive group of young adults. I felt really comfortable with the entire group and in the states I wouldn't be caught in public wearing my bathing suit as much I did on this trip. Generally I'm so self conscious about my body and etc, but maybe because I'm older I don't care so much and this group was more laid back than other groups I've been with and all had their special qualities.
It was a pleasure travelling with ya'll!!!
PURA VIDA!!!!!!!!!!
I can’t believe it’s already our last day :( However, I’m really excited to be going whitewater rafting!!!
So after 5 or so hours of travelling we were at Pacuare and as we suited up with our helmets and vests, I just thought about 1 thing… NOT falling out! My lungs probably couldn’t sustain the falling out of the boat and having to swim and breathe, forget it, I’d be better up dead haha.
In our group it was our guide, Kat, Jessica, Paul, Liberty, Kelly and myself. These rapids were 3-4 categories and I’m happy to say that I did not fall out, unlike Kat, Jessica, Paul, Liberty. I was really worried about them when they fell out on two different occasions, even our guide fell out! Now that’s trouble! It was way too much fun and I took my cheapo waterproof camera and hope the pictures come out well.
When I got home I spoke a little bit to my host mom, but she was talking to me about her day at the doctors office and then ran off to throw up on the porch. I just sat there looking at her vomit and her son looking at me, look at her. It was really strange, so I went up to bed and then came back downstairs to shower and go to bed.
As I was in bed I just thought about how eventful and wonderful my overall trip in Costa Rica had been and that I would love to come back!!
Yes, I’m STILL wearing my bathing suit. Today Lawrence, Ben, Paul and I went to the tarzan swing and ziplining, which was way awesome!!!!! Ask me about the video I have on youtube. Afterwards we ended up meeting with the group and we went to the waterfall and I really enjoyed soaking in the cold waterfall water! Ahhh, it was nice. The walk to the waterfall was lengthly, but man the walk back up SUCKED!!! Thanks Amy and Paul for staying with me.
I nearly wanted to stop and cry at one point climbing back up that damn waterfall path. I had never felt that much pain in my lungs or that knot that forms in your throat from wanting to just cry out and express the pain you’re in. Well yeah, I felt that way the entire time trying to climb up and though we took breaks to regain my lung capacity, I was just glad that when I finally made it to the top that was it and back into the van. I wish I could teleport.
When I got home at 6pm, I was way too tired to even say HOLA to my family that I just crashed out and woke up the next morning at 5: 30am to go white water rafting!!!!
My family was nice, the husband finally came back into town and he had bought me a burger, but like I said I had crashed out and with my host mom being really really really sick, I told her to stay in bed and not make me breakfast at 5: 30.
I’m not sure if it’s the house that’s not insulated or maybe the fact that my clothes never really dry in this humidity, but MY CLOTHES STINK!! I’ve kind of just given up on clean clothes and I’m just about wearing my bathing suit everywhere…. It’s become a second skin literally.
So today we woke up early to go to Arenal National Park and yes, I almost died again. Thanks Jessica for staying with me while we hiked up the active volcano. This high altitude stuff is killing my lungs, I never had this many asthma attacks as I’ve had here on this trip. By this time I was expecting the heavy rains everywhere and I plastic wrapped all my stuff in my backpack and wore my hiking boots and THANK GOODNESS. We ended up getting one of the hardest rains while had just climbed to the top for lunch, it was such a funny thing for me, but to others they were soaked and I felt so bad for them so I gave one of our friends an umbrella. Then it was bad for me because I had forgotten my lunch back in the van hah :-\
Going back down wasn’t too bad and then we went into La Fortuna for dinner and to crash our in our hostel.
Oh my! This hotel is 100X worse than any motel 6, it was really shady and I felt uncomfortable the whole night. I thought that someone was watching me shower or someone would key or break down my door while I slept. I couldn’t wait for the morning to come so the guys and I could go on the tarzan swing and waterfall.
I nearly died today on this hike to the Poas Volcano National Park. I really think it was because of the altitude that my asthma started to act up or maybe it was inhaling all that sulfuric acid hah. Either way, I’m glad Dr. Henneberry stayed with me while I was coughing up my lung and then some.
Once at reaching the two sites (I apologize for a lack of pictures, my computer isn’t working that’s why these journal are pictureless). Anyhow, the first site was the geyser and it was way too cloudy, but after it cleared up it was just a nice view that I’m not sure how many pictures I took to get the perfect shot, which I did! Then hiking up further to the lagoon was hell on my lungs and I was just so glad to rest, poor lungs.
So the view of the Botos Lagoon was out of this world, at that time I wished that I had a panoramic camera. The waters were well over 120F, but it was just stunning to least the very least. We then had our sandwiches for lunch and shopped at the parks’ shop that was too expensive for my blood.
Going back down through the cloud forest and looking again at the high altitude agriculture like the ornamental plants it was cool. The cloud forest was just that, it was a constant fog like condition and sometimes scary while driving on the crazy Costa Rican roads, but our bus driver rocks! We stopped at a shop to get some cheese and the famous strawberries that were extremely juicy and delicious! Some people in our group got their host moms some flowers, but for some reason I didn’t feel like it, I think I bought some candies instead.
When I got home, I was too tired to talk to my family, plus my mom was starting to get sick :((( I hope I don't get sick :(((( That would be awful, best plan is to stay away from her and wash my hands a lot.
Today was pretty short, we went back to the little café for breakfast (yummyy) and headed back to eco lodge to learn about conservation and sustainability while walking around the area and seeing the different plants. It was truly a hippies paradise! Our guide Oscar had just been released from his 1960s time capsule and he was just the best guide ever! We saw native Costa Rican plants guava, bananas, pineapples, and some spices trees too like turmeric, cinnamon, oregano, cilantro, pepper, mint and many more!
I also ate some fruits, but don’t remember the names. :) So after all that, we headed to an awesome buffet in Quepos and went to some shops. I got my friend some cigars and that's about it. Actually, I was rather disappointed the gifts available to tourist, it seemed all to cheapo and mass produced that really didn't say anything about Costa Rica. Maybe I'll order that organic coffee after all. I really think my Spanish is improving too!
At home for dinner my host mom and I were eating awesome cheese and banana empanadas and soup while talking about Costa Rican illicit drug life in the areas of Limon and Jaco. She was talking about the drug problems with the Colombians and Nicas, man, it was really bad, the Ticos' land had really been invaded by all the drug sellers and users. Before bed I drank some magical drink but it did nothing, I think it was cough medicine :( I guess the fairies, angels and nomes can only be found at the eco lodge with Oscar. Hah. He was something else.
Its one month until my birthday! :) Today we woke up earlier to hike in Manuel Antonio National Park. It was a very nice trip; it’s all been really great so far! It was so funny and at the same time not…we practically killed some of the rainforest creatures with our 40-100% cans of deet. I’m just really paranoid about getting malaria and others in our group had skin burning deet, it was funny watching all of us get ready to go hiking though carrying those hiking boots were a HUGE pain. However, I’m glad I brought them along with me on the trip.
So on the hiking adventure our tour guide showed us really abstract things that were really naked to the eye, I started to think they were plastic toy frogs or crabs. It was really amazing how he was able to spot those things in the depths of the forest, but then again that’s his job! We saw a yellow treefrog, something that I wanted to see, some howler monkies, sloths, deers, raccoons, hermit crabs and some bright red coloured crabs. It was quite a hike, but it was well worth it because we had finally reached the beach where we had a picnic and swam for around an hour. Oh, it was so beautiful!! Something cut out from a brochure, it was that amazing. I collected some shells and we left to find our hotel in Londres and then have a good cooked Costa Rican meal.
Hummmmmmm, our hotel was scary ghetto at first. In Costa Rica there aren’t any street signs so our bus driver Jose and Luis were looking for our hostel and we ended asking a man on a payphone and he said he had never heard of it. I was getting a little worried because the sun was setting and we were all pretty tired and hungry. So eventually Luis got off at the same spot where the man was and knocked on the mysterious door and it was really our hostel. I think at that point we were all a little scared at our compound seeing Indian like stone structures, a huge door, piles of dirt and shovels... it was not a place that I wanted to be. However, the eco lodge turned out to be really awesome and the rooms were all made out of wood and extremely compact though roomy at the same time.
We all unpacked and headed off to a little café place down the street that was oh so tastey! That chicken was the best ever! After dinner some people stayed up to play games, but I was too tired and went to bed early listening to the river as it put me to sleep.
AHhh!!! I can’t really tell the difference between a rooster and parrot, but either way I’m going to hit one of them. LOL I think I woke up around 5am this morning. Hah…what a nice alarm.
I had a nice little sandwich for breakfast today and Jennifer said that she was going to make me a traditional CR breakfast tomorrow called ‘gaspacho?’ It’s made with white rice, black beans and eggs (which is served at almost every meal hah). The white rice really threw my senses off, I had come from a land of white rice aka China and I really didn’t expect them to have that here as there staple, I was thinking more along the lines of sweet ole’ Mexican rice, yummy!!! I’m so craving Mexican food right now! :) I hope that CR food has some similarities and if not, it’s okay. I’ll try anything once!
We all woke up bright and early to congregate the centre park here in Atenas. Today’s journey will take us to a coffee plantation cooperative and a local farmer’s organic haven. First off, at the former we were educated about the processes and methods of planting, maintaining and making the coffee ranging from heating/roasting tanks to naturally drying them on the concrete for a more flavourful taste for exportation to Europe or the USA. The process itself is a very labour intensive method and considering that the beans ripen at different times, each bean is handpicked and the workers have to use a bag that can weigh up to 25 lbs! It takes four workers to fill up a figota? and that’s how they measure their progress, i.e. 1 figota is approximately 100 lbs and equivalent to $150USD. This place actually sells 90% of its products to STARBUCKS! Wow, that’s really awesome.
The beans plants are also germinated in little black containers and then transplanted to areas which features are either grown along side other vegetation, known as shade grown or grown with direct sunlight. From what I gather, shade grown and air dried seem to be the best quality, but I might be wrong. Inside the plant we saw machines that separated the bean from the pulp and used the top cover of the bean as fertilizer, how awesome is that? Ending our tour we were fortunate enough to have the chance to smell the fragrant (dried) and aroma (with hot water) of the four types of coffee beans. I didn’t have a favourite, but if I had to pick it would be the diamante one, the others were more “sour”. Here’s an interesting fact: They specialize coffee for different countries such as England who prefers the blended kind; the USA and their tart/sour taste; and Asia/China with a sweeter edge.
Maybe it was something in the air, but my contact was bothering me all day. Darn. So, off to the latter – the organic farmer Don Gerardo. The process of growing in the shade or not was the same, but the process in which they use for the end product is much more different. First off, organic is much healthier as the name implies and I personally think that the farmers care more their product for their consumers than the bigger coop. Health wise there are many benefits to being organic and though self satisfying to he farmer, it’s really hard on the farmer to participate in the organic field. We were told that the CR government does not do anything to subsidize them and work twice as hard to just comply with USA regulations. I was so impressed with his commitment to consumers and the earth. He had a tiny machine from Columbia that worked the same amount as the huge machine that we saw at the first place at half the cost, but often times the returns is less economically due to the fact that it is more expensive to sell organically. It was twice as healthier I would say, no additives or chemicals…it tasted amazing! I ended up buying two bags of organic coffee from Don G.
After our coffee exploration, we headed back to Atenas to Su Espacio to attend a lecture about CR by Tina and Nolan. He spoke about major issues that related indirectly and directly to CR such as going far to the beginning of the Spanish explorers to more recent times of the Green Revolution to now, eco-tourism in CR. The impact of globalization and the world economy of gas price influx and a gas ratio predicted in the future for CR citizens.
Luckily for us, there were several internet cafes and I checked my mail to see what was up… nothing, I had a lots of junk mail haha. My contact lens was still bothering me that I went to my host house and went straight to bed. :( Before going to bed though, I’d like to add how much I really am enjoying my group. These young kids are so headstrong and focused on what they want in life, they have their major pick out, visions of their careers, & etc already planned out…I wish I had that motivation when I was younger and even now. I’ll be lucky if I can even finish this coming semester without any problems :(
This religious music is really LOUD…I can’t wait until I pass out and wake up to hike the beach at Manuel Antonio National Park!! :)
1: At the cooperative coffee plantation.
2: The machine that seperated the bean and pulp.
3: A row of germinating coffee bean seeds waiting to be transplanted under the sun or in the shade.
4: A beautiful view from Don Gerardo's organic farming backyard.
5: The organic farmer Don Gerardo and his money maker :) coffee processor from Columbia.
OMG, that’s ropes course was intense and wonderful!!! I didn’t think I would make it all the way, actually I didn’t think that far into the future haha I was just concentrating on taking one step at a time since that proved to be very hard for my short and stocky legs. But I did it and I learned a lot about not only myself, but about the people I would be travelling with for the next 9 days.
I enjoyed the camping out and staying out of the spider infested cabin, I can’t really remember the last time I shared a hall with that many people…well, it was a long time ago at church camp in San Antonio, I was around 13 or 14, I can’t really remember, but last night was fun :)!
Don’t get the carpenter sharks get you!!!
In Houston…
After waking up at 3am, we about look dead tired here in the Houston airport and they apparently overbooked our plane and will have to divide the luggage transport. Oh no! I hope all our stuff arrives at the same place in San Jose. :-\
In San Jose…
We finally arrived in Costa Rica and it’s beautiful! We meet Luis our guide and Jose our driver and enjoyed the scenery to Atenas. Mainly that town will be our base area so we don’t have to carry around our luggage and so we can have that host family experience. We also meet Tina and had some yummy desserts to sooth our palettes before we have our first Costa Rican dinner.
I was little unsure if I would be getting the Costa Rica experience since my host family’s mom sounds like a non-native Costa Rican. Her last was exceptionally anglicized, however that was just a typo and she’s really Costa Rican along with her husband’s name who was not listed and her son too. Woot woot!
It’s only 8pm and for some reason I’m tired. I just had a short talk with my host mom, really sister –she’s only 26- named Jennifer and her son Jimmy about where I’m from and about them. She made a nice dinner though I was more tired than anything and I really enjoyed the prayer that she said before eating. You can tell she’s a very religious woman, if the blasting church songs didn’t give that idea away.
Over all I’m glad that I’m able to speak Spanish fluently or let’s just say ‘well enough’ for her and I to converse. I wonder how my new friends are doing with their families? An English-Spanish word/phrase sheet would have helped a lot for us and the families. If I didn’t know Spanish, I’m really not sure how I would have communicated with my host mom, her English is non-existent.
This weather isn’t as bad as I would have thought, but I had some training before I came…how so? I was in Hong Kong for the last 2 weeks and their weather is awful!!! I was drenched in either sweat or rainwater daily, so I hope it’s really not that bad here. My suitcase is packed with rainforest wear thanks to my experience earlier this month in Hong Kong. Oh my suitcase only weighs 40 lbs!! Amazing! :)
Well, I’m going to bed but let me tell about their house first. It’s a very small house with 2 levels, (which I later found out was rare to have). It’s so minimal with only the essentials of cookware, a stovetop but no oven or microwave. There is a living room/dinning room and the restroom is downstairs, which is strange to have it THAT close to the kitchen area. I suppose their ideas of mixing restroom with kitchen aren’t like those of here in the USA. The skewed stair case has shoes on the first step and curves up and around the 3 bedrooms on the top floor, mine being the first, jimmy’s and then the parent’s room. There doesn’t seem to a concept of master bedroom, a fan, insulation or a trash can. I’ll break it down here: All the rooms are the same with is a strange concept since the parents room is usually always the biggest, but not in this house, all the rooms are the same size. The ceilings of the house are intact but where the wall meets the ceiling is missing and is filled with a few wooden inches which make the house an open arena to any insects (like the cockroaches and lizards I saw later that night). Basing that opening as the only ventilation to the housing is rather restrictive even if they did open the door to their balcony which is only used to hang clothing, it gives me an uneasy feeling of that insects may crawl onto my bed and without having the air movement that I’m used to, I hope that my asthma won’t act up too much since there is not a fan and I prefer air movement when I sleep. Just breathe Victoria...
Before we went to the houses we got the low down on water usage and trashcans, they prefer to put toilet paper in the trashcan. My house hadn’t a trashcan in the restroom and a little bag in the kitchen for food scraps, but I was told to watch whatever I threw away…I took that as meaning some people look through other’s trash bags and you should just be careful what you throw out. WOW, she sounds like my real mom… paranoid!
I miss my real mom :( I’m going to bed. Night!
1st: In yellow is where Atenas is located.
2nd: Jose inside the bus and Luis helping him.
3rd: The sweet cheesecake dessert at the San Martin diner.
