I’ve got two days to update since I missed yesterday! On
Monday, we went for a hike around the rainforest. We split up into three groups
of about eight, and each group had its own tour guide. It was pretty
interesting because they are very knowledgeable about all the things in the
forest. We saw a bunch of monkeys, some parrots, these huge black birds, a
GIANT grasshopper (like 6 inches long), and tons and tons of hermit crabs. We
also drank water out of a coconut that our guide broke open and even ate some
plants from the forest. One group ate termites, but luckily we didn’t! The hike
was pretty cool though because it didn’t feel like we were on a trail at all.
It was like we had just taken off into the jungle, which is always more
authentic and interesting than the super obvious trails.
After that portion of the hike, we did another hike to this
big waterfall up in the jungle. It was a fun hike because once again it wasn’t
paved or super organized, so we had to jump across rocks and go slow in some
parts that were really steep. The waterfall was really pretty and high, and we
got some good pictures in. Some of the guys from the Puntarenas group pretty
much risked their lives climbing way up right next to the water, but at least
they got some good pictures. It’s funny because they always seem to need to
one-up each other. It’s like the closer they come to death, the more points
they get!
After those two hikes, we spent a couple hours on the beach.
I mostly read and slept in the sun, but spent about 45 minutes playing in the
water as well. When we got back, Morgan and I kayaked out into the ocean with
Jim, a guy from Puntarenas, in order to watch the sunset. It was really cloudy,
so we didn’t really get to see the full effect, but it was still pretty and really
relaxing. After dinner, we were all sitting in the pavilion chatting when it
started pouring rain. We figured that it would stop soon and tried waiting it
out, but after about 45 minutes we realized that we couldn’t stay there
forever. One of the workers gave us trash bags, and we literally put them over
us and tore little holes in order to see. We looked ridiculous, but it actually
worked really well! Someone took a picture of us, so maybe I can find that
sometime. We didn’t do anything exciting last night though; Morgan and I passed
out around 10.
Today, we went on a crazy horseback ride. I was really
excited to ride horses, but after this trip I don’t know if I’ll ever do it
again. Today was the epitome of a Costa Rican adventure, full of dangerous
situations, confusion, and blindly following our guides into a sketchy jungle.
It was really muddy from the rain, and the first hill we went up was really
steep. Well, I figured that the horse would know where to go since it was the
one walking, but it ended up slipping and falling with me on it. It pretty much
sat down, so I fell backwards into the mud. It was terrifying, not to mention disgusting,
and I was paranoid for the rest of the trip. I switched horses, but I had to pretty
much be leashed to one of the guides because I was so scared. Turns out, I wasn’t
the only one to fall off their horse—another girl did too! Other problems
included one girls horse taking off after she fell off and her being stranded
alone in the road for a while and one group got separated from their guide and
went the wrong way for about 45 minutes. In the States, we would have had to
wait forever for safety instructions, but here we just dove right in. For those
of us who know nothing of horses, that would have been extremely helpful. I
also heard from a guide that many of the horses were new to this and had only
been training for a short while before we rode them—good to know! :/
After the ride, we then went on this crazy hike through the
jungle to this “waterfall” that really ended up being a bunch of rapids. We
literally followed our guide while he hacked plants out of the way with a
machete. Not exaggerating, an actual machete. The path was really dangerous; I
witnessed a bunch of people fall and slide down since it was so steep and
slippery. We also had to maneuver around bee nests and army ants crawling over
logs that we had to scale. Definitely a once-in-a-lifetime experience. When we
finally got to the “waterfall” a bunch of us got in to cool down and in my
case, wash off all the mud. It was cool because we could jump off the edge of
these rocks into the rapids because it was really deep. I felt so much better
having all that mud off me. After that, we hiked/rode the horses back (in the
rain!) to the beach where we finally boarded the boats to go back to the
resort. I think most of us were over that trip by then! However, it was really
cool to ride through some of the pueblos. I can’t believe how different their lifestyle
is from ours.
We kayaked again to watch the sunset this evening, and this
time I’m pretty sure we saw some dolphins! They were swimming around us for a
while and we only saw their noses, but still very cool! I also love watching
the storms over the water. The other night, I went and sat by the water by
myself for like half an hour and just watched the lightning from miles and
miles away light up the clouds with color. It was so beautiful—that’s something
that I’ll for sure miss.
It’s our last night at Drake Bay, so hopefully we’ll do
something fun tonight! I go home on Thursday, so I’ll do one last wrap-up of
the trip in a few days. As amazing as this trip has been, I’m actually pretty
excited to go home. Hasta luego J