Wet, soggy, chilled, squelchy, if that's a word, wilted. These are all words about today. Tim arrived Thursday on a day that it never rained. The next day was bright and sunny until after sunset as well. Today he got full Rainy Season treatment.
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| Owl butterfly |
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| Up, up and away! |
We left the house early and took a bus to Hacienda Baru, a preservation and plantation. The lands are protected here and include many trails and gardens, including a butterfly garden where we saw Owl butterflies and several other species. The trails had intermittent plaques to explain the area you were standing in or general rainforest information. We explored one trail which lead us onto a beach on the Pacific and a large sandbox-like turtle hatchery. Nothing was hatching today, but we imagined them paddling their way up to the surface, over the edge and down towards the sea. Our main purpose here today, was to take part in Flight of the Toucan, a zip line canopy tour. Originally I was skeptical about the zip line approach to seeing the Rainforest. As one guide book put it, "There are two kinds of canopy tours. Those during which you can watch the animals as they live in the trees, and those during which you can ACT like animals in the trees." Today, at Hacienda Baru, with our guides Pedro and Victor, we had opted for the "ACTING" like animals version. There were 8 zip lines, each of them about 200 ft long. You would zip down one, and then walk to the next launching platform. Despite my original skepticism and fear of heights, everyone loved the experience, even me. The last zip line we took backwards in the beginning of a torrential rain. Tim's hat wilted.
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| A thoughtful moment on the beach inspired by The Thinker by Rodin |
When we were done zipping, we sat down for a picnic of guava, pickles, avocado, cheese, tomatoes, bread, rambutan and nuts, and then decided to walk 3 kilometers to Dominical to catch a bus. Otherwise it would be a 3 hour wait for the next bus where we were. Along the edge of the highway we marched, one behind the other, soaked to the skin, and resigned to our tired feet. The downpour continued.
Then, a black pick-up stopped after passing us, clearly wondering if we wanted a ride. Tim and I, without speaking, agreed we would accept an offer in the back of the truck. Hitchhiking is common in Costa Rica and there are no stories of murderous outcomes. It's considered safe. So we ran forward to climb aboard, and Tim looked in the window to ask if they were going our way, and lo and behold, it was a friend we had met at the Communal Dinner! Happily we climbed on board, and road for 10 minutes in the pelting bullet-like rain, shivering a bit, and were dropped off right at the driveway of Finca Ipe. It was a joyous ride and it took the edge off our exhaustion. The kids collapsed on the couches and I let them listen to a book on tape, and I cooked tons of warming foods, hung clothes to dry, and began the final planning for our trip. We leave Finca Ipe tomorrow, and continue our Costa Rica Adventure along the Pacific coast.
Then, a black pick-up stopped after passing us, clearly wondering if we wanted a ride. Tim and I, without speaking, agreed we would accept an offer in the back of the truck. Hitchhiking is common in Costa Rica and there are no stories of murderous outcomes. It's considered safe. So we ran forward to climb aboard, and Tim looked in the window to ask if they were going our way, and lo and behold, it was a friend we had met at the Communal Dinner! Happily we climbed on board, and road for 10 minutes in the pelting bullet-like rain, shivering a bit, and were dropped off right at the driveway of Finca Ipe. It was a joyous ride and it took the edge off our exhaustion. The kids collapsed on the couches and I let them listen to a book on tape, and I cooked tons of warming foods, hung clothes to dry, and began the final planning for our trip. We leave Finca Ipe tomorrow, and continue our Costa Rica Adventure along the Pacific coast.
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