Blogs from Monteverde, Puntarenas, Costa Rica, Central America Caribbean - page 10

This post is well overdue and is quite long, however it is well worth the read! Friday morning we woke bright and early at 5:00 to catch the 6:30 am bus from San Jose to Monteverde. The trip is only about 160 km but it takes 4 hours; this is partly due to factors such as city traffic and multiple stops, but mainly it is because the roads into Monteverde are crazy. The last 18 km of the trip accounted for a whole hour of the travel time! This section of road is extremely narrow with many tight turns and ascents, with a fairly steep drop off on the side! In several places we came to standoffs with approaching vehicles where someone had to back up and make space for the other to pass. It didn't ... read more

We made the decision early on to blitz through Costa Rica, just picking out some highlights. Though beautiful, it's comparatively expensive compared to the rest of CAm and after two weeks in the Corn Islands we had our fill of beautiful beaches. Along with Mike we traveled a couple of hours up into the hills of Monteverde which is renowned for it's pristine Cloud Forests and abundance of birds and other animals, and famed for a host of outdoor activities including ziplining, hiking and canyoning. The change in temperature was remarkable, having just come from the Pacific Coast, we suddenly found ourselves digging out jackets and long pants to keep warm as the thick mists descended upon us. We came here to go ziplining in the Monteverde Cloud Forest. We chose Salvatura as it has 3km ... read more

Sorry, not a lot of pictures for this one... Today we decided to relax a bit. We woke up later in the day and ate some breakfast. Then, headed down the hill to the Frog Pond. We bought tickets and got a guided tour. Lots of frogs... But, they were all sleeping! Almost all of them. Apparently frogs are, for the most part, nocturnal. Luckily, the tickets were good for the whole day, so we left and decided to come back later. Nap, eat, nap... After some much needed r&r, the sun had gone down and we returned to the frog pond. At night, the pond was a different world. The frogs were all awake and croaking. Most of them were right at the front of their cages. Plus, they were much easier to spot given ... read more

Monteverde is a little town high up in the mountains, north of San Jose. Due to the poor road network, it takes a long time to get there. Traveling to this area is best in the dry season, as many of the roads are impassable in the rainy season. Monteverde is a cloud forest and is home to the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve and several smaller biological stations that conduct research and work on sustainability and preservation initiatives. Monteverde was interesting. Besides being very challenging to get to, it was also challenging to live in. We thought our first apartment was too good to be true, and we were right. After purchasing a months worth of food, we were asked to leave after only 2 days. We were particularly bad tenants, you know, we did foolish ... read more

We knew Friday would be our last day in Monteverde. For this reason, we saved the best for last. We decided to finally see the eponymous cloud forest that is the reason that so many people come to this place. Yes, it is immensely popular and we saw more people there than anywhere else we went, but there was definitely a reason for it. The forest is amazing, with all the moss growing off the trees, trees growing upon trees, green everywhere - it looks much like the move Avatar - otherworldly. At one point, we came upon a vista of a huge tree that seemed like all of its branches had other trees or plants growing on it - it was so big, that it reminded me of that big fake tree in the middle ... read more