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Published: June 29th 2008
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These are real!
The orchid is the national flower of Costa Rica. This is the actual color of these -- no lights, no illusions. (By Crystal) directly after class, they pile us back to the van to head to La Paz, the waterfall gardens. It´s an hour ride there, during which time i do not face backwards. we drive through coffee fields, pass a volcano, lots of farms, cows in the road, a runaway cow... and we even stop to take pictures! but i think that was mainly because we were traveling uphill through the mountains, so lots of people were getting sick. so we wobbled around for awhile, the van drove ahead to pick us up later.
When we finally arrive to the park, the first place we head is the lobby so johnny (yes we have the amazing johnny again, but very sad because it´s for the last time) can get our tickets and we can all have really awesome paper bracelets in a nice prison orange color. First things first, the group must be fed. and SURPRISE! it´s a buffet with American food.. somewhat. Nothing is truly american unless you´re in the states.. but pizza, hot dogs and french fries? there was also an abundance of typical costa rican food, all very tasty. the restaurant overlooks the rain forest, with a
Blue Morpho
Blue morpho butterflies were everywhere inside the butterfly enclosure. waterfall right there in the restaurant. Yes it was man made and more of a fast trickle, but some of had our pictures taken with it nonetheless. Johnny leads us into the forest, literally a walking encyclopedia with a costa rican accent, which Glaze has learned to imitate almost perfectly. First, we see the monkeys, similar to those we saw in Manuel Antonio, these are both squirrel monkeys and white face monkeys. These, however, will never be let back into the wild. There are monkeys that had to be taken from human families, and are now not able to survive on their own. This park has graciously accepted to take care of them. They were not shy about coming right up to the glass and wire... Johnny told us to step back or risk being the object of torment by way of flying feces.
Next, we walk into a large cage.. there´s really no other word for it. It´s filled with many different types of birds (and more monkeys and other animals i can´t remember the names of.. i´m no johnny) I do remember the toucans, the macaws, the parrots, all the brightly colored flowers and drifting butterflies. Some
Gorgeous Waterfall
Anne Marie got this great shot of one of the waterfalls. That might be Pete getting a closer look. of us became closer to nature than others, a bright blue macaw landed on Katie´s shoulder and stayed there for quite some time. He seemed very intent on taking away her hair band (Johnny had instructed us to remove our jewelry because some of the birds could be a little naughty). Johnny wanted her to scare him away, but the rest of us begged her not to so we could all get pictures. Smile and say 'ARRR' became the new catchphrase for katie, or Captain Katie as she should be called. The beautiful creature finally leaves at johnny´s insistance, with katie´s hair band. We can watch the birds from a distance, fighting over the souvenir. We gather for a group shot, and the birds are flying overhead so we became a little nervous that we had ten cameras to get through. As soon as we´re done, Katie´s Macaw came back, almost like he knew he should be included, and sat right on her shoulder once again.
After the parrots and the monkeys are the butterflies. It literally felt like we were walking into a fairy tale. There were so many different butterflies, all different colors, shapes, and sizes. There
What a Place!
Time for a group shot near one of the waterfalls. were pictures and facts and cocoons displayed..while live butterflies drifted from flower to flower. I was thrilled when one landed on my foot, that i almost bent myself backwards trying to get a picture and then a video. . Anne Marie got a little exasperated when butterflies kept landing on me (3 times!) but never her.. the boys seemed to rush through this part, but johnny had to come back and find some of the girls and find a polite way to say 'hurry it up' after the butterflies were the snakes, which seems to be an odd sort of order, but this time I sat it out. well that´s wrong, i walked through but very quickly. you´ll have to ask someone else for the details. Next were the frogs, which Katie sat out because we were right there with them. I say with them but we had a hard time finding them.. Johnny says the were hiding.. which is likely but still disappointing. We did get to see a large bright blue one in the night time section.
The
Great Lunch
Glaze and Bailey sample the typical Costa Rican food on the buffet. frogs are the last animals we get to see close up, we head down the trails to the waterfalls. everything is downhill and very accessible as there are steps. Careful not to go too fast, some of our legs started shaking pretty bad. It was breathtaking to walk throught the rainforest, to be surrounded completely by foliage.. just soaking it all in. (quite literally as it was wet) there were exotic plants and flowers, and a spiky catepillar that johnny wasn´t around to name.. The walk and the steps were certainly worth it by the time we reached the first waterfall, just standing there in awe... well almost standing because we had to take pictures of course. We finally tear ourselves away from the first waterfall to descend the steps to the second which is even larger and more magnificant. Some find the paths down to the waterfall for more soaking pictures and to dip their feet into the freezing cold water. Before the path to the shuttle that will take us back to the top of the mountain, there is a separate path to three more waterfalls, but everything you walk down you must come back up. As my
Not Quite Like Home
Reid and Ashton try out the American favorites on the other side of the buffet. legs are shaking pretty bad by this point, i decided not to go and sat to chat with johnny who insisted on practicing my spanish. Darn tour guide only speaks english till you get him by himself. Turns out that his daughter tried to jump in the waterfall when she was a baby, so he told us to do our best to stay out of them.
The giftshop was waiting at the end, with lots of beautiful but expensive things to buy. This is an actual chain of souvenir shops owned by cafe britt, which we will see next week. Bailey did manage to inadvertantly buy a six dollar water bottle, she emptied the bowls of chocolate covered coffee bean samples in response.. the bottle wasn´t marked with a price after all. Katie found some awesome earrings that matched her new friend perfectly, which she put on straight away. I think she missed him. So after the ride back to our bus, johnny turns the backwards facing seat forwards so maybe not so many of us will get carsick, and we start the journey back to San Joaquin. We pile out at the plaza, where most head straight for
Open Air
Like many restaurants in Costa Rica, the buffet at La Paz is in a beautiful open-air setting. the internet cafe.
Pura Vida,
Crystal
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Dr. Gibson
non-member comment
thanks
Thanks for your blog and the beautiful photos. I wish I was there with you!!! Keep up the great work. Dr. Gibson, Dean