Arenal to Monteverde

Sunday we said farewell to El Silencio. We had a nice time near the volcano, but it was time to move on (and we couldn't get a room for another night in our hotel!). A few more shots of the hotsprings and our little cabana before we mount our trusty Bego and gallop off to Monteverde!!



Notice how much happier I am with the use of my hands!

On our way around Lake Arenal, we decided to stop at Los Puentes Cologantes (Hanging Bridges). We had read some good reviews of the place, so we decided just to take a self-guided tour.



This little pit viper was the only no avian wildlife that we observed on the trail (and it was shown to us by the man at the gate) but the walk was beautiful all the same.

From Hanging Bridges we drove around Lake Arenal which was pleasant and stopped to eat at a German Bakery in Nuevo Arenal. From this point on, the driving got muy interesante! First we crossed a bridge that, no kidding, had a sign warning drivers that it was not reliable. Then we began a bumpy trek up a rocky/muddy road (the first part being in a fairly thick fog at dusk) to Santa Elena. I am NOT a good passenger in such situations! At long last we made it Santa Elena and found a room at Hotel Poco a Poco. The hotel was not our first choice, but after switching from our first room (it had a balcony that didn’t lock and was easily accessible from the road), we found it to have everything we needed (although the internet service isn’t that great.)

I will post the next day here because we didn’t get any pictures :(

We wok e up early on Monday morning and headed to Santa Elena Cloud Forest Preserve. This Preserve is supposed to have all the wildlife found in Monteverde, but also has spider monkeys. It is a smaller piece of property that is owned by the town of Santa Elena. Money from the reserve goes to funding the schools in the village. We took the 7:30 a.m. guided tour. It was already raining pretty hard and I soon fell back in love with my new Goretex Marmot jacket! Well we walked for about 3 hours in a beautiful forest, but I’m afraid we didn’t see much in the way of wildlife. We did see a Crested Curasou, a tarantula, a crested flycatcher, and scads of hummingbirds (including violent crowned wood nymphs and green hermit). No spider monkeys. Our guide, Henry, informed us that the “dry season” in Costa Rica really only applies to the Pacific Side (hmm something they don’t mention in the guide books). Since then, I’ve searched the Internet and found numerous time frames given to the “wet” and “wetter” seasons here. Not sure who to believe. In any case, it’s pretty wet here and we never took the camera out of the case.

Anyway, we came back to the hotel and took a nice nap while the rain pelted the roof. We awoke and decided to get some food and then get ourselves to Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve for a guided night hike. Dinner was at Chimera, a fabulous little Tapas Restaurant on the way to Monteverde. The food was truly delicious. I had a coconut mojito that was splendid and Isaac had some kind of eye-popping mango drink that was made to look like a person (just trust me). So in good spirits we headed to the preserve.

Our night hike proved to me more fruitful than the morning session. First off, our guide, Juan Carlos, was so enthusiastic; it was hard not to get excited. He managed to make aphids sound like the coolest thing anyone could expect to see in Monteverde. We saw the aforementioned aphids, blue-eyed anoles, an orange-breasted trogon, a summer tanager, lots of nectar-sucking bats, a green tree frog, another tarantula, some bioluminescent mushrooms, some kind of tinamou (can’t remember the species), a white breasted robin, a leaf-mimicking aphid, and an Olingo (like a ring-tail cat). Isaac and I also saw some raccoons on the way out. Overall, we were pretty satisfied (oh yeah and the rain stopped!) and we might go back for a morning hike before leaving for Liberia tomorrow.