Blogs from Alajuela, Costa Rica, Central America Caribbean - page 8

Zip-lining is on today’s menu. The last of our extreme (to us) adventures. We were supposed to leave at 9am but it was delayed a couple of hours. At first it looked like we would again be the only customers but at our arrival at base camp, around the other side of the volcano, we were joined by 3 young Russians. The mountainside is more green here and the ravines formed by the lava flow less visible. The man was huge, at least 6’5 and with a belly to rival my own. We both got fitted with a double harness. There was a short practice run to make sure we understood the four basic commands and then into the back of the truck for a bumpy ride up the base of the volcano. This part of ... read more

More water sports today. White water rafting with Wave Experiences is on the menu. I chose the class 2&3 rapids tour. Claudette decided to take the day off. She has had enough of getting her face wet after the rappelling adventure. Our destination was about an hour out of town. The guide, Fabio, gave an entertaining introduction and monologue to keep us amused along the way. After a brief pit stop, we turned off the main road to reach our starting point. There were 70 people signed up for today’s river descent. Each raft held six people. It was a mad scramble and lots of wasted time as people tried to decide who they wanted to go with. There were some over-sized groups. Easy for me. I just latched myself onto a group of five. ... read more

Early start today for a river nature cruise. The kind people at Eruptions prepared an early breakfast and we were on the bus at 7am. We were the first to embark so we got to see some of the other tourist lodgings, including high end spas and a five star backpackers resort (not quite as nice as our place). The river we were to explore is about 15 km. from Nicaragua, an hour drive from Fortuna. It is slow moving and the banks are held together by large drooping trees. We saw different kinds of monkeys, caimans and about 10 different kinds of birds. Couldn’t get pics of them all as the zoom on my camera is not powerful enough. After about 2 hours, we headed back to our starting point for a buffet lunch. A ... read more

This is the second part of the Combo Tour we took in Costa Rica. After the visit to the Doka Coffee Estate our party of 13 with our guide and driver, continued to the Poas Volcano National Park. Again, the journey was mostly uphill along winding roads. I thought to myself at that time that I wouldn't want to do this on foot! On the way we stopped at a store where we were offered free samples of the local wine and fresh strawberries. Although I am not much of a wine drinker I opted for it. It was quite good but didn't really slake my thirst as they were served in tiny cups! Anyhow, after the usual restroom visits we got back into our van and reached our next destination, the Poas National Park in ... read more

Geo: 9.74892, -83.7534I'm not a huge fan of hot springs - sure, they're a nice spot for a soak after a long day on the ski slopes, and they feel great for those achy muscles and weary bones. But in North America, more often than not, those hot springs are a nasty human soup, a filthy mixture of humanity, dead skin, and floating band aids! They've never felt like a luxurious experience - at least, not until today at Tabacon, the biggest and best hot springs that Costa Rica has to offer.Even though temperatures are much cooler at this elevation, the idea of visiting hot springs in Costa Rica still seems a bit odd - things peaked at probably 28 or 29 degrees today, so it was counter intuitive to be spending so much time in ... read more