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Published: January 27th 2013
"Pura Vida" (pure life) is the slogan of the Costa Rican people and that's what you hear a lot and how they live their life: relax and enjoy, everything will be ok!
As we told you, we were planning to visit the Marino Ballena national park last sunday. After we woke up with the shouting of the howler monkeys (brulapen, our hotel was close to the forest), we took a boat trip. The guide told us we would see dolphins, but no whales, unless we would be very lucky. After about half an hour, the guide received a phonecall: another boat spotted a whale (yeah that's how it works a few kilometres away from the coast on the Pacific Ocean...). So we turned to another direction and went full speed to the place to be. And we were lucky: we saw a whale (humpback whale, about 18m long), but we needed some patience. It worked like this: he blowed water in the air, showed his back, then his tail and then went back under water for about 10 minutes. We were with 5 other boats following the whale about an hour, everytime waiting for another glimpse. When any boat noticed
another blow of water in the air, suddenly all the boats rushed to that place to see the big animal in close-up. According to the guide, it would have been even more spectacular if a female had been around, then the male makes spectacular jumps to attract the female. Besides that, we saw some turtles, no dolphins and lots of seebirds (pelicans and others) and we did some snorkelling where we saw some nice fishes. Lateron we relaxed on the beach.
The next day was a boring travelling day: bus at 8.30m ariving in Chacarita at 11 and there we heard that the bus to Puerto Jimenez would come at 2... And although Chacarita seemed to be a small town on the map, it turned out to be nothing more than a gasstation and 2 restaurants. Finally at 3 the bus arrived and we were in there for another 2-3 hours, arriving in Puerto Jimenez when it was already dark. We checked out some travel agencies to book a trip to Corcovado National Park, but that wasn't possible anymore for the next day. So on tuesday we had a relaxing day in Puerto Jimenez: walking around, swimming,... We went
to a small pool where caimans where living, when we made noise with a plastic bag, they swum in our direction (but they were not dangerous, as they told us).
On wednesday and thursday we went to Corcovado National Park on a guided trip (but just the two of us). We were disappointed about our guide, who couldn't spot many animals and didn't give much information. But anyway, it was a special experience to be in the jungle for two days: we walked about 20km close to the seaside (sometimes on the beach which was very hot and tough), slept in Sirena Ranger Station where we could camp on a platform, not very comfortable and very hot. The 2nd day, we left at 4 in the morning for a walk, but no, the animals were hiding, only a crocodile was present. The atmosphere was very special: still dark, lots of jungle-noises and water dripping all round (it's a rainforest). When we got back in Sirena station, there was a snake just outside of the cooking place. It was a dangerous one, so we just took a quick glimpse and we have no picture. Besides that we saw lots of
monkeys (we've all 4 species that are living in Costa Rica), some coatis, lots of scarlet macaws (papegaaien) and other nice birds (but we still didn't see the famous tucan) and a very small but very poisonous frog (Golfo Dulce Dark Frog, if you touch it, you can die).
On friday, again we woke up very early to catch the 5am-bus to San Jose, after 8 hours we were there and half an hour later we could catch another bus to Santa Elena where we arrived 4 hours later. A long trip, but we preferred that instead of travelling 2 days. So we were happy to find a nice hostel and have a relaxed morning today. And also nice: it's cooler here, lots of wind and clouds and sun are changing quickly. In the afternoon the guy from our hotel took us for a walk. We climbed a very big kind of tree, it was a strangler tree which had murdered the original one, so there was a hole inside where we could climb up. From there we had a nice view, seeing the see about 80km further.
Tomorrow we'll visit the National Park Santa Elena and then
we'll go on to Liberia.
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Tineke
non-member comment
Amazing nature
Hi Gyan and Zoe, I really enjoyed reading your stories and seeing your pictures (especially the ones with the killer trees, wauw, amazing, never seen anything like that!). You are so lucky to see this beautiful nature and spot a whale, so nice! :-) But please, don't talk about the weather and feeling nice and cooler in Santa Elena, because you can't imagine how cold it is over here, hahaha! ;-) So if you want to feel cooler, just come back home and I will try the sunny weather over there ;-) Have fun in the National Park, I hope you will have a nice guide to show you all the animals there! Take care! X Tineke