Back at Home

This is just a final post to let everyone know I made it home safe and sound. Unfortunately, my last day on my trip was actually my worst. I overslept my last day and missed my transport pick up to go river rafting, and spent that night in a casino playing poker (at one point being up $600 and then overall walking out about with $150 in profit) and not being able to find my friends who I planned to go out with. Despite this, the trip was obviously an unforgettable experience and adventure, and only foreshadows the amazing travels I will continue to have in the future.

Thanks to everybody who kept up with this blog and posted comments, and another apology for slacking the last couple weeks. Expect the next blog to begin this coming winter, when I begin my semester studying abroad...in a country to be determined. Pura Vida!

1 Tequila 2 Tequila 3 Tequila....Suicides!!!

I apologize deeply for being so god damn lazy. I was in San José about a week and a half ago and had written up a whole blog, but the internet crashed right when I finished so I couldn´t post anything. Right now, I will attempt to lay out my trip and just a few really amazing stories.

From León I went to Masaya. Did more volcano stuff. Hitch hiked my way into town and got picked up by a group of 10 Spaniards. They were amazing, really helped out my Spanish. Gave me a ride to Granada where I spent the night.

Then went to San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, a town on the Pacific known for great surfing. Met up with Zach. Lots of fun. Spent 2 entire days on the beautiful Playa Maderas surfing incredible waves, seriously improving, just having a complete blast on the beautiful beach. Did some serious partying both nights. My last night the guy I rented my board from bought me a ton of beers and we got into great conversations in Spanish about how great the town is and how everyone is like family. Definitely a place I would recommend to people.

A few days later, Zach and I crossed the border back into Costa Rica and decided to skip hiking Cerro Chirripó because we didn´t think we´d have enough time to do it and get Zach back to San José in time for his flight. Instead we made our way to the Caribbean side and went to a town called Puerto Viejo. The town is basically a reggae-style place surrounded by palm trees and sandy beaches. We spent Zach´s last day at the beach doing some surfing, but the waves were not nearly as good as they were in San Juan. It was still a good time.

The next day, Zach left and I hooked up with a group heading to Bocas del Toro, Panamá. The area is basically a collection of islands on the Caribbean but the main center where it all goes down is on Isla Colón, in the town called Bocas del Toro. We arrived at the hostel everyone told us about called Mondo Taitu. Really amazing story right now: When we got there and checked in, and made our way into the town to get a bite to eat, I passed a guy who stopped and pulled me over, stared at me, asked me to take off my sunglasses, asked my name, and after about 20 seconds, realized how he knew me....he was one of the soldiers on my bus on my Taglit Birthright trip to Israel - A YEAR AND A HALF AGO!!!! What a small world we live in. I hadn´t spoken to him in a year and a half, and now we are at the same hostel in the middle of the Caribbean in Panamá. Unbelievable. Anyways, I´m still here now, and this place is pretty much a party place. Of the group here, I am the only person who has been to a beach every day, taking full advantage of the shining sun that isn´t known for showing its face but for some reason has blessed us with its presence every day so far. Only today has it rained in the morning, and the entire afternoon it was gorgeous. Today I actually went on a 9 mile run out to a beach. It was really really awesome. This hostel is absolutely unbelievable. They attract a crowd every night for drinking before going out, and have some great weekly drinking traditions. For example, every Friday they put on a costume party until like 1 or 2 in the morning, with a different theme every week. Last week the theme was Punk, Goth, Rock, and Hip-Hop or something like that, and the week before it was Super Heroes. This past Friday´s theme: Cartoons, Clowns, and Queens. I dressed up as Aladdin. Pictures are to come, not to worry. Lots of people dressed up as Drag Queens. In fact, all the guys I traveled with did that, and I sort of felt left out, then looked at them and realized they were wearing a dress and make-up. That made me feel not so left out. There were some great costumes though, such as Duffman, Sponge Bob, Pinnochio, and a group of Aussies all dressed up as Transformers. It was a really fun night.

Another story: Our first night in, all the people I traveled with was just so happy to be at this beautiful island that we were just ready to get hammered. Before coming, all the way in Granada, I talked to some people who had been there and stayed at this hostel and said that whatever I did, one thing I absolutely had to do was a tequila suicide (also known in other countries as a stuntman or red-eye). So after throwing back some beers, I checked out the drink menu. The prices went from $5, $4, a couple 3s, some 2s, and finally: Free/Gratis. The drink: Tequila Suicide. The explanation: Snort a line of salt, squirt some lime in the eye, followed by a shot of the worst tequila we could get our hands on, leaving you wondering why you didn´t just spend a couple of bucks on a drink. How could I turn this down, a free shot of tequila! So after finding some Dutch guys who stayed in the same room as me, I convinced them to do it with me. For some reason, we decided to do another one right after - other nostril and other eye. Obviously, we can all agree that the best part of this trifecta is the shot of tequila. On the other hand, the worst: the salt up the nose. The reason is that the line of salt the bartenders give is not grainy, but chunky. So you´re literally snorting fairly big chunks of salt at a time, and this burning sensation just explodes all over. A farmer´s blow right after never looked so graceful. The lime in the eye was really bad, don´t get me wrong. The bartenders pull your lid, squeeze the juice, and just for kicks, just scrub the lime all over while you hurriedly try to close your eye and pull away. Finally, you´re rewarded with the tequila. Needless to say, the pictures are priceless (basically, I look like a friggin coke addict needing my fix on a crowded bar) and the experience is unforgettable. Finally, as a side note, 2 nights ago, a guy did 11 of those. I´m sure he´ll be very successful with the ladies using that as a pick-up line. "So, I snorted salt up my nose 11 times. What´s your name?"

Another small-world-story: After speaking with several of the people who work at this hostel, I discovered that the owners of Mondo are originally from San Francisco. Before my trip, I talked to my cousin Eric about where to go, and he mentioned that some people he went to high school with started up a hostel in Bocas. A few nights ago, I went out on a search for the owners and, amazingly, they and my cousins went to the same high school. One of them, Dave, even went to Israel with one of my cousins, Casey. This was a great conversation-starter and a perfect segway that led to several free drinks.

Tonight is Smokin´ Sundays at Mondo, which means they give out free Hookahs. Tomorrow is Power Hour. The hostel has a video of 60 1-minute clips of music videos from the 80s, so everyone just gets absolutely hammered singing classic songs that nobody really listens to but everybody knows. Tuesday morning I will go back to Puerto Viejo, do some more surfing, relaxing, and finish up with the best river rafting in Costa Rica, on the Rio Pacuaré. ¡¡¡Salud!!!

Granada, León, and Cerro Negro

I hadn´t realized so much time has gone by since my last post.

Well, on the 5th, I woke up early with a British guy doing the hike with me named Tom, and we met up with our guide. He took us on this trail up the 1600 meter Volcán Concepción, and it was an extremely steep climb. The trail literally had wildlife covering it, so we had to duck under branches and swipe away at brushes in the way. A couple of times I rubbed up accidentally against a plant that has a defense mechanism that stings your skin and then a small rash develops, but as long as you don´t scratch it, it goes away. As it did about 10 minutes later. It was pretty weird though. It was about an hour and a half literally climbing up the ridge of this volcano. I loved it. Once we got towards the top, there were so many dense clouds that our visibility was literally only about 5 meters, and the wind was blowing super super hard. Like hard enough to make me regain my balance and step with more authority so as not to get blown away. We climbed to an elevation of 1200 meters, so we were only about 400 meters away from the peak of the volcano. And once the clouds disappeared eventually, we could see the entire island of Isla de Ometepe, all the way across the lake to the port town, as well as the gigantic side of the volcano, almost to the peak. We ate the snacks we brought up with us and played around with the fierce wind, walking up a bit where the wind was really blowing, strong enough so that if you leaned into it, the wind actually supported your weight and balance. It was super cool. We walked down, got to our hostel, I showered and took a 3 hour nap, then began to party. There were a group of Canadians on the island who organized a movie (Shrek 3) and then a party with a DJ to raise money for the people on the island. So Tom and I and a couple locals went to the party and had a fairly decent night, not too late. I was wiped out from the exhausting hike.

The next day, I wanted to go see the San Ramón Waterfalls in San Ramón on the other part of the island. So Tom and I got on a bus that said San Ramón on it. An hour later, we were in another town just on the other side of Concepción instead of on the actual other side of the island, in San Ramón. I didn´t want to spend the whole day getting there and miss a night of partying in Granada, so instead Tom and I just walked to a nearby beach, went for a dip, and then just caught a bus back to Moyogalpa. We then took the ferry back to San Jorge, then from San Jorge to Rivas to Granada. I checked back into the Bearded Monkey and met up with all the people I had met the last time I was there. One guy from London named Sam was getting people together to party because it was his birthday, so I knew it was going to be a late fun night in Granada. We went to this club called Cafe Nuit that had decent live music and lots of locals, but there were about 15 of us around a table just drinking and talking about the most random stuff. When the club started to close, we decided to find this bar on the beach that was open 24 hours. The walk was far. At least 5 or 6 kilometers, which is even farther when you´re drunk. But it was super fun. We eventually got to this bar and stayed there until the sun came up. Then we caught a cab and got back to our hotel around 6ish. It was a ridiculous night to say the least. The sky from the sunrise was absolutely gorgeous. Because we were on the lake facing west, it was literally the best sunrise I think I have ever seen. Pinks and oranges and reds all mixed together to paint a landscape that would make anybody speechless.

The next day I sat around recuperating from the night before, really not doing much of anything besides reading and playing chess with random people. By the time night came around, I was ready to go out but every single other person was too wiped out and drained from doing what we did last night for 3 nights straight. So we just chilled watching a movie.

Then, I woke up, watched the Wimbledon Finals (great match) and made my way to the other cultural city that rivals Granada as Nicaragua´s prettiest, León. I checked into the Big Foot Hostel and signed up for a volcano tour for the next day. I was trying to figure out what to do when I overheard some guy telling another guy about a poker game going on around the corner. I sort of butted in and invited myself along, but they were cool with it. It was taking place at a tour company called QuetzalTrekkers, a non-profit organization that takes people on volcano hikes and donates all the money to charity. The guides were the ones running the poker game, they were mostly volunteers from American and Britain. The buy-in was 100 cords, and it was a cash game. 2 rounds of Texas Hold ´Em and one round of Omaha. After the first hour, I clearly had the largest chip stack. After a while though, I got tired and began to play poorly. After 4 hours, there were only 3 people left who had money and we decided to call it. I walked out with 450 cords, a very fun night with lots of good card-playing and interesting conversations.

The next day, Monday, I walked around the city for a bit, checking out the Parque Central, the church in the park, which is the largest in Central America, and grabbing small bites to eat. A bag of fresh mango is only 3 cords (less than a dime) - absolutely delicious! The church was very old but beautiful. What was more striking was its mere size and architecture from the outside, it´s just absolutely enormous. The town of León really isn´t that different from Granada. I think I like Granada more because there is more color to the buildings and it´s a bit smaller so there are more churches, which make it a bit more nice. Also it´s right on the lake which is awesome for partying. When 1 rolled around, the tour started. There were about 20 of us, and we all got into the back of pick up trucks which took us out of town and on a dirt road for about 45 minutes to the volcano. On the way, we passed by small houses and the children that saw us would wave and literally scream at the top of their lungs at us. It was just hysterical, passing by these kids that would just go AAAAHHHHH when we drove by. The volcano is called Cerro Negro, which is actually a name for a mountain, but technically, it is an active volcano. We grabbed our volcano boards, which were basically just planks of wood, our orange suits (which made us look like prison mates) and began the 40 minute climb up the volcano. The climb was not that bad at all, and the smell of sulfur and the feel of the steam coming out of the volcano made the whole experience that much more intense. Eventually, we got to the top, where we could see other mountains and volcanoes and just fields of green. Next we walked to a nearby crater and literally ran into it. Just ran right into the bottom of an active crater. Some people didn´t know where the path was though and ended up slipping and sliding down, and one Irish guy tripped and literally rolled down a bit. By the time he got to the bottom, his back was all scratched up. It looked hideous. Luckily, I got a good picture of it at its worst. The climb up though was the hardest part. The inside of the crater was really loose gravel so each time you took a step, it was like stepping in sand and your foot just sank down. It was like taking one step up and going down 3. So it took forever to go up the 120 meters that we ran down in about 15 seconds. Then it was time to board down the volcano. After learning how to sit and brake on the board by our guide, we walked to the edge and saw the steep steep drop. This was where the Frenchman (I forgot his name) rode a mountain bike to break the land speed´s world record. His bike ended up snapping in half and he suffered broken ribs, arms, etc...We were all really anxious to go after that story. The total distance is about 400 meters, and the guide said one guy she did it with got down the whole thing in 22 seconds, going 60 km/hr. That was the fastest she´s seen someone do it. 22 seconds! That´s so long. When it was my turn, I braced myself and headed down. I picked up some damn good speed, but my board started to turn and when I tried to readjust it, I ended up tripping a little. That wasn´t so bad. I had about 300 meters left to go, and so when I got back on, I was going straight, no brakes, picking up major speed. I was definitely going between 40 and 50 km/hr when I hit a big rock and went flying. I made it to the bottom though in one piece. Only after I got to the bottom did I feel burn on my arm and saw that I had scraped some skin off my arm pretty badly. That´s ok, makes for a good story. Got it going down an active volcano!!! Sitting down in the back of the pick up truck on the way back also let me know how sore my tailbone was after that experience. I´ll manage though. That night, the same guys that ran the poker game at QuetzalTrekkers ran a Quiz or Trivia Night at the hostel/bar/restaurant across the street from my hostel. They do it every Monday night, to raise money for poor children in the town. I joined a team with a guy I met who goes to Dartmouth named Zach, and also on the team was a guy from Med School, a Spanish business teacher working with the Peace Corps, a high school Spanish teacher who was valedictorian of his college, and a graduate from Penn State. So overall, we felt our team was definitely the most educated. The questions varied from movies to math to sports to Nicaraguan history to random insignificant trivia. One question was where is Jim Morrison buried, and Zach turned to me and said, "Who´s Jim Morrison?" I blew up in his face for a comment like that, but after the whole thing was over and done with, we had come from behind and were tied for first. The major questions we got wrong were ones on Nicaraguan history (like how many political parties there were in Nicaragua in 1990 and who the president was in 1909), and those were the questions that the other team, a group of Nicas, got right to get tied up with us in first. The first place prize was a bottle of rum, while the second place prize was a bottle of wine. We all wanted the rum, obviously. It was weird though, because normally they come up with a tie-breaker question, but because the two teams were one entirely of gringos and another entirely of Nicas, we each didn´t want the question to be biased so the other team knew it easily. Then a coin flip was suggested. I hated this idea, to leave it all up to chance. But the Nicas kept insisting. It was actually quite humorous to see the cultural differences between our two groups. Us, the educated American/British group, screaming to use our intelligence and a question as the tie-breaker, and the Nica group screaming to do a coin-flip. Eventually, the people running the event decided it would be best to just do a coin flip. The Nica group picked a side, the coin was flipped, and it landed on our side. We won the rum!!! Whoooooo, it felt damn good. My first Trivia Night in Nicaragua with a victory. We got some coke and killed the bottle in good style!!! It was a really fun night.

I decided to stick around here one more night because the guys are having another poker night, so I figured I´d leave León with a bit more money for the rest of my travels, then I´m going to go to Masaya to check out the volcano there and the infamous market which is great for shopping. Then I´m going to San Juan del Sur for some surfing and hanging on the beach. Then I´m going with Zach all the way south in Costa Rica to hike Costa Rica´s highest mountain, Cerro Chirripó. He has to leave soon and I really wanted to do it, just not alone. So it works out perfectly. I´ll try and put up more pictures soon, as I have taken a lot of them.

On to Nicaragua

Right now I am on an island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. Catch up time.

So my last day in La Fortuna, I checked out of the place I was staying at with Ruth because she left and they were going to charge me double, so I checked into another hostel called Gringo Pete´s, which is a great place, only $3 a night for a dorm bed. On the way to this hostel, I ran into Slovakian guys who I had met at a disco in La Fortuna a couple nights ago. They told me they were leaving today but I had to see the lava, and I told them that´s what I wanted to do. Then they sat me down and gave me a detailed plan of how they were able to go around paying the expensive entry fees for either the National Park or for the Arenal Observatory Lodge, another place tour groups go to either to see the volcano or it serves as a hostel as well. So I pretty much followed this plan to the T. I hitch hiked my way to as close to the Observatory Lodge as I could. On the main road in town, I pulled over this bus, and the driver agreed to take me to as far as he could go before he split off from the road. We drove past the Tabacón hot springs and past the National Park entrance, and then after crossing a stream, which the Slovaks told me I would cross, the bus turned right and I got off to continue going straight. Walking on this gravel path was really intense, because I had great views of the volcano through trees and what´s more is I could literally hear the rocks being shot out of the volcano and rolling down its side. It was pretty intense. Another car pulled over and was kind enough to take me the rest of the way, all the way to the Observatory. Right before the gates to this lodge though was a trail that led into the forest. According to the Slovakian guys, this trail would lead me right to the lava bath. They warned me though of an old woman who would charge me to go through. So as I walked this trail, I came across a little shack with a desk, chair, and notebook, but no old woman. Figuring this was where she charged people, I ran past it before she came back from wherever she was. The trail continued for about another 2 kilometers, as I passed by signs that said "Enter at Your Own Risk". The sounds of the explosions coming from the volcano got louder and louder, and that combined with the shrieks of all the different animals in this forest made the image of the movie Jurassic Park come right into mind. (Little did I know, I found out later that that movie was actually filmed in Costa Rica, on an island owned by the country about 500 km away from the mainland in the Pacific.) Eventually, I got to a sign indicating that I was entering on the dried up lava from the 1992 eruption. As I walked on top of the old lava, I saw the massive Volcán Arenal in clear view, clouds apart, spitting out hot rocks and watched them tumble down its side. It was around 1:30, and I was determined to stay until I could see red lava. Unfortunately, this can only be seen at night, so I was stuck there until sundown. Anticipating this long wait, I brought my book along. So after some reading and more hiking around the volcano, I went back to the old lava bath and just sat there, reading, waiting for time to pass, with this active volcano about 3 miles away from me. It started to rain, and anticipating this, I had carried my umbrella along as well. So just imagine, as tour groups so clearly saw this, coming to see the volcano and along the trail passing by a random guy, who looks like a local (and I was treated like one by all the tour guides), sitting on a rock reading holding an umbrella over his head with this active volcano right in front of him. That´s me. Looking back on it now, I must have looked ridiculous. But I was determined to wait until dark to see the red lava. Finally, around 5:30/6ish, I heard an eruption, and saw rocks falling down, and all of a sudden, sparks of bright red showed. I was so excited. As time went on, more and more sparks flew by, clearly visible from where I was, but unfortunately, too small and not strong enough to be photographed. So while I have no physical proof of seeing lava, I can assure you I actually did see it. By 7, I had run into a tour group and was kind of ready to go, after really seeing lots of lava (in my opinion) at this point, considering I had no ride back and was banking on hitch hiking my way back. The tour group said they could give me a ride, so I walked back with them, all the while listening to the thunder of the volcano. This sound by the way sounds just like real thunder, which is a bit scary because you don´t know if that is thunder or the volcano. We got out of the jungle trail around 7:30 and as we exited, a group of girls ran up to us asking if we saw lava and how bad the trail was and if the guide could go with them. Keep in mind, it is very very very dark at this point. The guide said it would be $30 per person and the girls were obviously saying screw that, and I told them I really didn´t want to go back because I had just spent over 6 hours there and didn´t have a ride back, even though they had a rental car and would be willing to drive me to my hostel. So I walked over to the tour group, and the guide all of a sudden said I would have to pay to go back with them. I said screw that, so the tour group drove away, and I´m left there getting ready to hitch hike. Then, the girls come up to me asking if they gave me $10, and a ride home obviously, would I take them along the trail to the volcano to see the lava. I said sure, not haggling over the amount of money, since they were paying me after all, and I was getting a ride. Plus, I recognized they were speaking Hebrew (they were a group of 4 Israeli girls), so once I told them I was Jewish and had been to Israel, they jumped and cheered and felt much better, despite their surprise that I wasn´t Tico. So I led them through this jungle-path again, for the 3rd time, and learned all about them: how they keep kosher and so cook all their own food (including using their own pots and utensils) and follow the Sabbath and had volunteered in the States with Jewish communities doing stuff for an Israeli organization after being in the National Service (a substitute for the army which religious girls can opt for). I was a bit scared though at how they continued to pester me, asking me why I didn´t know Hebrew since I´m Jewish or made aalyiah yet. Nevertheless, they were still a lot of fun. So we got to the old lava bath that I was just at, saw the lava coming down from the volcano, made our way back to the car, and headed back to town. I told them though I would take them to the natural hot springs I had found because I really wanted to go there as it was my last night in town. So we went back under that bridge and it was just as gorgeous as the first time. Of course, the Israelis loved it also. After about an hour, we headed back to La Fortuna and they invited me to their dinner, which they were going to cook as soon as they found a hostel. I took them to Gringo Pete´s, but for some reason, the private room for $5 didn´t satisfy them (I figured it was some religious reason; i mean they went into the natural hot springs with all their clothes on). So for the next hour, we drove around searching for a place that was cheap enough and with a room good enough for them, me acting as translator most of the time because none of them spoke Spanish. Finally, they found a place, and started making dinner. I struck up a conversation with a guy there, who turned out to be from Nicaragua, and he told me he was a guide for a rafting company and said next time he would take me on a tour for free. I asked him when and he said next Sunday. I thought this was fucking cool, even though La Fortuna is a bit out of the way, it might be worth to come back for a free rafting tour. Unfortunately though, I love Nicaragua so much I don´t think I´m going to make it back. Anyhoo, he brought out his pet, an elephant beetle, the largest beetle on the planet, named Enrique. It was quite entertaining. Finally, after a nice kosher meal, I got into bed, knowing full well I had to make the 8 am bus out of town to get to Nicaragua the next day.

And of course, I woke up at 7:45 and rushed my ass out of the hostel, just barely making the bus to a town called Tilarán. From there, instead of waiting for a bus to the next town, I shared a cab with some people to a place called Cañas, which is on the Pan-American highway. And about 10 minutes later, a bus going north all the way to the border (the border town is called Peñas Blancas) showed up and I hopped on. It was completely packed though, and for the first time, I had to stand up. Really, I had always seen people on buses where they were forced to stand because there were no seats, but it was the first time I had to do it. And for about an hour and a half, until we reached the town of Liberia where hald the bus got off, I had to stand in the aisle of ths jampacked bus. I then slept the rest of the way to the border, missing the drive (I´m sure it was gorgeous, as always). Immigration was no problem, and walking in between Costa Rica and Nicaragua, I met an Australian guy named Pete who was planning on going to the same hostel (Bearded Monkey) in the same town (Granada) I planned to go to. So we got our Nica stamp and got on a bus to head there. I turned to put my big pack down, and when I turned back around, I saw a familiar face come running towards me with her arms wide open. It was Nour, the Turkish girl from Santa Elena I went to the waterfalls with. She was so happy to see me, I was a bit surprised. Then she told me of her story getting into the country, and I realized why she felt so great to see a familiar face. She had signed up with a private bus to go straight to Granada, but the bus never showed and after she called back, it still didn´t show and ended up having to spend the night in Liberia. When another bus didn´t show, she met some a Tico family who was nice enough to drive her all the way from Liberia to Peñas Blancas (that´s a long drive, 2 and a half to 3 hours). Then she handed her passport to the immigration officer still in Costa Rica, and the officer was so shocked by a Turkish passport that he ripped the spine of it. Then he refused to stamp it because it was ripped. Then she had to talk to the officer´s boss´s boss and ended up crying because she was so upset over everything she had gone through. In her own hilarious words, "Being a woman and single, I used my most powerful weapon and cried. I cried my way into Nicaragua." Pete then laughed and said, "That´s the name of your first album right there!" Funny stuff. So the 3 of us made it to the Bearded Monkey in Granada and spent the night with another Australian Pete had met in Panamá named Nick, drinking Nicaragua´s famous 7-year spiced rum, Flora de Caña, on the steps of some random building across the street from our hotel, jamming on Nick´s guitar and making up songs from all of our crazy adventures. Nick had been traveling for 5 months already, going from Chile to Argentina to Uruguay a bit to Bolivia to Peru to Ecuador, flying to Panamá to go to Costa Rica and finally in Nicaragua and finishing up all the way in Mexico. What a guy! When we got screams from the hostel saying we were too loud, we went inside and talked for another couple hours about everything. It was such a chill night, I had a blast.

I woke up early the next day, naturally, upset that I couldn´t sleep more. Eventually, I made my way into the town of Granada, walking throughout the beautiful Parque Central. The town is very colonial, all the buildings are painted different colors (from blues to greens to pinks to yellows) and the park is a really nice place with well-planted trees and little tiendas selling everything. Hot dog stands are even scattered around. I walked to several churches, including one that had a bell tower that I climbed up and got a fabulous view of the entire gorgeous city of Granada. I walked to the shore of the lake and around the market. I am surprised at how the people will wear anything that has English on it, no matter what it says. If there´s English written on a shirt, then it´s cool. One big construction guy I saw working and was walking past wore a shirt that said, "I´m suffering from PMS." Great shirt!!! The difference between here and Costa Rica is also as clear as night and day, the place just reeks of poverty as well as culture though. I don´t think I´ve been to a place in Costa Rica that is as natural and not nearly as catered to tourism as much as Granada. Eventually I got super hot and tired and went back to the Bearded Monkey and just chilled and organized myself a bit. That night was a lot like the previous one, except that when the worker at the hostel told everyone they had to be quiet, and there were 3 other people jamming on various musical instruments, literally the entire hostel, about 20 people total, joined together and made way to the gazeebo in Parque Central to sit in a circle and just jam. One guy was just incredible at guitar and an Irish guy had a little flute/recorder with him and together they were just going off. And every single person had a drink! It was so damn awesome. We were there till about 1 at night, singing everything from Bon Jovi (Livin´on a Prayer) to Guns ´N Roses (Sweet Child o´Mine) to Chili Peppers (Under the Bridge) to originals people had written. It was by far one of the coolest nights I´ve had, maybe ever.

I passed out and woke up early, having packed the night before because I wanted to go to this island that I´m at right now in the middle of Lake Nicaragua, Isla de Ometepe. It has two volcanoes on it. I took a bus from Granada to a town called San Jorge, and from there a fairy to a town on the island called Moyogalpa. I was tired from a short sleep and fairly long trip, but I am not planning on staying long and want to see the island. So I rented a bike for the afternoon and rode about 12 km to a beach, took a nap, and rode back. There are a few British guys here who I had dinner with and celebrated the American Independence Day with no drinking, because I am getting up at 6 tomorrow to go hiking up to the island´s largest volcano, Volcán Concepción. My plan for now, because I am enjoying Nicaragua a lot and there seems to be a lot of cool stuff to do, is to stay on the island until Friday and then spend the weekend in Granada, to check out the night life there (it´s supposed to be absolutely amazing). Then I want to go check out other volcanoes more north, where you can actually go volcano surfing down after hiking up. Then do some other stuff around Granada and finish up Nicaragua with a few days at the beach and surfing in San Juan del Sur. Then I´ll head to Panamá and the Caribbean side of Costa Rica. I will now almost for sure skip some beaches and climbing I wanted to do in Costa Rica, but I´m willing to do that for some new experiences here in Nicaragua. Happy 4th of July!!!

Back to Santa Elena and La Fortuna

First off, my birthday celebration was quite fun. I ended up going out with lots of students and teachers from the school and around 2ish, Joshua and Maude were the only people left with me. We found this little food stand and they ordered me a triple-cheeseburger, which of course I gobbled down, with fries. I ended up passing out around 3ish, I think. All in all, I can´t say it was as fun as the 5-day celebration I had in Peru last year, but it was still a hell of a good time.

I left school a couple days early to start my real adventures, and I decided to go back to my favorite hostel so far: Pensión Santa Elena. As soon as I got there I was welcomed back by the guys who worked there who remembered me from our last night of partying (the same night of the big fight). That was pretty cool. I checked into a dorm and it was pretty full. I struck up a conversation with the people bunking next to me. One girl from France, a Turkish girl named Nour, and a Canadian named Ruth. I decided to take it easy that night and just get up the next day and do nothing.

The next day I started out doing pretty much nothing, then after overhearing one of the workers mention waterfalls in the area, which I had read about but didn´t have time to visit, I figured I would go check them out. I ran into Nour and she didn´t have anything to do, so she tagged along. We took a public bus that was heading to the Monteverde Reserve and got off early to start our walk. The first part was downhill on a semi-paved road, but because it was a pretty clear day, the views were just breathtaking. We could see all the way to the Nicoya Gulf, very very impressive. So green it´s amazing. We turned onto a trail that kept going and going and going, and eventually we were crawling over rocks and across wooden planks used as bridges going over deep rivers. It was a pretty cool little trail, it just went on forever. Eventually, we got to the infamous San Luis Waterfalls. It was pretty big, I´d say close to 20 or 25 meters. Nour and I sat there eating and talking for a while, just enjoying, when all of a sudden, lightning lit up the sky and thunder screamed over all the noise, leaving us in silence. We figured we should get out of there before it started to pour, but then all of a sudden a group of people showed up and said they were going swimming. The thought had crossed my mind but I didn´t have a towel and the water was freezing, but when Nour said she had one, I had to jump in. The water was freezing, probably some of the coldest water I´ve ever been in, but I got used to it after a while. It was well worth it after looking at the pictures. So after I dried off, it wasn`t raining that badly but it was thundering, so Nour and I started to head back on the trail, when the rain gradually came down harder and harder. Within a couple of minutes, I was completely soaked. It was as if I had gone swimming with the shirt I was wearing. Seriously, it was thunderstorming like a damn monsoon. We quickly made our way back to a lodge (it took us surprisingly only a short amount of time to go back on that seemingly never-ending trail). After ringing out our clothes and waiting for the rain to stop, Nour and I called a cab and took it back to Santa Elena, ready for a steaming hot shower and some dry clothes. After dinner, we gathered up the people at the hostel, and went to the one and only Bar Amigo´s. It was a good time, nothing too crazy.

I got up early the next day because I planned on going to La Fortuna, a popular spot to see Costa Rica´s most famous Volcano, Volcán Arenal. The fastest way to get there is to take a jeep to Lake Arenal, a boat across the lake, and then another jeep to the town of La Fortuna. However I was told that it´s possible for you to walk to the lake, saving money and letting you see some incredible views, then get on the boat across the lake and finally taking the last jeep. So I was planning on doing that, but then it started drizzling and grey clouds covered the sky. I figured it would be nice in the morning like it normally is. But not today. I really didn´t feel like getting caught in a rainstorm again, so I decided to just wait until the next jeep-boat-jeep transfer to La Fortuna, which left at 2 pm. Ruth, the Canadian in the same dorm as me, was scheduled to take it also, so we traveled across the lake and into La Fortuna together. The town is located about 20 kilometers away from the base of the volcano, so you can see the whole thing most of the time. The tip though is covered by clouds a lot, so when people take tours to go see the volcano, it´s hard to see lava and everything with clouds in the way. We got to our destination around 5, so after dinner, we figured we would check out the hot springs. Back in Santa Elena, I met these guys from Hawaii traveling around who had come from La Fortuna and they said that right next to one of the resorts, called Tabacón Springs (which was recommended to me by my cousins and other relatives who had been there), was a path that led you underneath a bridge that had natural hot water running through with little natural pools that you could sit in. I was also told by other travelers earlier that Tabacón was sweet as hell, but super super expensive, and that it was possible to just sneak into it if you acted like you belonged there (because people who stay at the same-named hotel get in for free). So Ruth and I took a cab there and just walked in, testing out our sneaking-in abilities. We were called back walking down the first stairs, saying we had to pay. I checked out the prices, and it was $40 just to get in, and more if you wanted to enjoy the buffet. Screw that! So we walked out, and literally 100 meters away down a path under a bridge ran a river with water that was probably between 65 and 75 degrees. It was absolutely incredible. Steam was rising up from it due to the heat. And it was all natural, none of that man-made crap. We brought a bottle of cheap liquor with us to fully enjoy the experience. It was beautiful, full moon giving us enough light to explore around, and just chillaxing in natural hot springs. We told our cab driver to come back and pick us up at 10, but when we got to the place where he dropped us off, he wasn´t there. So we just figured we´d stick our thumbs out and try and hitch-hike our way back until the cab showed up. About 2 minutes later, a van pulled over and let us in. It was an Argentinian couple with their son (who works in Puerto Viejo, a town on the Caribbean coast), and so I talked to them about what we were doing and asked them questions about what they were doing. They complemented me on my good Spanish!! Coincidentally, they dropped us off right at our hostel because they happened to be staying at a hostel across the street. We then randomly met these Slovakian guys and went to a discotheque with them, which ended up not being that fun. So we called it quits early and just went to bed.

I woke up at 8, because I had a lot planned to do, and told Ruth I´d meet up with her later. I first wanted to hike up Cerro Chato, which was a crater that used to have volcanic activity but then turned into a lake. First I had to get to the property though. That was about a 6 to 8 kilometer hike from my hostel, which consisted of walking on a road that ran through fields and eventually going uphill, where I could see pretty incredible views of La Fortuna. Unfortunately, it was a bit cloudy, but it was still beautiful. I got to the lodge where you need to pay to go to nearby waterfalls as well as to hike up Largo Cerro Chato. Obviously I didn´t want to pay to hike so I tried to get on the trail without paying. I was stopped by a guy who asked if I had a ticket. I asked if I needed one and he said of course. Then he asked if I was a citizen. I quickly said yes, and he said ok, only $5 then. I asked if there was a student discount and he said well normally it´s 10 but since you´re Tico...I figured I´d better not let this chance get by, so I ran in, bought the 50%-off ticket, and started my climb. At first it was just a steep climb up some farms. These views of La Fortuna were even more gorgeous. Just fields and fields of green on either side of the town. About 2 kilometers later, the hike turned into a climb through the jungle. The trail looked like someone had just taken a machete and gone through the jungle making their own trail. I was literally walking up a mountain covered in jungle-forest. It was pretty cool, but it was a very very steep climb. After a little over a kilometer and a half, I reached the top and then it was a quick 100 meter descent to the lake. It was pretty cool being in the crater, because I also could see part of Arenal. White cloud-smoke was at its tip, and I couldn´t figure out if that was coming out of the volcano or if that was just clouds coming off. Either way, it was sweet. I relaxed on a branch sticking out into the middle of the lake, keeping my balance so I didn´t fall into the freezing cold water. After about an hour, I decided to head back. The climb down was much easier and more fun. I saw a little snake slither its way off the trail. The views coming down were also better because the clouds disappeared. The hike down took a little over an hour. I was dead beat and made my way over to the waterfalls that were right next door. The lodge charges a $7 entry fee to see the falls, but of course I shimmied my way out of that by hanging out in the gift shop next to the gate and just walking right in when no one was looking. The gate was attached to a hanging bridge, so I walked quietly to make sure no one heard me and made it across with no problems. There was then about a 600 meter steep descent to the grand Cataratas de La Fortuna. It was at least 30 meters, if not more, and had a powering thunder-noise coming from the water hitting the pool of water. It was extremely powerful and impressive to stare at. After relaxing my dog-tired feet for a bit, everyone else there left so I had the waterfall all to myself. I jumped in and started to make my way around to the side to get behind it when all of a sudden a group of 15 teenagers arrived to the falls and started screaming and shouting. I got out, waited for them to jump in and leave, and then jumped back in and made it all the way around the falls. It looked even more powerful and impressive from behind it. Ruth showed up soon after and after more pictures, we started our walk back to our hostel. I was so exhausted and tired that the first car that passed I stuck my hand out and they made room for us two to get back to La Fortuna.

And that leaves us here. Tonight, I am going to try and get to some lookout spots to see the volcano and some lava, then hit up the natural springs again. Tomorrow, I´m not sure what to do. I was thinking of going to Caño Negro, where you can take tours around and see some cool wildlife. But I think it´s a bit too expensive, and I´ll save money for other stuff. Instead I may just hike around the volcano in the park. Haven´t decided yet. Either way, after I am going to go to Nicaragua, do stuff there, then cross the country doing stuff and ending my trip on the Caribbean side and dropping into Panamá. Should be a good time. More to come later.

First Time Experiences and Manuel Antonio

Bueno, I apologize for the delay between posts. This weekend I was not around a computer at all, and during the week I just got a bit lazy, so here it goes.

Family: My family here in Heredia consists of one mother named Cármen who is not married (don´t know where the husband is or what happened to him) with several kids, one of whom is the director of the language school I am at. When I first arrived she was very friendly, very talkative, and it seemed like I was going to have a good time. Things started getting much worse after that. I decided to have a bowl of cereal that night, because I was a bit hungry, while watching some tv, right before going to bed. I put the bowl on the ground and put the milk away, and she woke up and walked with me to the couch to watch tv with me. I didn´t know whether to hide the cereal and risk her seeing it or just tell her (I didn´t think she would be that mad) so I just decided to be honest and tell her that I was eating some cereal before bed. She gave me this look, then continued to watch tv with me, which I thought was weird. It took literally 3 minutes to finish the cereal then I went to bed. The next morning at breakfast she told Elena (another student from New Hampshire staying with Cármen) and I that we could buy whatever food we wanted and keep it in the fridge but just don´t take anything of hers. I found this to be quite rude and odd, considering we were living with her. I glanced up on the shelf, and noticed the cereal was gone. She hid the cereal and gave me a lecture on not to eat food over a bowl of cereal. I couldn´t believe it. Throughout this past week, conversations with her have been horrible because she acts like she knows everything, including the laws of America, and when I proceed to correct her she says no and remains stubborn. It´s very frustrating. That is the least of the problems though. The food situation got worse. One night she made spaghetti and I wasn´t that full after one plate of it, so I asked if there was a little bit more I could have. She looked at me, chuckled a bit, and said, "Uhh, no." I was shocked. I just figured there wasn´t any left so I didn´t make a big deal out of it. What made it worse though was that Elena told me Cármen mentioned what happened to Elena the next day and started saying, "I gave him a big plate. I mean he didn´t pay twice," referring to me. I couldn´t believe this! This is not normal for a host family to deny a student more food. They are supposed to provide a sufficient dinner and breakfast. I have continued to sneak some food out of her fridge every night ever since, because she continues to not feed me a filling dinner. I have informed the school of this, and last week our class of 4 spent the majority of the time laughing and gossiping about her and how she is quite the character. I´m not going to bother switching families, because I only have less than week left, but it is just a bit frustrating and ridiculous at the same time. I will admit though, we have gotten into some pretty heated debates which I feel has made my Spanish better since I have to articulate my arguments to her because she speaks no English. So some good has come out of living with her. Ok, enough family talk.

School: Classes are better. I´m with really advanced students and the teachers are great and really don´t care what we do as long as we are constantly talking and using correct grammar. I have met a bunch of other students who are really great and who I may try and travel around with depending on our schedules. Nothing too exciting or interesting though.

Now on to the fun stuff!!!

Last Wednesday, after class, I did the most dangerous, nerve-wracking, adrenaline-pumping activity I´ve ever done in my life: I went bungee-jumping! I went with 2 other people, Chase and Kelly, and Elena came along even though she wasn´t going to jump. The drive was about 40 min. away and as we moved farther and farther away from the city and closer and closer to the mountains, I got more and more nervous. We turned off a main road onto a dirt road and there was an old bridge with a few platforms on both sides. When we got out of the car to look down, my heart rate definitely doubled. We were in the middle of these mountains that was just surrounded by green on a bridge that had a river running through it. There were rocks throughout the river, so not only was there no way we could touch the water on the jump (which I´ve heard people do in other places), but if there was an "accident", that would be the last "accident" any of us would have. Chase was designated by the group to go first since he didn´t seem that nervous. He survived, but watching him do it made the rest of us a bit more nervous. Next it was my turn. As they were strapping the ankle braces on to me, I tried to calm myself down but it wasn´t really working. I got on the platform and tried not to look down and just straight out, but that didn´t really help. When they gave me the go ahead, I started having second thoughts, and then......I just lept out. It was soooo damn scary, watching the entire world fly by, wind pushing my eyes and neck and head back into my body. And I was just screaming the entire time. I could feel all the blood rushing to my head, and even after the first jump, when I was dangling and swinging around, I was screaming from all the adrenaline. It was a huge rush. Probably the scariest part though was having to reach for the cable they dropped down and hook it up to a harness that was fastened on my waist. It wasn´t as tight as I would´ve liked it to be, but I managed to get pulled up with no problems. My legs and hands were trembling from it all. But it was so worth it. I later found out that it was an 80 meter drop - 80 friggin meters (over 260 feet)!!! The jump came with a video that a guy took from the top of each of us jumping, and I also had the guy that drove us to the place take a video with my camera. To say it was crazy is an understatement - definitely the most insane thing I´ve ever done. Jumping off a bridge with a thick piece of stretchy rope attached to you, who comes up with this stuff?? Anyways, I´m definitely planning on doing it again elsewhere in Costa Rica.

The next day after class, Chase, Elena, and I went into San José to check out a big music festival going on in the city. It was International Music Day around the world or something so there were a ton of local groups performing in different parks all around the city. The first group we saw was a rock band and they sucked, not to mention the fact that the lights and sound system didn´t work half the time. We walked down a street to another park and saw an African percussion group that had about 6 guys playing different types of bongos and drums and just making crazy beats. They were great. Then we walked about 2 miles to a gym that had performers because a guy from my class said he was going to be there. When I couldn´t find him, I remembered he said he was going to some dance performance with our teacher, so I wanted to go find him at this theater. Chase and Elena didn´t feel like coming, so I told them I would meet them at a bar called El Pueblo (The Town) at 10, which was when we were meeting other friends also. This was when things started turning a bit weird. I took a cab to this theater, and there ended up being no dance performance at this theater. I didn´t feel like going back to the gym so I walked to another nearby park where I could hear music playing. On the way though, I could hear people calling me over, and I turned around and it was two girls on the street. I debated going over just to talk to them, because that would have been quite weird, but when I took a closer look, I was pretty sure the two women were not women...I then briskly walked to the park a block away. Now this concert going on at this park wasn´t normal either. It was a heavy metal/death metal band, so there were literally about 100 kids with black lipstick, black eyeshadow, wearing black clothes, with either black or dyed magenta-red hair. Luckily, I was wearing a black shirt that night so I blended right in with everybody. To say the least, the music was not good. I knew there was a soccer game going on at that time, so after about 20 minutes of chilling in this park, I decided to go find a bar and just grab a few drinks and watch the game before 10. I noticed though that this area was covered with casinos. So for the next hour, I pretty much went from casino to casino (about 4 or 5 in all) pretending to play only so I could get a complimentary beverage. The time passed and I met up with the rest of the guys at El Pueblo. We were out till about 2 and by 2:30, I was home in bed.

Friday, I made plans to go to Manuel Antonio and catch the public bus out of San José after school around 5ish. Kelly (the one who I went bungee jumping with and who met us at El Pueblo the night before) was planning on going to Monteverde with some other people, but missed the pick up at a nearby park, so she showed up at my place and so I invited her to come along. It was great traveling with another person, even though I would´ve been fine alone, it definitely made things enjoyable. Manuel Antonio is a small small town on the Pacific Coast, so small in fact that most buses take you to another town called Quepos about 5 km away from Manuel Antonio. So our bus stopped in Quepos and we started our search for a hostel. After going to different places and failed bargaining, we found a new hostel that had only been open for 4 weeks (and so wasn´t in any guide book) that was located below a pharmacy on the road connecting Quepos to Manuel Antonio. It had several rooms with 4 bunk beds in each room, and was the cheapest one we could find. Plus it had a common kitchen and a nice big common room with a tv with cable and an XBox hooked up to it to watch movies or play games. There were also several groups of travelers staying there so it made things fun. We didn´t have that late a night that night because we wanted to get up early to go to the National Park in Manuel Antonio (that´s pretty much the only thing to do between these two towns).

Saturday we woke up a little after 6. Kelly took a shower and I got ready for the day. The hostel has a balcony that runs across the back, which you have to walk across to get from some rooms and the kitchen to other rooms and the common/tv room. This balcony though gives a view of the forest that is absolutely breathtaking. There were no clouds and the sun was beaming by 7, so there was just a fields and plains and blotches of different shades of green until the horizon. Suddenly, a monkey climbed across a couple trees right in front of me. That was a good sign that we were going to see lots of stuff in this park. We took a public bus to Manuel Antonio where you can walk to the entrance. But in order to get to the entrance you need to walk through a trail and in order to walk through the trail you have to cross a tiny stream. Now at high tide, this little "stream" can get a little above ankle-high, because it is fed from water from the beach right next to it. That´s right, ankle-high deep water!! Luckily, there are men with boats who are willing to take you across the 10 foot wide stream for a measly dollar. Kelly and I decided to brave it out and walk across this 10 foot stream that had water up to our ankles, risking everything in our day packs from getting destroyed. 5 seconds later, we made it across safely, with only our feet wet. That was close!! It was pretty damn hysterical watching people actually take a boat across from fear of water, even though we were at a beach. We got to the park by 7:30 and decided to walk a trail that took us around an isthmus with several look out points and different beaches to visit. We didn´t seem much wildlife besides several huge iguanas and lizards and lots of butterflies and other insects. Once we finished that, we saw a tour group heading to see some monkeys, so we jumped behind and followed. It was on the same trail we just finished, so we didn´t know what was going on because we would have seen them. But all of a sudden right next to us, there were about 6 white-faced capuchin monkeys crawling from tree to tree searching all over for food. Then one monkey grabbed a huge spider out of one tree and crawled to a branch about 5 feet in front of us all and started picking it apart and eating it. Very cool. After lots of pictures and oohs and aahs, the guide found a three-toed sloth about 20 feet above us. It was crawling on a branch ever so slowly. The guide said it only moves about 110 yards a day, and is only 5 times slower than a snail. What a lazy useless piece of crap! But watching it move almost in slow-motion was pretty interesting. On our way to another trail, everyone stopped and started staring at a backpack. I couldn´t figure out what was so great about it until I saw a monkey crawling over to it very cautiously. Then I heard screams from a couple in the water and I figured it out: we were watching a robbery in progress. When the monkey started to unzip the pack, the guide ran over and scared it away, as the couple ran over to make sure it didn´t take anything. But it definitely would have if the guide hadn´t done anything. Kelly and I decided to break off from the group and go ahead on another trail and on the way we saw tons of monkeys in the trees all searching for food, as well as another sloth hanging on a tree. I still can´t get over how lazy those things are! Along the trail I noticed a branch on the side had two different colors on it. When I looked closer, it turned out a snake was wrapped around the tree. It was very creepy looking and so after some quick pictures, we moved on. Then we ran into a tour group who had a scope set up looking at some zebra grasshoppers (brightly striped yellow and black grasshoppers). They asked us what we saw and we told them oh monkeys, sloths, and a snake. When we said snake, they turned right to us with a look of surprise. We told them it was right on the side of the trail a bit back and the guide was surprised he didn´t see it. Then a woman in the group said all we´ve seen are spiders and bugs. I felt bad. They paid $20 a person for this guide who couldn´t even find this snake on the side of the trail. The guide told us it was a rainbow boa snake, after looking at our pictures of it. We continued on to several other trails and later ran into another pack of monkeys that were even closer than before searching through the jungle for food. These trails also led to some great lookout points to the Pacific and the rest of the park. The trails were so damn awesome because everywhere I turned, there were lizards and iguanas scurrying about. It felt more natural there than in Monteverde and Santa Elena because of that, and the trails were less marked and there were fewer people. We got out of the park at 12:30. 4 and a half hours of hiking, at least 5 miles in total. We laid on the beach for about an hour, swimming in the water and body surfing the waves. The water was so amazingly warm, no need to get used to it. Like a bath. We got back to our hostel, made some lunch and passed out till it was time to party. We went out with the people in our hostel, good group of people who had been here for a little over the month getting certified to teach English. It was a good relaxing time.

Sunday, we packed our things and jumped on a bus after convincing the driver to fit us in even though we didn´t have a ticket. The drive was just UNBELIEVABLY BEAUTIFUL!! Equally, if not more so, than the drive from Santa Elena back to San José. We drove along the Pacific Coast and was on a ledge that just gave way to the most beautiful views of crescent-moon beaches. Got back into town around 4ish and was back at home with the wonderful Cármen by 5. For dinner, half a bowl of chicken soup with a few scoops of rice. Don´t worry, I filled up on other stuff that night.

I am currently figuring out other travel plans right now and getting excited for my birthday tomorrow. There is a teacher here named Samuel who has the same birthday as I do, so he´s going to get the teachers together and I´m going to get the students together and we´re all going to party hardy in town. Should be a good time. I´ll try to keep the rest of the posts more frequent and shorter. On the list of things to do: Volcán Arenal, river rafting, beaches on the Caribbean, Panamá.

Monteverde, Santa Elena, and Heredia

Catch up time!

So in Montezuma, I met a guy named Adam at the waterfalls, and he said he was going to Sámara. When I asked him where he was going next, he said Monteverde and Santa Elena, and since he had rented a car, he offered me a ride with him. How could I refuse a free ride? He seemed like a nice enough guy - 32 year old Jewish doctor - what´s not to trust? What I didn´t realize was how forward and talkative he was. I had seen him talk to other travelers, and he just doesn´t know when to stop talking (in Montezuma, our group was eating brunch and he came over, and ended up talking to us the entire time we ate, not giving us any time to ourselves). Well the car ride was just as bad. He continuously told me stories of his travels which were interesting but not so much that I cared for 4 hours of them. I basically kept my eyes out the window the whole time, enjoying the beautiful scenery: the country is just one layer of green, I´m convinced. In the middle of the drive, Adam was cruising at a pretty high speed, when all of a sudden we saw a cop walk out of nowhere with a radar gun and wave his hands at us. It looked like he was just giving us the slow down sign, but I told him to pull over in case it was serious - better than getting chased by the cops. So we pulled over and I saw the cop motion us to back up, so we reversed up to him on the side of the road. He showed us his radar gun, which said that Adam was driving 108 km/hr (which is only a little over 60 mph; hard to believe this is above the speed limit on a highway). So the cop asked for Adam´s license and passport, which I found a bit odd, then said that it was going to cost him 20,000 colónes plus 30% of that (which I figured out in my head pretty quickly was 26,000 colónes). Adam though for some reason couldn´t understand this, and kept asking what? How much? Finally the cop told him the full sum. Then the cop said that he could either pay now and not receive a `multa´(or fine), or the cop could just write the ticket up and he would have to pay that. So Adam just agreed to pay now. But when he pulled out his money, he didn´t have change, all he had were fives and tens, so when he asked if the cop had change, the cop just said "25 is fine", took the money, and left. A minute later on the road, we realized that that the cop just wanted the money - Adam basically bribed a cop out of a ticket. We then figured that he probably could have saved money and bargained the bribe to a lower amount, because the cop would definitely rather have preferred money in his own pocket than writing a ticket and having money just go to the police department. Unfortunately, we didn´t think of this at the time. It was still an interesting experience. We both decided to stay at this hostel recommended by Lonely Planet as being "one of the best hostels in Costa Rica" called Pensión Santa Elena. It´s run by a brother and sister (Ran and Shannon) from Austin, Texas, and they are the friendliest people ever. They sat down with me and gave me advice on anything I wanted to do and which company was the cheapest to do it with. They were just so helpful and laid back that it made the entire hostel that much better, even though it wasn´t all that special. Another reason why this hostel is the best one I´ve ever stayed at: they have agua caliente (hot water). That night was the first hot shower I´ve had since I´ve been in Costa Rica, so you can only imagine the sensation I got when I expected cold water and out came steaming hot water. That night, I drank a bottle of wine on my own and made friends with a bunch of random travelers. We later went out to the only bar in this small town called Amigo´s, and I returned around 12:30 or 1 (don´t really remember).

The next day I woke up at 6 am to catch the 6:30 bus to the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserve. Now these two towns (Monteverde and Santa Elena) are high up in the mountains (only around 1600 meters, I believe), however, they are uniquely located on a range of mountains that divides the continent into the Caribbean (or east) side and the Pacific (or west) side. What happens is hot wind from the Caribbean mainly swings up to the mountains and brings with it lots of humidity and water vapor, thereby creating lots of clouds that are incredibly thick and dense. This inevitably leads to rain, however, on some lucky mornings, the clouds don´t roll in and you can have a very clear and visible sky (and forest). So I wanted to catch the earliest bus to these reserves to increase my chance of seeing more of the reserve and wildlife. Based on advice from Shannon, I decided to get a guided tour. Even though it was a bit expensive, Shannon told me it was the only way to see wildlife because there is just so much cloud forest, the animals know to stay away from the trails and the guides just are trained to see and hear animals that are really a good distance away. So my guide started off by telling us where we would be going and how he had gotten lost in this reserve twice, one time seeing a jaguar. Walking through the trails though was absolutely sensational. The trees were ginormous (gigantic + enormous) and just took up every little space in the forest, creating homes for the thousands of different species of wildlife. The reason for the trees being so big is because they all have to compete for sunlight, so only the tallest who can reach closer to the sun survive. Our guide told us some trees grow 4 meters a year!!! He pointed out a few millipedes, centipedes, and other various insects and plant life, until we got to one point in the trail. He said that yesterday he saw a snake in a tree being attacked by birds and he wanted to go check if the snake was still there (the reason he was being attacked is because the snakes are nocturnal, so in the day the birds try and attack the snake to get it out of the tree, while it doesn´t have much energy to fight back). So he climbed up this off-the-trail path. A minute later, he grabbed his telescope which he brought along and told us to follow him. Sure enough, through the scope, there wrapped around a tree was a green pitviper. I looked through the scope to see it, then looked out of it to see if I could see it with my own eye with no help, and I had absolutely no clue where it was. I asked the guide where it was and he pointed in the direction of where the scop was pointing, but that didn´t help at all. I was amazed at how good his eyesight was. We walked a bit farther on the trail and stopped again because our guide had spotted a sloth sleeping in a tree. He set up the scope and everybody else who looked couldn´t see it, because it was curled up as just a bundle of fur. When it was my turn to look, the furball started to move, so I got a great glimpse of his face and claws - that was totally incredible. It looked like something from Planet of the Apes - creepy but completely awesome. Continuing on the path, the guide heard the call of the quetzal, a very famous and beautiful bird that is well-known in Central America (it is Guatemala´s national bird and the currency is named after it as well). So our guide kept imitating the quetzal´s call and after hearing its response, we searched in the trees for it. Unfortunately, after 15 minutes of looking around (I was mainly standing there not doing anything because there was just no way I was going to be able to find this bird in all this wildlife), the bird stopped calling and we couldn´t find it. Out of nowhere though came a sort of screech, a bit like a horn honk but it had a bird-call-ring to it. The guide said that was the three-wattled bellbird, or as he so fittingly called it, the "Fu Man Chu" bird (due to its so-called whiskers that it had dangling from the sides of its mouth and on its beak). He said that he had seen one earlier and I was really eager to see just what the hell he was talking about. After hearing this bird call repeatedly, and knowing we were right underneath it, he was determined to find it. I thought there was no chance in hell it was going to happen. A minute later, I hear him say, "Found it." I thought no way so I ran over to his scope that he set up, and sure enough again, there lay the brown and white Fu Man Chu bird. I took some great pictures through the scope of this fascinating creature, which did in fact have three "wattles", one on either side of his mouth and one on the top half of the beak. Walking back was gorgeous; we were so high up I could see the clouds rolling in. On the return hike the guide spotted a glass-thin butterfly, so properly named for his transparent wings. It was pretty incredible. After that, and a small bite, I walked aboute 5 minutes down the hill to a canopy tour company called Selvatura and signed up for a canopy tour. This is basically a super long zip line that has different cables that you go across which take you throughout the cloud forest. Costa Rica is known for being the first country to create the zip line, if that means anything at all. The experience was great, but I had the unfortunate luck of signing up at the same time that a group of middle school students did, so the wait to go from cable to cable was particularly long on each different paltform and I was just surrounded by constant adolescent chat, which got very annoying. It was particularly funny though when one student cursed another and then all the students went AAAGHH, and asked their chaperone if they heard that. Aaah, the good ol´days. Nevertheless, the tour was awesome. Gliding through the forest over and through the trees was definitely a new experience. One cable was 550 meters long - a little over a quarter of a mile! There was also a Tarzan swing, where I was hooked up to some ropes and climbed up to a platform that was about as high as the waterfall jump and I was basically pushed off, but at the highest peak of the swing I could see the entire forest: an amazing sight! After it was all done and I got a ride back to the hostel, I decided to han out and play some cards with some other travelers, then made some spaghetti for dinner in the communal kitchen, and after another late night of partying, went to bed.

I woke up even earlier the next morning, at 5:45, to catch the 6:00 bus to the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. Unfortunately, I didn´t realize the bus didn´t pick up outside the hostel the way the bus to the Santa Elena Reserve did, so I had to wait to catch the 7:15 bus. I got there and decided to not get a guide. I walked through some trails that led to the Continental Divide, a lookout point where it´s possible to see the Caribbean Sea on one end and the Pacific on the other...on a clear day. Unfortunately, unlike the day before, today was a particularly cloudy morning, so my visibility was only about 30 meters. It was still pretty impressive to stand on this mountain range with a view of both sides of the continent. I was not as big a fan of this reserve though, mainly because the trails were so wide and well-marked and clean that I didn´t feel like I was in a real reserve. It was still gorgeous though; the amount of wildlife and green in general was just incredible. I ran across some caterpillars and millipedes and butterflies, but nothing impressive. After I made my way back to the entrance, I had talked to some people earlier who had been to Montezuma and said they saw some quetzals, so at this ponit, I was just dying to see the bird, especially after not having found it the day before. So I kept asking random guides where I could find one and they gave me the same mundane answer: "Well they´re really rare so it just depends." Finally, one guide I asked pointed me in the direction of the entrance where the buses were and said there´s a couple of them over there that people were going to check out. So I ran over there, and asked a guide where it was and he pointed to me that it was in a hole of a tree and its long tail (which it is known for) was hanging out. I couldn´t see it for the life of me, so he eventually got so fed up with pointing that he just shoved me in front of his friend´s scope and there it was. The gorgeous blue, red, and green bird then flew across the way, and landed on a tree right in front of us, with no other natural life blocking the view. I got some unbelievable pictures after putting my camera up to the eyepiece of the scope. After that, I felt like I had seen everything I could see between these two cloud forests reserves. I then went back into town and went back to Selvatura to go to the Jewel of the Rainforest Exhibit, a display of the third-largest insect collection in the world. A man named Richard Whitten began his collection at the tender age of 5, and has continued his interest in entymology ever since, gathering species from all over the world. I had my own private tour and so asked the guide to do it all in Spanish for practice, and to my surprise, I understood nearly everything (except for a few words in Spanish that referred to specific insects). What was really cool was when I made my way over to the exhibit, on the second floor of the building was an old man with a thick white beard - Richard Whitten himself. We exchanged hellos and told me to enjoy myself. I thought that was pretty special that the collector himself lived above his own exhibit. Walking in, I was overwhelmed by the glorious display of the many colors and species of his insects. The collectin contains over a million different species, from elephant beetles (the largest in the world) to the moth with the death face (the one from the movie Silence of the Lambs) to the beetle in the movie The Mummy (the one that crawls in their skin). It was just incredible. Here´s a tip: take a museum tour in another language. This is the best way to practice a language. However, later that night I found just as good, if not a better, way to learn a language. Get involved in a fight! I went to the bar for my last night with some friends and random locals I met at the hostel. One guy named Sandro and another named Jordan were talking to me, and for about an hour, all they told me was that the Caribbean had real Ticos while the Pacific had foreigners and was too fake and touristy. But no matter how many times I agreed with what they said or even repeated it back to them, they would just say it again. It was pretty hilarious. They were clearly good friends, hugging and high-fiving each other. Then all of a sudden, they started shoving each other and things got really messy. It took everyone at the table (5 or 6 guys) to keep them apart. I found it absolutely ridiculous, and when they were split up and people were talking to each of them in Spanish, I just sat right next to them listening to every word they were saying. I ran from end to end of the bar just listening and chiming in when I didn´t understand what they said. It was a great way to practice Spanish. So like I said, want to learn a language? Get involved in a fight!

The next day, I took the 6:30 bus to San José. But after going to bed at 2 am, I didn´t wake up until 6:15. So to say the least, I was a bit rushed. This drive though was one of the most beautiful drives I´ve ever taken. We were descending from the mountain and it was a clear morning, so the landscapes were just unbelievably green with white clouds perched in the blue sky. The 4 and a half hour drive when by fast, after which I took a public bus to Heredia and met my new host family. My host mother, Cármen, is very friendly and talkative, which is great for me. And another student in the school, Elena, is staying with her so we converse a bit also. Now is dinner time and I´m starving. This weekend´s trip I think I´ll go to Manuel Antonio. But I definitely plan on returning to Santa Elena to reunite with Sandro and Jordan and the fellas at Pensión Santa Elena.