Geoff, Author at Gainfully Unemployed

May 11, 2018

Nuevo Arenal: Live the Life of a Retired Expat

Do you dream of retiring and moving somewhere warm and tropical, where people live a slower, more deliberate life? Well, come to Nuevo Arenal, and you can see what that looks like every time you walk by a bar or café. Now, you’ll find expats littered all over Costa Rica, but what make them stand out in Arenal (I’m going to save myself the trouble of writing Nuevo every time and just call it Arenal – like everyone else in the area) is that there’s not much else there. So what you have is a town that, if left to its own devices, would be a place for local farmers to buy groceries and supplies and for travelers to get a tank of gas and a bite to eat. But the weather is pleasant and the views of the lake and volcano (both also named Arenal) are decent, but not good enough to attract significant tourism – so a bunch of old gringos moved in and brought with them enough restaurants and shops to keep them happy.

A view of the hills at sunset behind some typical houses in Arenal
Taken by Elani

So, why did me and Elani end up there for 12 days? Because there’s kiteboarding in the area. Bet you didn’t see that coming. Also, it looked a like a nice place to chill and relax with enough restaurants and good enough Internet to keep us happy and Elani working. It was a good place to settle in for a few days and change gears from being in tourist mode in Monteverde to living at a more sustainable pace while traveling.

Getting there was pretty straight forward. We took a public bus to Tilaran (what, you’ve never heard of Tilaran?), the closest city to Arenal, and our AirBnB host offered to pick us up there, partly as an excuse to runs some errands. He was, as you probably could have guessed, a mostly retired ex-pat who owned an apartment building that was built by another old ex-pat, and rented mainly to other old ex-pats. It was a nice little apartment, nothing fancy, but with everything we needed to be comfortable for a couple of weeks.

The town itself was cute, with two main roads formed an “L” and had most of the shops bars and restaurants. At the end of one of the roads was a nice looking little church that overlooked the soccer fields – you know, exactly want you might expect from a pleasant Costa Rican town.

Arenal’s church and soccer fields.
Taken by Elani

It was pretty common to see views of Arenal Volcano from spots in the town – it didn’t have the commanding presence that it did in our next stop, La Fortuna but it was quite picturesque.

Arenal Volcano seen over over Neuvo Arenal.
Taken by Elani

In town, there honestly wasn’t a lot to do other then taking a walk, eating, and drinking. But those were pretty worthwhile activities, since the scenery was pleasant and sightings of keel billed toucans (for the uninitiated, those are the ones that look like Toucan Sam), vultures, and other birds were fairly common, and Arenal definitely punches above its weight with respect to the food scene. There were several good options for pizza (which is pretty much the second option you’ll find in Costa Rican after Costa Rican food), local, and American-ish. We had some admirable burgers and pasta at a place right next to the lake.

Lake view restaurant in Arenal
Taken by Elani

But the real standout restaurant was the “Gingerbread.” The chief was an American-trained Israeli chief with a gregarious attitude and a rather foul mouth. We ordered a 5 course chief’s menu and were by no means disappointed or underfed. The first two courses were a roast duck quesadilla and a wild mushroom cream with fresh bread. They were followed by a Greek salad, fish, and fillet minion. Which were then followed by a multi element desert with ice cream, cake, passion fruit seeds, and some things I’m sure I’m forgetting. Everything was great, but I think the first two courses were the winners.

Roast duck quesadilla and creamed wild mushrooms at The Gingerbread restaurant
Taken by Elani

I’m writing this a bit after the fact, so now that it’s been a couple months, I’d say the most memorable part was – not surprisingly – the kiting. On Lake Arenal, there’s really just the one launch. It’s run by a nice Brit who’s been running it for the last 19 years that it’s been a vacation spot of sailboarders and, more recently, kiters. It was probably still a bit more of a sailboarder spot then a kiter spot, but there wasn’t any of the silly rivalry that sometimes pops up between the two groups. Everyone was very friendly, so there was always someone to shoot the shit with on breaks between sessions or when waiting for the wind to pick up. Since I didn’t have a rental car, the trip out there was a bit of a slog on the public buses with all my gear. On top of that, there wasn’t really a stop where I needed to get off (which is fairly typical for Costa Rican buses) so on the return trip, I had to wait until the bus went by (which could vary quite a bit) and flag the driver down. Oh well – after a couple times, it was pretty much routine.

The conditions on Arenal aren’t perfect, and I can see why it hasn’t become one of the kiting meccas of the world. The launch was tricky, the wind is fairly gusty and variable, and the water is fairly choppy, but not choppy enough for wave riding. On the other hand, the wind was certainly a fair sight tamer than at Playa Copal (a welcome change, I must say) and there was pretty much always enough of it. Also, the temperatures were warm enough to never even consider a wetsuit, the scenery had excellent views of Mount Arenal in the background, and as I mentioned, there was a nice contingent of friendly sail- and kiteboarders around. One particularly friendly sailboarder – Ted – was taking pictures between outings and was nice enough to send some of me along and let me use them here. This one does a great job of making me look awesome and showing off the views of the mountain:

Kiting on Lake Arenal
Taken by Ted the sailboarder

April 7, 2018

First Day in Tarifa

Well, I’m getting a little tired of being out of sync between real time and what I’m writing about in the blog. To remedy that, I’m going to start writing little pieces as they come to mind (like this one), while still doing longer, more in-depth posts in order. As far as writing goes, some things are just easier to write while fresh, and others work better with a bit of reflection. Breaking the chronological order will help me achieve that. That means that I’ll still be writing about Costa Rica for a while, but right now I’m in Tarifa, Spain, and I’m going to write a little post about what’s happening now. Also, I’m going to be in Tarifa for 5 weeks, so hopefully I’ll get all caught up.

Elani and I have been here all of about a day, just enough time to get settled in the apartment we’re renting in the old town, go buy groceries, walk around the old town, and go out for coffee. The old town basically looks like a mash-up of a kitschy beach town and the Cairo set from “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” but populated with Spaniards. The building style is heavily influenced by the close proximity to Morocco – less than 20 km across the strait of Gibraltar – with densely packed two story buildings covered in white plaster inside and out and topped with red clay roofing tiles. The buildings are broken up by a maze of narrow cobblestone streets and narrower walkways lined with an interesting assortment of shops, cafes, restaurants and bars. The old town is surrounded by an old stone city wall that terminates at a castle next to a rocky coastline.

A narrow plant lined back alley in Tarifa
Taken by Elani

View of a breakwater from coast in Tarifa with Morocco in the background
Taken by Elani

Walking along the coast, you stroll past a modern port filled with a variety of boats ranging from small fishing vessels to the high speed ferries that jet off between Tarifa and Tangiers, Morocco – the rugged coastline of which is visible in the distance. After that, you arrive at the beach, which is flat and open, with white sand and brilliant blue water. The beach stretches miles up the coast and well outside the city, and both times I’ve been down there, it was lined with kiters as far as the eye could see. But lest you think this is some sort of tropical paradise, the temperatures this time of year are in the lower 60s (Fahrenheit) and there’s a constant strong breeze, so while I’m sure that throngs of sunbathers and swimmers fill the beach in warmer months, the beaches are fairly empty save for a few folks strolling along or taking pictures in windbreakers at this time of year.

So far, it looks like an amazing little town and I’m excited to get out and kite and do some more exploring! But now it’s time to sit down and start in on my taxes – which I’ve been procrastinating on because doing taxes is always terrible, and when faced with the option to “explore a foreign locale or do your taxes,” it’s been pretty hard to convince myself to chose the latter.

March 31, 2018April 21, 2018

An Update on My Plans

Temples in Bali, Indonesia 2015
Taken by Geoff

As I’m writing this, I’m in Samara, Costa Rica. There’s still a lot to write about my Costa Rican travels, but that doesn’t mean that travel plans aren’t being made in the meantime. As has been the plan for awhile now, the next stop for Elani and me is Tarifa, Spain (after a brief stop in Malaga, where our flight lands). After five weeks there, it’s off to Lisbon, Portugal for three weeks. During that time, I’m off to a seminar on classical Portuguese fencing with the folks from the classical fencing school I attended in Seattle and their affiliate schools, which I’m very excited about. Our last two weeks will be spent in Germany (exact location to be determined). That brings us to the end of June and of our visa in the EU, so where to after that?

Bali, Indonesia. It was where Elani and I spent our honeymoon, and it’s high on our list of places to spend more time. Also, we found a pretty good deal on flights from Berlin to Bali, and to seal the deal, that puts us there right at the peak of kiteboarding season.

It appears that it’s pretty easy for visitors to get a 60 day visa in Indonesia, so our plan is to stay there until that runs out. Bali is a small island and it’s getting to be time to hop around a bit less, so we’re going to use Sanur (a small beach suburb of the major city of Denpasar) as our home base.

That moves the big question mark out to the end of August, and at that time we’ll be setting out from a spot that’s nicely situated just south of mainland Asia and north of Australia, so there are a lot of possibilities for what’s next!

March 30, 2018

Monteverde: Time at Home

I thought I’d end my series of Monteverde posts by writing a little bit about where Elani and I stayed for the last five days there. It was a little place we found on AirBnB called Cabinas la Montana. A wonderful local family had built three little cabins on their property, and it was somewhere on the spectrum between a bed and breakfast and a homestay. Usually, I’m not too invested in where I’m staying while traveling. It’s a place to sleep, maybe do a little writing or reading, and sometimes cook. Nowadays, it needs Internet and a workspace for Elani. As long as it has the stuff we need, I don’t think much more about it. But this place ended up being one of my favorite parts of the trip.

The cabins were a bit out of town, about a half an hour walk or a $3 cab ride, and at the end of a full day, we pretty much always took the cab ride. It was set off from the road in a nice chunk of forest, with several paths to explore on the rare days when we had free time during daylight. It wasn’t quite the stunning lush greenery of the nature reserves, but it was fun to explore nonetheless. There was a pretty amazing ficus tree:

Me in front of a epic ficus tree
Taken by Elani

And hosts of leaf cutter ants making lines all through the forest as they carried leaves back to their hives:

Leaf cutter ants hard at work
Taken by Elani

The most impressive animal sightings we had were the birds. They had figured out that after breakfast, there would pretty much always be fresh fruit scraps added to the compost pile. That meant that we got great views of the little emerald toucans almost every day, and some motmots made an appearance one day as well:

An emerald toucan preparing to raid the compost pile
Take by Elani

A motmot waiting for scraps
Taken by Elani

But the things that really made our stay a memorable experience was the time spent with the other guests and our host family. The day started out at with breakfast, which was a great home cooked spread of coffee, fresh fruit, sausage, plantains, eggs, pancakes, and gallo pinto. Gallo pinto is a mix of beans and rice, and it’s in pretty much every Costa Rican breakfast. It’s usually just the sum of its parts, but Terri’s (the mother of the host family) gallo pinto was above and beyond, and I was excited to eat it every morning. This was also a great time to talk to the other guests, a Germany couple traveling with their 4-year-old and a nice middle-aged American couple. All of them were great folks, and it was fun to compare our adventures around the Monteverde area. Our host family was amazing. They did an excellent job of making staying there more like a homestay then a hotel, while still giving us a private cabin to retreat to at the end of the day (that’s a very nice feature if you’re an introvert like me). As I mentioned, Terri was the mother of the family. While everyone pitched in and were very helpful and friendly, Terri took on most of the running of the bed and breakfast, so she was the one me an Elani got to know best. She was also one of the most mom-ish moms I’ve ever met. Her daughter described her mothering as “extra”, which was said with a fair amount of teenage exasperation, but was apt none the less. She cooked a hearty breakfast every morning, put up with Elani’s limited and my even more limited Spanish, helped us navigate Costa Rican transportation, did a load of laundry and refused money for it, tried (unsuccessfully) to pay us for moving some computer files around for her, took a morning to teach us the secrets of cooking her amazing gello pinto, and was just generally kind and caring towards us. When we left, Elani said she almost teared up. I of course didn’t, why would you even think that (sniff).

Watching the sunset at a spot a short walk from our cabin
Taken by Elani

March 24, 2018April 2, 2018

Monteverde: the Deconstructed Mocha Tour

It’s actually a coffee, chocolate and sugar tour, get it? Well, I laughed, at any rate. That aside, with all the wandering around nature reserves and zip-lining, it was nice to take a chill afternoon and work on getting a pleasant sugar/caffeine buzz.

The tour was mostly what you might expect. You wander around a plantation with a guide who explains the process of making coffee, chocolate, and sugar. The view from the coffee fields was pretty impressive, I must say:

View from coffee fields with the Nicoya Peninsula in the background.
Taken by Elani

Then the guide shows you the machines that are used and explains the processes. I’m not going to go into that, since if you actually want to know, I’m sure Wikipedia can do a better job than I can. Of course, they’re generous with the samples throughout the tour. It was the first time since our trip to Bali that me and Elani got eat raw cacao, a favorite of both of ours. The bean themselves are quite bitter and not great to eat at this stage, but they are surrounded by a sweet pulp that tastes more like lychee then chocolate. It’s very good, and a rare treat (for us at any rate).

Cacao pods on on the bush
Taken by Elani

Cacao pods and beans set out to ferment
Taken by Elani

My favorite section was probably the sugar. We got to taste raw sugar cane, which was very tasty, sweet with a taste sort of like how fresh cut grass smells. They gave out samples of the Costa Rican version of moonshine – made from sugar cane juice. It was…um…bracing. They showed us the pressing machine, both the new high-tech water wheel type, and the old school oxen powered one. Then they had us try mixings the boiled-down syrup into sugar. To do that, you stir the hot syrup with a wooden paddle until it cools and crystallizes. The warm sugar was my favorite sample, it basically tasted like molasses, but fresher and sweater. Awesome!

Me turning syrup into sugar
Taken by Elani

Finally they gave us a cup of coffee and for some reason a taco filled with a root vegetable called aracha – which was very good, Elani’s favorite actually. Then they drop you off in the gift shop where they have more coffee samples. At the end of the tour we were thoroughly satisfied, if a little over caffeinated.

March 23, 2018March 23, 2018

Monteverde: Zip-Lining

Well, of course we went zip-lining in Costa Rica. How could you not? That’s sort of like going to Venice and not taking a gondola ride. There are zip-line tours all over Costa Rica, but Monteverde is definitely one of the premo spots for it. There are several companies that run zip-lines there. We went on two of them: 100% Adventura (which translates into English as “100% Adventure,” in case you were wondering) and Selvatura.

Both tours began in pretty much the same way. The shuttle bus picks you up from your hotel along with a bunch of other folks and drives you out of town to the zip-line park. Then you’re fitted with a harness, helmet, and gloves and given a brief safety lesson. Then you queue up and wait to get on the first line. People tend to spread out after the first one, so wait times drop off after that.

The first of the tours we did was 100% Aventura. It was highly rated in fun and safety and supposed to be one of the more thrilling ones. We started by climbing a flight of stairs up to a little platform in the tree canopy. The first one was pretty much for practice, only a couple hundred feet long. The operator stationed on the tree top platform hooks your pulley on the cable and attached you to that with a carabineer, and off you go. The gloves have a thick leather pad glued over the fingers and palm that you let slide over the cable to keep yourself from spinning. On the shorter cables, you were in charge of your own breaking (done by pulling down on the cable), I pretty much figured if I wasn’t being told to slow down when I was approaching the next platform, I wasn’t going fast enough.

When I was in my teens, me and a buddy set up a zip line between two trees at my parents’ house. In that version, of course there was no harness, you just held onto the rope, and there was a little plywood seat you could sit on, and there was no fancy platform to set off from, you just climbed to the top of a ladder and set off from there. It was thrilling for a few brief seconds, and then you were at the end (if you were lucky and jumped off the ladder a little, you could hit the hard stop). The first couple cables were an improvement over the home built variety in every way, higher up, better scenery, faster speeds (you wanted to break before the end instead of seeing how fast you could get going). But they were basically that same experience taken to the next level. After a few runs, they changed things up and let you do a rappel down from the canopy. They asked you how fast you wanted to go. I said fast because why not. A quick drop before the guy handling the line starts putting on the breaks, a bit of an adrenaline rush, then you’re back on the ground again, and a short walk and stair climb later, it’s back on the cables.

Elani on one of the mid length cables at 100% Adventura
Taken by Geoff

The cables started getting longer and longer, and with that, they gave you the chance to relax and look around. As the zip-lines got longer, they stopped having you slow yourself down and used a breaking system instead. It was actually quite nice, since it gave you look around and enjoy the scenery without having to pay attention to speed. Now this was more like it, whooshing through the treetops, enjoying the view, bit of a rush. Ahh, yeah. Then came the big lines. On these, you had the option to “superman.” That meant that they they turned the harness around so you were hanging from your back, laying flat, looking down. There are two lines that you ride like this, and they are LONG. As 100% Aventura proudly points out, they’re the longest in Latin America. The longest of the two runs comes in at just about a mile. Now this was something completely different from the zip-line I made in my youth.

To start out, you lay flat and take the slack out of the lines to the pulley, then the operator lets you go and you start to pick up speed as the ground drops away from you. At least for me, this is where primal fear of falling to my death kicks in, but there’s plenty of time to relax and let that go. Then you can look around and enjoy the feeling of cruising along in midair a couple hundred feet above the ground. It is somewhat like flying, if you could only fly in a straight line and had no control over your speed. So I guess it’s like flying badly. You get going quite fast – judging by the wind speed, probably around 25 mph. Fast enough that the mile long trip doesn’t take that long. The day we went, there were pretty heavy cross winds so you swayed back a forth a little on the trip. Then you approach the platform and hit the line break and come to a fairly dramatic stop. It slows you down from cruising speed to a complete stop over about 20-30ft – if you were stopping that fast in a car, you’d leave some rubber on the pavement. Here’s a line to a quick video of Elani at the end of her run:

After two long thrill rides soaring over the tree tops, the tour was almost over. Just one more ride, which they called “the maga tarzan swing” and presumably added to the park because they don’t like repeat business. It was optional, but of course I did it. On reflection, I’m not sure I made the best choice. It’s probably worth noting at this point that I’m a bit afraid of heights. It’s not so bad with I’m attached to something semi-solid that prevents me from hurtling toward the ground in free fall. My fear of heights at this point in my life is at a level that the zip lines were more thrilling and fun then terrifying, but the maga tarzan swing was not. I walked out on to a bridge built on four steel cables stretched across the valley I’d just zip=lined over. Well, part of a bridge, it went a couple hundred feet out and terminated in a platform with a gate. Elani went first, and I was walking out as they rigged her up and let her jump. She screamed, then the whole bridge swung violently as she hit the end of the lines. It was not confidence inspiring. The two operators reeled in two large, heavy bungee lines and attached them to my harness. They pulled me up against the little gate that was the last thing that kept me from falling. Then, before I was ready (though in all fairness, I might not have gotten to “ready”), they opened the gate and shoved me out. Then there was a long moment of free fall, too long. I know my brain was doing the math and about how long with would take to hit the ground and how long I had been falling and those numbers seemed too close. There was no reassuring jerk of a line going taut ether, they were bungees. So, they didn’t provided a lot of feedback until the direction of travel changed and I started to swing. Swinging out over the trees would have probably been pretty fun, but I was a bit shell shocked at that point, and was pretty much just riding it out until I was on solid ground again. Okay, that might have been too much adventura, I guess I needed more like 95% adventura. But, when I wasn’t being forcefully reminded of my own mortality, the zip-lining tour was amazing.

A few days later, we decided to do another one of the zip-line tours. We chose one of the other companies in the area, Selvatura. The rides were a bit less “extreme”, but they traded more on views of the forest, and they did not disappoint in that regard. Selvatura’s park was located just outside the Santa Elena nature reserve (if you want to read about my experience there, check this out), so it was located in beautiful, dense cloud forest. Appropriately enough, the forest was covered in a thick fog the day we went.

Me on a cable at Selvatura park
Taken by Elani

The zip-lining itself was a pretty similar experience. The combined cable length of this park was at least the longest in the area, though the two longest rides were a bit shorter than the last one. There were mid-length runs, which was nice, because as I mentioned the scenery here was great. The second longest run was done in tandem, with two people on the same cable. Of course, I went with Elani. They rig you both on the same cable, with one person in front of the othe. The front person (Elani) holds the other person’s ankles under their armpits. The view as the back person wasn’t great, which is especially inconvenient as the person in the back does the breaking, but not until the operator signals. Which of course you can’t see, because there’s someone directly in front of you. There’s also a cable break, so it’s not that important, and there’s good odds the whole thing was set up to amuse the folks running it. The longest run was done “superman” style again. The fog was thick enough that I couldn’t see the other end of the cable. It gave a somewhat eerie effect. Out in the middle of the cable looking down I could just make out the tops of the largest trees through the mist. It reminded me of looking down into deep water and just being able to make out the largest rocks on the bottom.

This tour ended with a swing as well, though it was a “tarzan swing” not a “maga tarzan swing,” which I guess meant that it didn’t have the whole free fall/bungee element. This one, I liked. I was just a very large rope swing, and as you hopped off the platform there was only a brief moment of falling while the slack in the rope was taken out and you started to swing out. I got a video of Elani doing this one:

I can definitely see why zip-lining is getting to be such a popular tourist activity. So much of the time tourist activities have a sharp split between hiking and looking at beautiful, unique natural attractions and exciting “adventure” activities that you could pretty much do anywhere, including your home town, and not have to spend all the time and money to get to. Zip-lining is fun and fast and a thrill but still allows you to take in all the beautiful natural scenery around you. Really, if I could do away with all this pesky walking and just zip-line everywhere, I’d be set.

March 15, 2018

Monteverde: Nature Reserves

Elani and I went to the two main forest preserves in the area – La Reserva Bosque Nuboso Santa Elena and La Reserva Biológica Bosque Nuboso Monteverde. I’m just going to refer to them as the Santa Elena and Monteverde reserves to make life easier. We nicely bookended our trip by going to the Santa Elena reserve on the day after we arrived and the Monteverde reserve the day before we left. Both the reserves are in cloud forest – so named because they’re on the top of mountains and in the clouds a lot of the time.

To get to the Santa Elena reserve, we had our hotel reserve us a spot on one of the little shuttle vans that go scurrying around a few times a day, picking up folks at their hotels and driving them 20 minutes on rough dirt road through the jungle. They charge a whopping $2 for this service. So getting there was cheap and easy.

We paid our entrance fee (the standard $15 that Costa Rica seems to charge for popular parks), then grabbed a map from the front desk and set out to explore. The jungle here is lush. I’m going to say it again for emphasis, L-U-S-H. The plant life is dense and plentiful, emerald green leave of every shape and size pretty much fill your vision in any direction you choose to look, broken up occasionally by a few bright tropical flowers here and there. And the plants didn’t just restrict themselves to growing out of the ground, oh no, they grew out of other plants. The trees were covered with a multitude of other plants. Thick layers of moss on hung off of their upper branches, broken up here and there by bromeliads and the occasional orchid. A wide variety of creeping plants scaled up their trunks from the ground and vines hung down from their canopies. It was pretty intense. Time for some pictures to illustrate my point:

The dense jungle of the Santa Elena Reserve
Taken by Elani

Trees provide a platform for other plant to grow on
Taken by Elani

Berries I think – probably best not to eat them
Taken by Elani

The fauna in Santa Elena was a bit more elusive. It was a pretty wet day when we visited, so some of the creatures may have been hunkering down to stay dry. We saw a couple of insects and several large millipedes. Birds were scares, but made the best showing. The most impressive (and certainly the easiest to photograph) was the black guan, a chicken-sized ground bird that seemed pretty much indifferent to our presence.

A brightly colored beetle
Taken by Elani

The final stop was the lookout tower. Not only was it fairly rusted out, it was fairly poorly constructed in the first place. It hurt me a little as an engineer. Is it really so hard to make a decent welded structure? I’ve had that thought several times in Costa Rica, but this was definitely the worst example. Oh well, we climbed anyways and were rewarded by quite a good view of the trees from canopy level and the surrounding hills.

Great view, terrible tower
Taken by Elani

The trip to the Monteverde reserve was a bit less convenient, but equally cheap. There is one large bus that runs from the center of town to the reserve, but the real issue is that there is a bus at 7:30am, then no more until 1:20pm. Which is to say there isn’t a bus at the time when a sane human being would want to go there. But whatever, we had to wake up early to see breathtaking natural beauty, boo hoo. Much like Santa Elena, Monteverde is a lush dense, jungle. The crowds were a little larger, and we had to pick our way past a few clusters of people on guided tours, but once those cleared out, it wasn’t so bad. There were a few more attractions in this park, including a waterfall, a lookout platform (with great views of the surrounding hills), and a hanging bridge (which was an excellent way of getting a view at canopy level).

Tropical flower – Monteverde Reserve
Taken by Elani

Tree fern flower/fruit? I don’t know tree ferns are weird
Taken by Elani

View from the lookout platform
Taken by Elani

Another view from the lookout
Taken by Elani

Waterfall at Monteverde Reserve
Taken by Elani

Elani on the canopy bridge
Taken by Geoff

Trees as seen from the bridge
Taken by Elani

The animal life was a little more active in Monteverde, I think in large part because the day we went had considerably more sunny stretches then our day in Santa Elena. Several varieties of colorful song birds were out, insects were more plentiful, and some mammals made an appearance. We saw a couple of aguti (a large rodent that looks something like a cross between a rabbit and a guinea pig) and a coati. Though that was after we popped out for lunch at the nearby hummingbirdcafé. So I was kind of “coati-ed out” at that point. If you want to know how our lunch went, read this post.

One of the most colorful damn bugs I’ve ever seen – and I’ve seen a lot of bugs
Taken by Elani

Even though the jungles may not have been quite as teeming with wild animals as I would have liked, being able to wander through dense, vine-covered jungles and catching views through the mists of the vast rolling hills of full of trees fading off into the distance was a truly amazing way to spend the day. If you ever find yourself in that part of the world, I recommend making the trip to one – or preferably both – of these wonderful nature reserves.

Me at the Santa Elena Reserve
Taken by Elani

March 9, 2018

The Coati: mysterious jungle animal or the dick who’s trying to steal your bread pudding?

Perhaps the title gave it away, but I’d say they’re closer to the latter. In my experience, most animals have a certain mystique about them, whether deserved or not, until you get to learn about them first hand. Until actually being in Central America, a coati was something I’d only seen in zoos or on nature documentaries. My first sighting was a brief glimpse from a shuttle bus as it pulled away from the Santa Elena Reserve parking lot. I remember thinking how cool it was to see one and hoping that I would run across another one while I was in Monteverde. Well, turns out wishes do come true. Elani and I had taken a break from hiking in the Monteverde Nature Reserve to grab coffee and snacks (the bread pudding mentioned in the title), and as the server was making our cappuccinos, a coati casually strolled pasted the front door. Well, casually trundled, coatis definitely trundle as their main mode of locomotion, but I digress. Anyways, I exclaimed, “Coati!” and me and Elani dashed out the front door, camera in hand like this might be the last chance to ever see one. I’m sure the server thought we were a little nuts. But hey, we did get some decent pictures:

Yep that’s a coati alright
Taken by Elani

Who does this coati think he is anyway
Taken by Elani

After the Coati wandered off, well, trundled off, we went back, paid for our coffee, and took a seat outside to watch the hummingbirds at the feeders outside the café:

Three hummingbirds and one impostor at a feeder
Taken by Elani

It didn’t take long before I heard rustling in the tree behind me and turned to see a coati climbing down the branch that overhung the bench. We got up and moved out of his way. Seemingly unfazed that his master plan had been thwarted, he then proceeded to climb down and attempt to trundle into the gift shop next to the café. In response, the guy at that counter good naturedly shooed him off, and when he was persistent, came out with a bucket of water and splashed the little guy with some to get his point across. He gave us a smile and shrugged: I got the impression that this was not even close to the first time he had had to do that. So we sat down at another bench to watch some more hummingbirds and it wasn’t much longer another coati came up to Elani, looking very interested in her coffee. After she pointed a finger and sternly told the coati, “no!” several times, it finally got the idea and wandered off with a slightly disappointed look in search of a less well-guarded snack, stopping on the way to lick the spilled sugar water off the railing below the hummingbird feeders.

Coati scoring some sweet sweet hummingbird food
Taken by Elani

Well, there you have it. After an hour-long coffee break, the coati had moved in my mind from being an exotic animal from a faraway locale to being basically a more mild-mannered and slightly dopier version of their cousins from back home – the raccoon. We ran across another coati when we got back on our hike in the cloud forest. Though, since we didn’t have any food, this one seemed to have very little opinion as to our presence one way or the other.

Oh, speaking of raccoon relatives, another one made an appearance at the hummingbird café, the more dainty and agile olingo (kinkajou). It was a bit more wary of us human than the coatis. It seemed to mainly be interested in raiding the smaller feeder for sugar water, which it managed to do with style and grace.

All in all, the hummingbird café was actually one of the high points of our stay in Monteverde (even though the coffee and bread pudding I would say earned a solid “okay” rating) and had a greater density of animal sighting then either of the two cloud forest reserves.

March 7, 2018

Monteverde: Night Walk

So as not to let any time go to waste, we signed up for a night walk on our first night in Monteverde/Santa Elena. Night walks are guided wildlife tours through the jungle that happen – as you may have guessed – after dark. The shuttle picked us up from our hotel and dropped us off at an office on the edge of the forest right after sunset. We paid and then waited around with a group of about a dozen other tourists to start. The guide gave us the spiel (don’t wander off, no flash photos, blah blah blah…). Then he handed us each a flash light and we set off.

This was, I should say, not in one of the nature preserves or anything. I’m pretty sure some company bought a piece of undeveloped land a little outside town, made a few paths, hired some guides, and started making money.

The wildlife density was quite high. The highlights reel included: toucans, frogs, onlingos (small lemur – like relative of the raccoon), a tarantula, a tree viper, and a sloth. The photo opps were, well not great. Our guide stressed making sure everyone got a look before we busted out the cameras. Good advice, since night time photos rarely come out that well. Here’s one of Elani’s better ones of a toucan:

Toucan spotted on the night walk
Taken by Elani

Though seeing all these animals was great, the encounters felt a bit – well – scripted. The guides seemed to know where everything was almost a little too well. At one point, he hopped off the path, grabbed a specific leaf next to a stream and turned it over to reveal a tree frog. He had some good facts about that species of frog – including that it’s endemic to Costa Rica. Not that I’m complaining, it was a cool frog, and I enjoyed seeing it, not to mention it is easily the best picture of the night (in part because the guide took my phone and he was a master of cell phone photography):

Costa Rican tree frog at night
Taken by a night walk tour guild (who I’m afraid I don’t remember his name)

As another example, we saw one of the real crowd pleasers – a young two-toed sloth – as the last sighting on the way out. It seemed like a bit too good of timing to be purely coincidence. I’m not sure how they did it, though all the guides (there were several groups) had radios and were talking, and I’m sure some of the animals have their favorite spots that the guides all know about. It did detract a bit from that marvelous feeling of running across an animal by chance in the wild. Despite that, it was still a great way to see some animals in the wild and at night when some were more active. All in all, a great way to spend our first night in the cloud forest.

March 5, 2018

First days in Mondeverde (or is it in Santa Elena?)

From Playa del Coco, we took a shuttle bus to Monteverde. We decided not to brave the public buses on this occasion because catching a bus at 7:30am and getting to the hotel after dark didn’t sound fun. In a particularly un-Costa Rican fashion, the bus arrived 25 minutes early – rudely interrupting a nice breakfast we were having with our AirBnB host. So we got our egg sandwiches to go and hopped on the shuttle. It was still about a 3 hour trip, including a stop to stretch our legs and get a nice view of some scarlet macaws. One thing I’m learning about Costa Rica is that there’s some amazing wildlife, and some of the best sightings are where you least expect them.

Scarlet Macaw at a bus stopover
Taken by Elani

I’ve heard a fair number of complaints about the roads to Monteverde, and yes they’re bad, but so are all the roads in Costa Rica, and the scenery was nice. The shuttle driver pulled over for a quick rest and photo op:

On the road to Monteverde
Taken by Elani

So we made it there without incident. Strictly speaking, we were staying in Santa Elena, not Monteverde. However, you could reasonably be confused by the fact that half the businesses in Santa Elena have “Monteverde” in the name. Monteverde is sort of a separate town about a whopping 15 minute walk away. Santa Elena is the slightly larger of the two and has the majority of the shops, restaurants, and inns, whereas Monteverde is a little ritzier and has the high end hotels, a couple restaurants, a lot of handmade craft shops, and best of all, some true amazing views of the Gulf of Nicoya. But the whole area gets called Monteverde, oh and there are the Mondeverde and Santa Elena nature reserves, the most famous of which is Monteverde, which is probably why the whole thing is named the way it is.

View from Monteverde of the Gulf Nycola
Taken by Elani

The first thing I noticed about the area was the lush greenery, emphasis on lush. The jungle is a “cloud forest,” meaning that clouds roll through and mist the area a couple times a day. On the ground, there was a lot of emerald green plants with huge leaves, and the trees usually had a healthy coating of moss, bromeliads, and vines. The jungle comes right to the edge of town, and sometimes spills out on to vacant lots.

Santa Elena is definitely a tourist town. It’s littered with hostels, hotels, restaurants, and little shuttle vans delivering visitors to the various activities in the area. There are a few pretty good restaurants around, and the high point, at least as far as ambiance goes, was the “Tree House,” which was actually a restaurant built around a tree. Very cool, but a little pricey, so that was definitely a sometimes treat.

There were also a few coffee shops selling locally grown coffee, and a beer house and taco bar that featured local craft beers, which was a nice change from the standard fare. Anyway, plenty of places to keep you fueled up for whatever adventure you were off to or returning from. But that’s really the point of staying there – going out and exploring. While Elani and I were there, we hiked two of the cloud forest nature reserves, did two zip line tours and a night wildlife walk, and went on a coffee/chocolate/sugar tour to relax. All of them were great. I’ll go into those more in future posts. Monteverde was a pretty action packed stop!