Costa Rica Baby

Well folks, we just got back from a marvelous vacation to the land of Costa Rica.  Country numero 10 for me, and 11 for Dan.  We had a fantastic time.  All our activities were stupendous and my oh my was it beautiful!  We started out, leaving on Wednesday July 31st at 6 PM.  Dan made that gigantic neck pillow for the plane.  It was huge.  He tried to get me to use it, but it didn't even fit in the space between my chin and chest, so I couldn't.  But he said it was pretty cozy.  We arrived in Costa Rica on August 1st (it was a redeye flight) at about 6 AM.  We headed straight to our first activity:  river rafting the Pacuare River.  It was the rainy season for them, so the river was high and fast.  We rafted through class 3 & 4 rapids, and almost fell out a dozen times.  But it was a rush, and we survived.  Riding through the canyons and forest was amazing.  Some of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen.  We really enjoyed it.

After rafting, we headed to our first location.  La Fortuna - Arenal Costa Rica.  This is the home of the famous Arenal Volcano, but it was so cloudy we never actually got to see it.  We were bummed, but it was so green, we were ok with it.  We got to our hotel a little later that night, so we didn't have time to do much.  We went for a swim & had dinner, and then headed to bed so we'd be rested for the rest of our trip.  The next day, we went horseback riding to La Fortuna water fall.  We rode most of the way, but then hiked about 1/2 a mile to the waterfall through the rainforest.  It was a beautiful hike.  The waterfall was beautiful and pumping out so much water!  Dan tried to get close so he could swim behind the falls, but the water was coming so fast that he couldn't even get within 20 feet of the falls.  It was an amazing sight.  On the way back, it started pouring!  Literally pouring.  We were soaking wet by the time we got back to the horses and then continued to get soaked while we were riding back.  It was something though.  The rain wasn't cold, so it was kind of cool to hike through the rain forest while it was actually raining.

Later on that night, we went to the Tabacon Hot springs.  OH MY GOSH! These were amazing.  I've never seen anything like it.  It was literally rivers and waterfalls of piping hot water.  Sometimes even a little too hot to get in.  The spings are heated by the Arenal Volcano which heats 2 different rivers that flow through the area.  This place was amazing, and I'd go back to Costa Rica just to do this again.  We got there a little later in the day, so didn't have that much light, which was a shame because the grounds were simply beautiful.  I wish we could have enjoyed it a little longer in the light.  The dark was pretty romantic though.  They have dammed up some of the areas to form pools were you can sit (Literally like sitting in a river) and it is wonderful.  There were also waterfalls flowing into the rivers and pools that you could sit under and get a good massage.  It was so nice.  And once we got tired of one area or it got too crowded, we would walk from area to area and pool to pool to get a feel for the different pools & more privacy.  It was huge!   Most of the time, we were the only two in a particular area.  I can't say enough how cool this was. It was easily one of the coolest things we've ever done or seen.

In the morning, we were off to our next location:  Monteverde, home of the cloud forest.  We took 1/2 the trek by boat and the other half by van.  The boat ride was beautiful.  It was foggy, so it gave a really cool feel for the ride.  We stopped in a little city for a pitstop, and Dan got a coke cause he was starting to feel a little sick.  Can't beat sippin a coke in the middle of paradise.

Once we arrived in Monteverde, we headed to a butterfly garden where we learned a lot about bugs and butterflies.  We even got to release a couple.  It was very educational and cool.  The butterflies were beautiful!

After the gardens, we explored the little city, and had dinner at one of the worlds top 10 bizarre restaurants.  It was called Treehouse Restaurant.  It was actually built around a huge tree, so there was branches and a big tree right in the middle of the restaurant.  It was outdoors, with a roof (which was needed since it was pouring) and it was really fun.  We both had traditional meals called casados.  Basically, its rice and beans with a salad and protein.  In our case - chicken.  It was pretty good. That night we also headed out on a night hike to see if we could see some animals.  I didn't get any photos, but it was a really fun hike.  We didn't get to see many animals, a tarantula, and some pretty cool rare birds, but the environment was cool and learning about the different things that were hiding out there somewhere was interesting.

Day 4 we headed to the cloud forest to do some killer zip lining and walk through the canopy's.  I cannot tell you how breathtaking this scene was.  We were right in the middle of the forest, zip lining over the trees.  It was so green and lush.  The zip lines were amazing.  Most of them were over 500 feet, and there were 15 lines.  It was such a rush!  On the last line, they let us go together - it was also the longest line at 3000 feet long.  Again, it was probably one of the coolest things we've ever done.

At the end of the zip lines there was a Tarzan Swing, where we jumped off a platform about 150 feet.  IT WAS SO AWESOME!!

After we were through the zip lines and Tarzan swing, we headed to the canopy walk, where we walked over about 10 bridges above the trees and then hiked through the rain forest in between the bridges.  It was beautiful, amazing, spectacular, breathtaking, fun, exciting and exhilarating.

The next day we were off to our final destination: Manuel Antonio.  Finally, the beach!  I'd been waiting the whole trip for the beach.  I was throughly enjoying all of the other aspects of the trip, but I was ready for some sun, and relaxation.  The previous days were pretty cloudy and drizzly, but when we got to the beach, we had amazing weather and lots of sunshine.  We spent our first afternoon/evening eating lunch at a little shack right off the beach looking over the ocean, soaking up the ocean air and feeling the humid sticky on our skin.  I was in heaven.  I am convinced that I was made to live on the coast.  I love the smell, feel, and lifestyle of the coast.

The next day, we went to Manuel Antonio National Park.  It was so cool.  We hiked for about 4 hours through thick forest, and lush trees.  We saw lots of cool stuff, like creepy spiders. lots of monkeys, hummingbirds, grasshoppers, lizards, iguanas, raccoons, an anteater, and Dan's favorite, a couple sloths.  We also saw a beautiful beach.  I wish we had our suits on so we could have taken a dip, but we were in our hiking gear so we couldn't. :(  Simply beautiful.

After our hike, we headed out on a mangrove tour.  It was so cool!  I feel like I am saying that about everything, but everything we did was SO COOL!  We were the only ones on the tour, so we got a totally personalized guided tour.  We saw more monkeys, a possum, a silky anteater (one of the most rare things to see..) a few lizards & iguanas, lots of tree crabs,  and a basilisk lizard (the kind that can run on water).  Our guide also boated us over to some palm trees, macheted  off a few coconuts and we drank fresh coconut milk.  It was delicious.  Then, after we drank all the milk, they sliced open our coconuts and we ate the fruit on the inside. YUM.

And we finished off our night walking along the beach, and listening to the waves while drinking a fresh fruit smoothie.  Ah, the good life.
Our last day was spent relaxing at the beach and soaking up the sun.  We played in the water, layed in the sand, and did some souvenir shopping.  We were sad to leave this beautiful paradise, but our time was up.  We saw and did so many things, and we didn't even see half of the country.  Costa Rica is beautiful and we would go back in a heartbeat.

We were sad to leave this paradise, but were so excited to get home to our baby girl.  This was the first time we've ever left her, and it was a long trip.  I could hardly stand the flight and layover and just wanted to get home to squeeze her and kiss her cheeks.  I missed her like crazy.  Having kids makes it ok to have a vacation end.  I am feeling refreshed, and rebalanced.  It was so great to just have a week with my guy and to be able to spend some much needed quality time together.  It was a great vacation, and we are looking forward to our next adventure!