Jaco week 3

Hola!

I'm already 3 weeks in Costa Rica. Time flies! On the other hand it feels like Im living here for months. This week was my last week in Jaco. A well spend week.

This weekend I went to Monte Verde national park, together with 4 other girls. Renting a car was realtively easy, the bad road was just funny, and in 2.5 hours we were in the Costa Rican mountains, covered with cloud forests. You could feel the height: it was cold! Suddenly I had to use my long trouwsers and my sweater. Tropics? I don't think so! Saterday afternoon a small hike brought us to a hollow tree (a Ficus, for our ecologists). Going inside and climb totally to the top. As well scary as exciting, and above all... weird! 20m above the ground, IN a tree! In the evening we experienced the jungle at night. The night tour showed us pretty snakes (their venom kills you in 4 hours), creapy spiders (totally harmless), sloths (they came down for feeding, an activity they only do once a week. Lucky us!).
The next day became even more exciting: we went on a -tourist activity to the max- canopy tour. It was called extreme. I couldn't agree more. Despite the bad weather the ziplines were beautiful. Disappearing between the clouds. Waking between the tree tops, fully grown, covered with all kinds of algea and who knows what more. The extreme part was experienced in the Tarzan swing (jumping on a rope (20m down) and swinging trough the forest, 40m above the ground. The super man zipline gave me goosebumps as well: a zipline of 1000m, head first, and GO! After 4 hours of playing in the tree tops we were as well super cold, super happy, super tired and filled with adrenaline but super hungry. A lunch with our new made friends made us feel confortable again. Our way back went super smooth, and a small stop at ¨crocodile bridge¨ showed us around 20 crocodiles, paciently waiting for their next prey.

They next days at school could be summarized by Spanish, sun, beach and food. At a cooking class we learned to make patacones (take some green bananas (platones), fry them, squeeze them, fry them again and eat with tomato salade and mashed beans. The perfect snack). Another typical Costa Rican food is the gallo pinto (I guess I already told you, a mix of rice and beans, commonly eaten for dinner. And breakfast. And lunch). Costa Ricans are really good at combining as many different carbohydrates as possible in one plate. And my lunch in Costa Rica: think about empanadas (puff pastry filled with e.g. chicken) and half a liter of a fresh made smoothy (2 euro - probably the only cheap thing you can find here).

Although I become a little bit bored by all the beaches (I'm so spoiled, I know), I was really suprised by a beach yesterday. No other human being at playa Hermosa. Black sand. Palm trees. A sea with such a strength that standing in 10cm of water was too much. Beautiful rocks. Millions of hermit crabs running around. Pelicans. And of course a beautiful sunset. A bit too beautiful, since our buss drove away without us. A cab helped us out. The sunsets this week were amazing. I'll try to upload some pics these days to make you even more jealous. I'm so kind... :P

In the previous weeks I noticed not only the Costa Ricans struggle with my name. The nicknames I collected here range from Tsjau, to Ciau Quien, to Shakira and Shoarma. At least you can say that travelers are creative...

Before leaving Jaco this weekend, some Latin-American dancing is on the planning. Do you see that happening? Me doing salsa? I don't... :P Saturday up to San Jose, so I can continue on sunday to Barva Volcano. Here I'll stay for 2 weeks, doing volunteer work in the middle of nowhere. Nature conservation. Clearing tracks and painting signs? I don't know what to expect. I will see. At least I will experience a totally different, wet and cold, side of Costa Rica. And I'm looking forward to that.

Adios amigos!