After two more nights in San Jose, once M arrived, we finally left the capital! Our time in SJ was more 'down time' with the city not offering much to do other than wander the streets and visit the National Museum. It gave us the chance to recover from jet lag and plan the rest of our time in Costa Rica.
We left SJ early on June 5 and collected our rental car from the airport, which we would use for the remaining time in CR. A quick breakfast at Denny's and we begun our 3 hour (117km) road trip to Arenal Volcano. This may seem an excessive amount of time taken to drive the mentioned distance but never before had I experienced such dense and low-hanging fog. For a good portion of the journey visibility was 5-10 metres at most and our resulting travel speed remained below 30 km/h. Incredibly the cars driven by, seemingly, local Ticos (Costa Rican's name for themselves) didn't put their headlights on under these conditions!
Finally we reached La Fortuna, the closest town to our lodgings, which sits in the foothills of the Arenal Volcano. Our accommodation was not in town, thankfully. A quick stop at the supermarket and we were on our way to find the Arenal Observatory Lodge - half an hour and 11kms on an unsealed, bumpy road and we were very grateful for our choice in rental car, an SUV.
Another thing we were immediately grateful for was our chance choice in lodgings. We are on the southern side of the Volcano, which is still almost bare from the last eruption in 1968 and subsequent lava flows and molten rock explosions up until 2010. The barrenness is limited to the actual face of the volcano with the surrounding land boasting a lush, dense and, most importantly, protected rainforest that is home to many of the exotic flora and fauna species that Costa Rica boasts.
A quick introduction to the lodge and we were on our away to our first tour - the Lava Flow tour - with our local, excitable host, Cristiano. An animal biologist, in his words, with eleven years experience and a passion unparalleled, was able to hear, locate, show and talk about dozens of animal species that we came across during our relatively short 2.5 hour hike. As part of the hike he took us to a section of the National Park that received the bulk of the lava and molten rock from the 1968 eruption. The now-cool lava rocks took 5 years to cool down enough for life to restart. The rocks are now mostly covered with a velvet-like moss: upon touching, M exclaimed, 'Now we don't need a bed!'.
Dinner on our return to the lodge and an early night meant an early start the next morning. Over the next 2 days we have been quite the adventurous couple. Day one included a nature hike on the lodge property, zip lining over the forest canopy and bathing at Baldi hot springs and spas. I would say the canopy zipping was the most 'extreme' part of our day however the water slides at Baldi most likely wouldn't be approved for OH&S in Australia or Germany! Something to note, the Baldi springs had the largest concentration of (almost exclusively American) tourists. The rest of our time has been pleasantly secluded at the lodge.
Day two, which was only added this morning when we were faced with the reality of leaving, has consisted of a lot of rain. Given the normality of this large quantity of rainfall during this time of year we have remained undeterred for our chosen activities - horse riding around the (much larger than we realised) lodge property. And again, this trumped the water slides for most adventurous experience with deep river crossings and a lovers quarrel between our respective horses (mine, la boss, tried to bite M's, el follower). This afternoon we will join Diego (our pre-chosen name for our tour guide (ha!)) for a four our river rafting experience. Inshallah the rain doesn't cause our raft to overflow!
Current visibility? Two metres.
Tomorrow we depart for Manuel Antonio, where we will spend two nights before returning to San Jose for our flight to El Salvador.
- N
We left SJ early on June 5 and collected our rental car from the airport, which we would use for the remaining time in CR. A quick breakfast at Denny's and we begun our 3 hour (117km) road trip to Arenal Volcano. This may seem an excessive amount of time taken to drive the mentioned distance but never before had I experienced such dense and low-hanging fog. For a good portion of the journey visibility was 5-10 metres at most and our resulting travel speed remained below 30 km/h. Incredibly the cars driven by, seemingly, local Ticos (Costa Rican's name for themselves) didn't put their headlights on under these conditions!
Finally we reached La Fortuna, the closest town to our lodgings, which sits in the foothills of the Arenal Volcano. Our accommodation was not in town, thankfully. A quick stop at the supermarket and we were on our way to find the Arenal Observatory Lodge - half an hour and 11kms on an unsealed, bumpy road and we were very grateful for our choice in rental car, an SUV.
Another thing we were immediately grateful for was our chance choice in lodgings. We are on the southern side of the Volcano, which is still almost bare from the last eruption in 1968 and subsequent lava flows and molten rock explosions up until 2010. The barrenness is limited to the actual face of the volcano with the surrounding land boasting a lush, dense and, most importantly, protected rainforest that is home to many of the exotic flora and fauna species that Costa Rica boasts.
A quick introduction to the lodge and we were on our away to our first tour - the Lava Flow tour - with our local, excitable host, Cristiano. An animal biologist, in his words, with eleven years experience and a passion unparalleled, was able to hear, locate, show and talk about dozens of animal species that we came across during our relatively short 2.5 hour hike. As part of the hike he took us to a section of the National Park that received the bulk of the lava and molten rock from the 1968 eruption. The now-cool lava rocks took 5 years to cool down enough for life to restart. The rocks are now mostly covered with a velvet-like moss: upon touching, M exclaimed, 'Now we don't need a bed!'.
Dinner on our return to the lodge and an early night meant an early start the next morning. Over the next 2 days we have been quite the adventurous couple. Day one included a nature hike on the lodge property, zip lining over the forest canopy and bathing at Baldi hot springs and spas. I would say the canopy zipping was the most 'extreme' part of our day however the water slides at Baldi most likely wouldn't be approved for OH&S in Australia or Germany! Something to note, the Baldi springs had the largest concentration of (almost exclusively American) tourists. The rest of our time has been pleasantly secluded at the lodge.
Day two, which was only added this morning when we were faced with the reality of leaving, has consisted of a lot of rain. Given the normality of this large quantity of rainfall during this time of year we have remained undeterred for our chosen activities - horse riding around the (much larger than we realised) lodge property. And again, this trumped the water slides for most adventurous experience with deep river crossings and a lovers quarrel between our respective horses (mine, la boss, tried to bite M's, el follower). This afternoon we will join Diego (our pre-chosen name for our tour guide (ha!)) for a four our river rafting experience. Inshallah the rain doesn't cause our raft to overflow!
Current visibility? Two metres.
Tomorrow we depart for Manuel Antonio, where we will spend two nights before returning to San Jose for our flight to El Salvador.
- N
