Tiff & Jared's adventures

Day 3

We started the day in Nosara and caught our private shuttle to Monteverde in the morning. Holy Moly, what a ride. We were in the van for about 2 hours traversing windy, narrow roads and feeling quite a bit queasy before we made it to our Casa Picuya Airbnb and were able to breath fresh air again.

We had just enough time for an early dinner before heading out for our night tour, so we walked downtown and decided to try Open Kitchen, where we had some delicious Mediterranean food and lucked into happy hour (2×1 mojitos hello)! The restaurant was downtown and the seating was on the second floor, which afforded us a beautiful view of the lush surrounding forests.

Our night tour was coordinated through Refugio Monteverde and included transportation, so around 7:30PM, we were collected for our 2-hour nature walk on the nature reserve. The refuge is home to different species of frogs, snakes, and insects, and other animals such as the sloth, ocelot, tarantula, and armadillo, and most are active at night so we were excited at the prospect of seeing some of these animals (preferably not the tarantula though). Our guide, Loan, was very passionate about his work and it made the tour that much more memorable! We started the tour in the opposite direction of other groups, so it was more of an intimate experience. Not five minutes into the hike, we came across a scorpion hanging on a tree (invisible to the naked eye) – when Loan shown his UV light on the animal, it became fluorescent! He explained this was a defense mechanism, and manifests within the scorpion after three months. Crazy to think that there were probably way more around us that we weren’t seeing because we didn’t shine the UV light everywhere! Definitely made me feel small in such a vast (and dark) forest. Not shortly after that, we stumbled across not one, but TWO, venomous bright green vipers. One of the snakes was right on the trail – we respected its space as Loan explained all the different types of venomous snakes in Costa Rica, including those both that are either neurotoxic or hemotoxic (affects the blood and blood vessels) – great! We stayed our distance as we watched it slither away, and then we continued to slither away as well!

Scorpion

Viper

Tarantula

Male frog protecting its eggs

Monkey

Salamander

Loan continued to point out various flora and fauna, and I honestly had no idea how he was able to spot all of these things IN THE DARK (yes, we had flashlights, but also it was nighttime?). For example, he saw a praying mantis underneath a leaf; he pointed out a green, male frog underneath a leaf protecting its eggs; he showed us a tarantula hiding in its hole. Honestly, at first I thought all of these animals were staged, but the guides were all working together and sending alerts when they saw animals within their groups so I think we just got really lucky! One of the cooler sightings towards the end was a sloth! However, it was high up in the tree and we were only able to see it through Loan’s scope. We learned that Costa Rica is home to two sloth species – the two-toed sloth and the three-toed sloth (yes, very creative). A few key differences between the species include the fact that two-toed sloths have two claws on their front limbs, and have a more varied diet, than three-toed sloths. Three-toed sloths are also more likely to be strictly diurnal, while two-toed sloths can be more active at night. I don’t even remember which species we saw but just cool to say we saw one! Overall, a very good nighttime nature walk with a lot of sightings!

Day 4

This was by far the busiest day on the trip! It was jam-packed with activities and ended with a fun girls night out on the town. First item on the agenda was going to the Monteverde Cloud Reserve. We coordinated with Hotel Coati for transportation to the reserve which ended up working out very well. I was really looking forward to visiting because of its world-famous reputation for incredible biodiversity due to its unique ecosystem of constant mist and high humidity (hence “cloud forest”). We didn’t have a tour planned here so we were on our own to glimpse any of the many flora and fauna that the cloud forest had to offer (over 2,500 plant species, 100 mammal species, 400 bird species, 120 reptile and amphibian species, and thousands of insects). Some fun facts about the cloud forests:

• There are actually three cloud forests in Monteverde: The Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve (where we went), the Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserve, and Bosque Eterno de los Ninos.
• The Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve was established in 1972 and initially covered approximately 810 acres of forested land. Currently, its protective reach extends over 35,089 acres and encompasses eight life zones atop the Continental Divide.
• In April 2019, CNN featured the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve as one of the top 25 most beautiful places globally and the most magical place in Costa Rica.
  

As we started along the trail (tickets are $25 pp to enter the park), I felt as if I were in a scene from Jurassic Park. Everything was so lush, and we were basically walking in the mist of the clouds, with an overcast constantly above our heads. We took the Sendero Camino walk all the way to La Ventana, (The Window), an overlook with a wide view of an elfin forest below (although it was completely foggy when we ascended and couldn’t see anything). We tried to channel our inner-Loan along the way to spot animals hidden in the forest, but alas one time on a night tour didn’t provide us with enough experience. On the way back, we veered paths so that we could walk over the suspension bridge, which spans a valley and allowed us to gaze into the treetops. We picked the right trail on the way back! Shortly into our path back, we saw some branches fall from the canopy above, only to be followed by some gibbering above. After gazing aimlessly for a bit, we spotted some monkeys!

The Cloud Forest is home to three main monkey species: the Mantled Howler Monkey, the White-Faced Capuchin Monkey, and the Central American Spider Monkey. These monkeys were too far away to identify, but we could definitely see them gliding from treetop to treetop, slowly moving their way towards us (wondering if they were plotting to poop on us). In this same span of trail, there was a sign that the nest of the Resplendent Quetzal was nearby – I truthfully only saw a quick flutter of wings, but one of the girls said she was able to see the beautiful bird! What a lucky day indeed, as its known for being one of the most beautiful species in the world.

Our luck didn’t end there though – close to the entrance of the park, something caught my eye on the forest floor below. It was an “agouti”, basically a big brown rodent. Then, when we made our way completely down and walked to the Hummingbird Gallery, not only did we see a bunch of beautiful little birds, we also saw a coati walk right by us! It was just sauntering by all the tourists, not a care in the world, just wanting to make its way back in the treetops. I’d say we had a very lucky day at the cloud reserve!

All fun things must come to an end and we were picked up at the cloud reserve by Selvatura Park for our ziplining and tree canopy adventure! It was a short drive to the adventure park and we got there around 1PM. Our tour started with the canopy tour, which included 13 cables, including a 1 km cable, 15 platforms, and one Tarzan Swing. Our group of four B-lined for the front of the group so we could be FIFO (first-in, first-out) and have enough time for walking along the suspension bridges. Most of us hadn’t been ziplining before, but after a basic tutorial, we were ready to go! I brought my GoPro which was fun to film some of the lines, especially the longer ones. For two of the cables, they were so long that we had to zipline with a partner, so our group paired up and away we went! What a thrilling feeling it was to be soaring above the treetop – it felt like we were flying! The weather held out for us too and we barely got any rain during the whole trip. Towards the end, the group had the option to do the Tarzan Swing, a short “bungee-esque” free fall swing.

After working through all 13 cables, we didn’t have much time before our shuttle back to town, so we walked out and back about half an hour to some of the suspension bridges (which I thought were way cooler than the ones earlier in the morning at Monteverde Cloud Reserve). Technically, Selvatura Park is also a cloud forest, so we got to experience more of this environment on more suspension bridges! We only made it to three out of the eight total bridges, but saw some beautiful flora.

After a full day of activities, we shuttled back to Monteverde and made it to our Airbnb around 5PM. We spent some time relaxing, drinking tea and cleaning up before getting ready for our girl’s night out! We got dressed up and headed to a restaurant downtown called Taco Taco, where Taylor had been before and recommended as a good local spot. We ordered a bunch of tacos, bowls, and various cocktails – queue frozen pina drink! We hadn’t eaten that much throughout the day and burned lots of calories, so we gorged up before going out for drinks!

When we were at Selvatura, we met a really nice couple that recommended a cool speakeasy bar called NaTu for unique drinks. Such a great recommendation (just as good as their other recommendation about getting in front of our ziplining group to be the first ones to finish!). We arrived at NaTu and it was pretty empty (granted it was a Wednesday night) so we sat at the bar and struck up a great conversation with bartender Alexander! We ended up staying for two rounds of drinks and it was such a curated experience – each of the cocktails had a backstory and somehow tied into Costa Rica (for example, one of the drinks was called the Sloth, which was an elaborate Gin and Tonic that came in a freakin’ TERRARIUM to represent the national symbol of Costa Rica and its leaf-based diet. My first drink was one of my favorites, a “Whiskey Sour”, which I would never have guessed was a sour. The drink is inspired by the speakeasy’s ice cream shop, and the seasonal flavor included lime, chocolate bitters, strawberry and “everlasting young cow milk”. The drink came in a cone-shaped glass and had bubbles on top that turned into smoke when I touched them – what a visual and sensory experience! We decided we had enough time and energy for one more drink, and went to Bar Amigo, a local joint that multiple people recommended to us. After listening to a little karaoke, we headed back to the Airbnb to rest up.

Day 5

Last day in Monteverde! We found a good breakfast spot called MexTea downtown and got had a nice sit-down meal of pancakes, pico gallo, and coffees. We wanted to make sure we had a good breakfast in us for our trip to La Fortuna. We’d heard from multiple people that the roads from Monteverde to La Fortuna are “fun” and “like riding a horse” so we were a little apprehensive, especially after our adventure from Nosara. After doing some window shopping, we went back to the Airbnb to pack up for our 11AM private shuttle pickup.

By this point, we had the order of seats down between the four of us driven by our varying degrees of motion/car sickness. I took up the back row of the shuttle, laying down and reading my Kindle (I typically don’t get too car sick but GD, those roads and the overall driving were something else!). The route from Monteverde to LF is unique because halfway through the trip, there’s a drop-off where we leave the first van shuttle, and embark on a boat ferry across Lake Arenal to La Fortuna. That part was definitely interesting. At one point, the driver veered off the main road, and started backing up down this desolate, narrow, jungle road. As we drove further away from the main road, I think we all had varying levels of anxiety as to what was about to happen, ha! Only once we saw the ferry boat, we realized this was the exchange point (and we weren’t about to be left in the jungles of CR).

The ferry was super cool! Because it was a private shuttle transport, the four of us were the only passengers on the boat for about a 20-30 minute ride across the lake. The weather was gloomy, and we weren’t quite able to see the Arenal Volcano, but got great views of the surrounding countryside. We docked on the other side of the lake, and were picked up by our second shuttle that brought us to Paradise Hot Springs. Let the La Fortuna adventure begin!