3 in 1 Day Adventure

Arenal Volcano

Quinn woke up with diarrhea and a splitting headache.  She would not be joining us today. So we brought her some dry toast after our breakfast, kissed her on the forehead, and bid her goodbye.  Coasta Rica doesn't wait for viral infections.

A van picked us up at our hotel with our driver (can't remember his name - he spoke no English) and our tour guide for the day: Jorge.

First stop, the hanging bridges. Jorge was not messing around. He had binoculars hanging from a chest strap, a flashlight, a bag loaded with other survival gear, and full tripod hoisting a telescope. 

The hike is a circle, with very little elevation, that has 15 bridges (7 of them suspension) spanning huge gorges. A couple of the bridges were over 90 meters long and 45 meters above the river valley floor. This hike is within, and above , the rainforest canopy. 

Jorge was insane. We got a full education about ecology and biology and the incredible biodiversity of the rainforests. He pointed out tree types, plants and flowers, including dozens of orchids. He would listen at the sounds of the frogs and the birds coming from far away, cock his head, look up into the forest or sky, and then point to something way far away on a branch. We saw lizards and blue jean poisonous dart frogs.  Three venomous snakes - two of which were camped in trees.  He spotted an owl.  Howler Monkeys. Spider Monkeys.  Toucans. Dozens of bird species. Wild boars.  Wild Turkeys. Several spiders, including a couple of tarantulas. And, of course, the Leaf Cutter ants. 

This tree has been worn down by ant pheromones

Just a little bit about the type of education we got today from Jorge.  The Queen Leaf Cutter ant lays over 3000 eggs per day.  They live in a nest that can be the size of a football field.  Once a year, female ants mate and fly away to start a new colony and become a queen herself. The Queen can live for 25 years or more.  The worker ants are looking for "clean" foliage to bring back to the nest.  They are blind and travel by following the pheromones of other ants.  The cleanest foliage is high in the trees.  Long trains of ants follow well worn pathways thru the grass and forest floor to tall trees where they climb over 100 meters to cut and return fresh leaf pieces.  Among the cutter ants are cleaner ants who crawl all over the cut leaf while a cutter is carrying it to the nest. The cleaners move from leaf to leaf, all while his compadres are carrying them, in order to make sure that no contaminants enter the nest. The ants don't eat the leaf pieces; they are "food' for the fungus that the ants eat.  Leaves that are contaminated can kill the fungus - that is a bad thing.  But if, for whatever reason, a nest comes under attack thru preditor or desease, the colony has a built in disaster recovery plan in place: a pod of eggs and food stored in a safe place that will emerge at a later date to recolonize. 

We had a full day of that.  It was awesome.

After the Hanging Bridges we had a quick snack of fresh-cut watermelon and pineapple before driving to the Waterfall.  

We had to walk way down, via a long staircase, to get to the river valley floor to reach the pools at the base of this immense waterfall.  Not sure if the name or how high, but it was comparable to ones I have seen in Hawaii.  Beautiful.  People were swimming in the main pool where the waterfall was crashing, but only at the edge.  There was a lifeguard on duty warning people of the strong current and dangerous falling water.  Below that pool, people were swimming and sunning in the successive pools.  The water was cold but refreshing.

We swam for about an hour before climbing the stairs back to the van.

From there we went to lunch at a local restaurant for some authentic Costa Rican food.  Casado.  It was delicious. I had mine with pork while the girls ate pollo. We ate with our tour partners for the day: a family of four from D.C. and a single dude from Manhattan.  Aubrey and Shelby were having a good time getting to know the two other girls while I chatted with the adults. 4 adults and 4 kids. All in good shape and up for any adventure. It was a fortunate pairing for us on a beautiful weather day. 

Jorge using Daves Samsung to video an image of a toucan thru his telescope.

From there we went to the volcano. There is a little park called Silencio where you can drive up to the base of the volcano and walk on the lava rocks that rolled down the mountain in 1968, when the Arenal volcano first became active again.  It was a short hike up and back.  Nothing special. But we opted to hike down beyond our van.  He just drove and met us at a lower parking lot.  This 45 minute hike wowed us with monkeys and toucans. Jorge continued to impart his wisdom while calling monkeys and birds. He even had an app on his phone that could call birds - which is how we attracted then toucans.  

We are now back. Quinn is still not well. Poor thing. She missed a fun day.  I hope she gets better soon.