Heaven on Earth

What a day, what a day.

After sleeping well for 9-10 hours in just boxers, without even sheets, with a fan on high, we were ready to start the day.

We had a delicious breakfast served to us by our 'amable' owner, Mauricio which included banana, watermelon, pineapple, and grain & milk. Really, it wasn't cereal. Too rough for that. It was grain a milk. Pretty good for $9/person/night to have free breakfast. We thought that was it when he came back with scrambled eggs and bread!

To prove his "amable"-ness, we left and forgot to lock or even shut our door, so he shut and locked it for us. (Don't worry, all of our stuff is locked shut in a bag that is locked to a bedpost. But still, we did make the mistake of forgetting to lock up.

As we said in a previous post, we went for comfort and security and convenience and peace-of-mind so we selected tours that includes transportation (they pick you up from the hostel).

Spur-of-the-moment, that morning, we opted to participate in a guided Suspended Bridge Tour near the Arenal Volcano. It was $40 and went from 930 to 130. Sauer and I were the only people on the tour! Thus, it was very personal (just us and one very knowledgeable guide) and we hiked for about 3 hours across long suspended bridges in the Costa Rican canopy looking at nature's finest. We got great views of the volcano and of the Arenal Lake. During the tour, we saw a Toucan, some poisonous frogs (blue jeans frog), a walking tree, some type of wild cat (extremely rare to see), and two venomous snakes.

The snakes were less than 1 foot long and likely weighed less than a pound, but Franklin, our guide, made it clear to us that a bite from this snake could kill us. Good to know. Both snakes that we saw were hiding on branches merely a foot or two off of the trail.

Franklin had a good eye and ear for nature, where most of the stuff he pointed out we would have missed.

Thinking about Franklin: On the 20 minute bus ride he would check out women and make unnecessary remarks. Then, we get out into nature and God's beauty and his character seemed entirely different. He was like a child doing his favorite hobby.

We returned at 130 and then needed to run some errands before our 300 tour and hot springs. We went to the grocery store and bought some meat and cheese, a HUGE tub of water, bread, frosted flakes (Zucaritas), and bananas. Bananas are 7 cents each!! We then went to the bank to withdraw 120,000 colones ($240).

We then paid off our owner Mauricio for the tour that he set up for us and the five days of staying at his hostel. At 3 we got on a bus with 8 others to visit a hiking trail at the base of the Arenal Vocano. We actually had Franklin again as our tour guide and saw volcanic rocks, got a good view of the volcano, and learned more about nature while strengthening our calf muscles.

After the hike, we took a bus to the Baldi Hot Springs. We were a little down because we had read over and over to go to the Tabacon Hot Springs, not Baldi, but it was $85 more. (The $85 difference is the price difference for three hours at the springs, so we figured there's no way it's worth that much more). BALDI WAS INCREDIBLE. ALL AROUND. I actually couldn't have dreamt of a better resort with unlimited resources. http://www.baldihotsprings.cr/

To start with, it is naturally heated water in roughly 15 pools and swimming areas at varying temperatures, from ridiculously hot (we couldn't even stick our feet in for more than 5 seconds) to cold. Essentially, a very hot waterfalls cascades at the top and trickles down towards the hotel lobby and swim-up bars at the bottom where cooler water is. Keep in mind, this place is probably 50 yards wide and 200 yards long. Each individual pool is surrounded by actual vegetation and wildlife.

We first went to the tour-included buffet which was phenomenal. Unlimited, great-tasting food and drink. Afterwords, we went straight for the water slides. I was told the middle slide was the fastest. It had a sign next to it that said that the company was in no-way liable for any injuries... The first time I went down (it's a quick right, then a quick left, then a huge drop) I was sitting face-forward like normal and outside of my control I was spun backwards just before the pitched-black mega-drop that I had never been down before. I was scared for my life. But oh, it was worth it. The lifeguards even encouraged us to go down backwards lying down on one of those short, fast-drop slides. We did, it was awesome.

Side note: This resort was practically empty. Almost no people were in most pools. It's not peak tourism season in Costa Rica now.

Sauer and I also hiked to the top of the Baldi resort, where the fake waterfall and hottest water was. They have tiled, stone recliners in the pools so you can lay there and watch the waterfall. I remember just praising God for blessing us with this evening. We returned home safely and I write this.

Other Thoughts:
1. Tomorrow we are doing something called the "Mambo Combo" through the Desafio company which includes canyoning and river rafting.
2. The REI underwear and zip-off, dry-fit shorts are keeping us cool and doing a great job.
3. It really hasn't rained here yet, a little surprising for us. We keep bringing our raincoats on the travels and they never seem needed.
4. We ran into same woman that we rode bus with to Arenal, the German gal traveling around the world in a year. Always good to see old friends.
5. There's a woman that went on today's tour with us that is staying at our hostel. She's probably 45, traveling alone, and seemed generally unhappy/sour for the entire trip. Maybe because she wore jeans on the hike, but we're really not sure.
6. Although our plan is to stay at this hostel for four more nights including the night that I write this, we may only stay two more nights and actually head to Monteverde (we were going to visit it anyways) because Mauricio's brother owns a hostel there. This would make it easier to hike in Monteverde as we desire to do.
7. Girls just moved into our pod - now we have to share the bathroom :(. It's weird, at 10 at night they decided to wander the streets of this town (we don't even have dirt rodes, it's like loose stone rodes)... I just wouldn't feel comfortable doing that in a foreign place, but it always seems like women travel more than men and women are okay doing this sort of thing. Braver or riskier? I don't know.

Quick Notes on Things I forgot:
1. On the sketchy drive from Alajuela (and Denny's) to Arenal, we saw a body on the road from a car accident with a motorcyclist.
2. When we entered our hostel room, Sauer and I both questioned, "Where are our blankets?" After about 15 minutes, we realized that this was because of the always hot temperature. Live and learn.