We left Costa Rica two weeks ago, and I'm slightly embarrassed that this post took so long to write. But, here it is.
After spending time in Granada, Nicaragua, which turned out to be our favorite city of the trip, we took a boat to Isle de Ometepe. Ometepe is an island formed by two volcanoes, Concepcion and Maderas. The ferry to Ometepe was a much better experience than the one to Utila at the beginning of our trip. This was due to a number of reasons, the main one being we were on a lake instead of the ocean. Taking dramamine also helped/knocked me out. Once we got to Ometepe, we had to take a rickety old school bus to the hostel we were hoping to stay at. After walking through the rain and a very muddy road we reached the hostel only to be told that they were full due to a Quinceañera. Luckily (or not so luckily as we would soon find out) they had a sister hostel right next door that had a room available. I believe we took a nap as soon as we set our bags down (our bus left Granada at 5 A.M.) and once we woke up we tried to find an entrance to a trail that was mentioned in the Lonely Planet book and known for seeing monkeys. We managed to pass the trail and by the time we figured it out, we decided we had done enough walking and would go back to the trail the next day. It had also started to rain, so we weren't really in the mood to go monkey spotting. We arrived back at our hostel just in time to hear the speaker testing for the Quinceañera. The "testing" lasted from about 3 o'clock in the afternoon to whenever the party ended, sometime after we went to sleep. It's amazing what ear plugs can do for you!
The next morning we headed out to find the trail that would lead us to monkeys. It was a beautiful trail overlooking Lake Nicaragua and one of the volcanoes. At the very beginning of the trail we reached a little obstacle. I'm guessing a little stream was highly flooded and the only way to continue on the trail was to wade through it. So, Nick and I took off our boots and socks, hiked our shorts up and walked through a river that was probably about 40 feet wide and 2 1/2 feet deep. There were multiple paths to take on the trail and it was easy to spend a couple of hours walking around. Just as I was starting to get discouraged because we had yet to spot a monkey, we found a tree full of them! There were probably 10 or so Howler monkeys sitting in the tree, including a baby. You can check out an informational video on Howler monkeys here. After watching the monkeys for about 20 minutes we decided we should start heading back to our hostel as we needed to check out by a certain time. On our walk back we spotted another Howler monkey and her baby. Since the monkey was not howling at the moment, Nick tried instigating the monkey by howling at it. I think the monkey was extremely offended by Nick's attempt at mimicking her howl. She started howling and then started to scale the tree branches closer and closer to us. Since she had a baby she was trying to protect and Nick looked pretty scary, I told Nick to knock it off and suggested we start speed walking away from the monkey. I was in no mood to get in a fight with a monkey.
Our next stop was the other side of the island. We needed to catch a bus to do this. So, we walked back down the muddy road to reach the main road of the island and waited. The people at our hostel thought that the bus should pass by in about 20 minutes. Now, you would think that by this point in the trip we have figured out that buses aren't always reliable in terms of what time they pass through, and they especially aren't reliable on Sundays. After standing on the side of the road for exactly an hour, the bus came. We knew we would need to stop in a different town and change buses in order to get to our final destination. However, we did not know that we would need to waste 3 hours in this other town. Again, it was a Sunday so trying to waste 3 hours was not an easy feat. We started by sitting under a pavilion and reading books. A stray dog came up and practically climbed in my lap. I had to use all of my strength to not reach out and pet and hug the dog, as it was probably crawling with fleas and other insects and/or diseases. This poor dog, which was heartbreakingly skinny followed us around the park and surrounding areas for about 20 minutes. We found a restaurant that was open and wasted the rest of our time watching a soccer game and eating a small snack at the restaurant. Eventually we made it to our final destination, a beautiful hostel right on the lake with a dock, kayaks, hammocks and more.
Unfortunately, this hostel was also connected to a public boat landing/little beach and the only unfortunate thing to happen on the trip happened here. Just as we did with any other hostel we stayed at, we put our shoes outside our door so they wouldn't stink up our room. (Rain, sweat, heat...just not a great combination) We went to the buffet dinner that the hostel puts on every night and after returning to our room I noticed that my tennis shoes were gone. Although it is unfortunate my tennis shoes were stolen, we were very lucky that both of our hiking boots and Nick's tennis shoes, which were also sitting outside, were still there. I'm sure whoever took the shoes needed them much more than I did, and now I have a GREAT excuse to go shoe shopping!
Early the next morning we set off to hike the volcano Maderas. We had set up a guide the night before, as it is illegal to hike the volcanoes without one. The hike was beautiful and we saw some monkeys along the way, though it was a pretty difficult hike. There were numerous times that I was hoisting myself up rock walls using tree branches and roots, hoping that my feet wouldn't slip from the small crevices that I managed to jam them into. It took about 3 1/2 hours to make it to the top, which turned out to be pretty anti-climatic. The crater was covered in cloud and it was impossible to see down into the volcano or anything around it. It was also freezing up at the top. After having lunch at the top we started our descent. We got a couple of good pictures of the volcano on the other side of the island.
The next day, Tuesday, July 19th, we spent relaxing, as we were pretty tired from climbing a volcano the day before. We did some kayaking around the lake and circled Monkey Island but only saw one monkey.
Wednesday, July 20th, was day one of our travels from Ometepe, Nicaragua to Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica. Now, the border crossing we needed to use was in the northwest corner of Costa Rica. Puerto Viejo is in the southeast corner of Costa Rica. We knew it would be a long trip, but we were determined to get to Puerto Viejo to scuba dive one last time. Wednesday was a full day of travel, stopping in San Jose to sleep. The day was pretty boring and there is not really anything to write about, accept for the ferry ride back to the mainland of Nicaragua. This ferry was by far in the best shape of any of the boats we previously were on. The seats were padded, there were tables and they served food and drinks. The ferry also had biggish bathrooms which I happened to use. It was in the bathroom that I realized just how different things are in the US versus Nicaragua. I saw a live hen, in a plastic bag, in the bathroom, on the ferry. It was quite the experience.
We arrived in Puerto Viejo on Thursday and spent the day walking around the very, very touristy city. Friday we went scuba diving. The visibility was unfortunately pretty bad and the coral did not even come close to comparing to what we saw in Utila, but we did spot a turtle! Other things we saw included many crabs and shrimp/lobsters and a lot of lion fish.
On Saturday we started our adventure to our last destination, Tortuguero. We knew it would be tricky to get there, yet we were determined to not go back to San Jose to do so. There was a boat that would leave from Puerto Limon that would get us to Tortuguero. So, we took a bus from Puerto Viejo to Puerto Limon and then a taxi to the boat dock to catch the boat. Little did we know that the boat wouldn't leave unless there were six people going. When we arrived, which was about an hour before the boat was to leave, we were the only ones there. We had very few options at this point, as we were in a bit of time crunch with our trip ending and needed to get to Tortuguero that night. Option #1: Wait at the dock until the scheduled departure time. If more people come, we pay $35 each for the boat and get to Tortuguero that night. If more people don't come, we pay $35 six times to cover the cost of six people or the boat doesn't leave that day. Option #2: Our taxi driver would drive us the 2 1/2 hours to the a town where we would catch a different boat (very reliable boats that leave every day at a certain time - tourist filled). Oh, he would take us there for $100, no less. Because we already had reservations in Tortuguero for a hostel, as well as reservations for a turtle tour that night we had no choice but to fork over the $100 and take the taxi. We knew when the boats were supposed to leave the other port and we knew that the 2 1/2 hour drive away would only give us about a 30 minute wiggle room to catch the boat. Long story short, our taxi driver got lost about 500 times down some muddy dirt roads, later exclaiming that "All the roads look the same" and "I've only been here two times before". I was crossing my fingers the entire time, hoping that we wouldn't get stuck in the mud or that we wouldn't get a flat tire. Finally, we arrived to the boat place 15 minutes after they were supposed to leave. Thank goodness that nothing runs on time in Central America and we were able to get on a boat to travel the rest of the way to Tortuguero, which is only accessible by boat. So, after an hour boat ride through what seemed like the jungle, we made it to Tortuguero.
That night we met up with our guide at 9:30 to head out on our turtle watch. Late July through October is the high season for turtles to lay their eggs along this particular stretch of beach. We waited with our guide until she was radioed from the turtle spotters on the beach. Then we made our way along the beach in search of the Green turtles. We ended up seeing three turtles. Two of the turtles we watched crawl back to sea. Apparently they had started to dig their hole, felt something they didn't like, so decided to call it quits for the night. Fortunately the last turtle we saw did not feel anything strange. We got to watch the turtle lay her eggs from an outrageously close distance. I mean that we were within a foot away from the turtle, crouched right down next to it. The turtles are huge, too! I would say that the turtle was about 4 feet long, and it's shell was about 2 1/2 feet wide. We watched the turtle for about 45 minutes and then let her be to finish things up. Apparently the turtles are in a trance when they lay their eggs and aren't bothered by much around them. The whole process takes about two hours. Sadly, we were not able to take any pictures of the turtles as the flash would disturb them. Besides diving, watching the turtle lay her eggs was one of the main highlights for me on this trip.
Monday morning we started our journey back to San Jose for one final activity: dinner with an old co-worker of Nick's dad. They had a traditional Costa Rican meal for us, which was pretty delicious and lots and lots of exotic fruits for us to try! They were extremely friendly, and it was the perfect way to end our trip.
Tuesday we flew out of Costa Rica, headed for Chicago. We spent the night in Chicago at Nick's old roommate, Mike's apartment. Wednesday was supposed to entail a short one hour flight from Chicago to Minneapolis. But what fun would that be?? Instead, our flight got canceled due to weather and we were put on standby for a flight 3 hours later. Luckily we were able to get on the flight and we did end up making it back to Minneapolis.
So, that's it. Nick started work five days after we returned, and I start back up with school workshops in three weeks. Pictures are on facebook. Overall the trip was amazing, and I couldn't have asked for a better experience as my first time out of the country. Traveling like this really helps you to appreciate what you have back home, but at the same time helps you to appreciate the laid-back, simplistic lifestyles of others. Our next trip will most likely be somewhere we can use our scuba certification and likely be much shorter than six weeks long. Until our next trip...
