Rio Celeste

Rio Celeste

So, Costa Rica has a river named after me, or so my children think!  Rio Celeste is located in Tenorio Volcano National Park, up in the mountains where it is blessedly cool and refreshing after sweating at the beach for almost 2 months.  The day we arrived the weather was cloudy and misty - we had to wear long sleeves and pants!!!!  It was awesome!  We stopped in Liberia on the way, to pick up Geoff from the airport, as he had been gone for an entire month back in the USA.  We stayed at a cute hotel in Liberia called Hotel Javy, which is run by a sweet Tica lady who speaks no English.  It was awesome practice for me! She cooks great food too, if you are in Liberia alone with two kids and its getting dark and you don't want to leave for dinner.

The next morning we left for Bijagua, which is at the foot of the Tenorio Volcano.  We checked in at the very cute Hotel Cacao where there was an abundance of colorful hummingbirds, butterflies and feral cats.  Amara ran around trying to catch a kitten to bring home but was luckily unsuccessful. One new pet a month is probably enough!  The owner of the hotel informed me that he only gets about 10 Americans per year, because most stay in the resort hotels.  I would highly recommend travelling like a European and staying in this place if you want a more relaxed and authentic experience.  Muy tranquilo!!!  Just down the street you can walk a half a block to a great little restaurant too, and order a casada - a Costa Rican dish with fish (or meat or veggies), salad, beans, rice, and a fried plantain.  Very healthy and tasty too!

The first afternoon we spent in Bijagua we went to Finca Verde, where we took a guided tour and saw sloths, sleeping bats (they are really cute!!), butterflies, frogs, snakes, and birds. Geoff also ate some termites.  He says that they taste "woody".  No one else felt it necessary to verify this information...

The next morning we got up early and headed up a really really slow, steep, rocky dirt road.  It took us about 45 minutes to drive 11 km, but Tenorio National Park is worth it.  Because of the road, there aren't a lot of tourists here, except a crazy German lady that felt obligated to bring her 3 inch heels with her to change into for a photo shoot - she was hilarious to watch!  The photographer kept missing the mid-air jump so she spent a long time jumping into the air in 3 inch heels onto a slippery wet wooden deck.  Entertaining indeed!

The hike through the jungle to the Rio Celeste waterfall was what I had pictured when I thought of Costa Rica before we arrived here.  Dense jungle, shin deep mud, misty fresh cool air. We all loved it!!!  The color of the water is the beautiful blue that reminds me of glacial-fed waters like Lake Blanca in Washington.  The color here is not glacier fed, but rather a chemical mixture from underwater hot springs bubbling up from the volcano.  Another "brilliant" tourist decided it would be "interesting" to stick her hand in the boiling water.  You can imagine what her reaction might have been at discovering that it was indeed boiling hot water.

When the guides at the entrance to the park tell you to rent boots if you didn't bring them with you, definitely listen.  They aren't joking around about the mud.  :)

It was such a great mini-vacation, getting away from the heat and dusty roads of Guanacaste in the dry season.  I could have spent more time sitting at the hotel just watching the hummingbirds and butterflies and wearing long sleeves!!

Graham holding the famous Red-Eye Tree Frog

Rio Celeste Waterfall

3-Fingered Sloth

The Mixing-Pool - where the beautiful blue color is made.

Hotel Cacao - a great place to stay in Bijagua

Cacao seed

Amara and the Frog

and, on a different topic, Happy Birthday to my awesome daughter! 

Stranded!

I decided that it was time to drive further than 2 miles from our home base here in Nosara, so the kiddos and I loaded up the Honda with our snorkel gear and headed to San Juanillo, about 18 km north of here - about 11 miles.  Not far.  At home, it would take about 11 minutes to go 11 miles.  Here, however, it took about 40 minutes of driving on some crazy dirt roads with hills so steep that my tires started slipping and I had to shift into a low gear.  I also drove through 2 rivers, a first for me and my SUV!  I was really nervous about this, and was second guessing my "brave" idea to go on this little adventure.  However, as I was sitting and pondering how many crocodiles were in this insanely deep river, I saw a tiny little 2 door sedan drive through the river with no hesitation.  The car was probably 4 inches off the ground.  I think the driver smirked at me, thinking I must be a tourist.  I decided that I was being a wimp, after all I was driving a Honda Pilot which has 4WD and is MUCH higher off the ground.  Off we go!  Into the river and through the woods!

San Juanillo is worth the crazy drive to get there.  The beaches are beautiful!!  The beaches are protected from the waves so lots of local people were out snorkeling and swimming.   It has been really windy here, so the water was pretty murky but we did see tons of cute blue fish and 2 freaky looking eels.  Rumor has it that there are two tasty restaurants in town that serve greek food, and we were really excited to try the vegetarian one - testing it out for Nana!  It closes at 4:00 though, and we just missed it.  Super sad kids, they were hungry!!  So we'll have to go back, and eat lunch there next time.

On the way home, we drove back through the two rivers.  Just past the second river, which I zipped right through this time, there was a photo I just had to stop and take of the farmland and sunset beside the road.  I had to take the keys out in order to do this, because the camera was safely stored in my rocket box on top of my car.  I took some pictures, including this one here:

Which was fine, although not an awesome picture and definitely not worth what came next...I got back in the car, and turned the key.  NOTHING.  Dead.  WHAT??  I've been here for 2 weeks, Geoff is out of town, I'm the furthest away I've been from "home" and my car dies???  On the side of the road, and its going to get dark any minute.  Seriously??  I try calling my husband and I CAN"T because I'm in Central America on the side of the road with no wifi!!   Poor kids started crying and were so scared!!  I called one of the 4 phone numbers that I have programmed into my phone of local people.  People I barely know.  Elizabeth answered, first try!!  She said she'd be right there.  She had to drive probably 20-30 minutes out of her way (each way) to rescue someone she just met a few days ago.  She didn't hesitate at all, and we are so grateful to her.  So we repaid her by then having dinner at her house that same night.  :)  I guess she figured I was too traumatized to cook for my kids or myself.

So what is wrong with my Honda, that has never caused me any grief?  At first I thought it was the river I drove through.  I must've gotten something important wet.  But that didn't make sense, the water wasn't deep enough.  It jump started just fine.  Then I turned it off and tried to start it again, and nothing.  Dead. ???  All the lights had just been on, working fine!!  What is wrong?  Then we went to jump it again, and the cable connecting the battery to the car was actually NOT connected at all.  It wasn't screwed on.  So, in conclusion, we figured out that the battery had rattled itself loose on these bumpy nasty roads, and had probably not been screwed on at the port here in Costa Rica when we shipped it.  Nice.  At least it was simple.  This time.  On the plus side, at least my car didn't start on fire in the parking lot at school (which did happen to someone!!).

Well, as they say here: Pura Vida!