Our receptionist did show up and bowed before us begging for forgiveness. (in Spanish as she did not know any English).  She’d overlooked our reservation. Without any guests at all we didn’t quite understand how this could happen. We decided to forgive her nonetheless. We also found out that due to the slow season the restaurant could only serve breakfast.....

The next few days she took excellent care of us – preparing us a feast of a breakfast each morning. There was a mattress with blankets on the floor near the television and a motorcycle parked outside. On our final day we had an early bus pick-up so she agreed to serve us breakfast at 6:00 a.m. When we walked into the restaurant downstairs we noticed someone under the blankets. A young Costa Rican man sat up with his bathrobe on, smiled at us, and said, “Buenos Dias.” Our scrunched-faced receptionist ran over and nudged him out of the room yelling Spanish profanities……and we laughed. Costa Rica, such a colorful country! 

Monteverde is one of five places in the world where the Continental Divide sends waters to both the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans. This creates the Cloud Forest environment – and while hiking in the Monteverde Cloud Forest at times we would see nothing except what looked like a large white cotton sheet. ‘Walking through the clouds’ seemed mystical even if we couldn’t see much around us – especially with all of the jungle sounds in the background. Hmmm….what’s out there?

While wandering around the local area (near Stella’s – a coffee house with cluttered walls containing Stella’s oil paintings with price tags dangling), we found a private hiking area (for a nominal fee) to a waterfall. The owner had a motorcycle accident three years prior and had sustained major injuries. In spite of having what appeared to be a prosthetic leg he had built the trails himself so tourists can enjoy his property.

The trails took only about 45 minutes to complete on steep terrain with ropes to climb up and down in places and a creek crossing on tires (along two wooden planks). I did fine with the rope climbing yet this tire contraption across the creek didn’t have anything to hold onto. So I crawled like a baby across this with my rump in the air (whilst Jim ran along the tires to the other side after me. That show off)!

So I took away from this experience that there is always a way to accomplish something (even if it takes more time) AND if the young man in the motorcycle accident could build these trails – I could certainly hike them!

Our friends from San Diego, Marianna Pinto and (soon to be Nashville, TN), Dean and Kathy Ziegler joined us for a week of Costa Rican exploration. We took them to the Arenal Lodge (since we’d experienced Nirvana here the week before).

One of our huge highlights was taking the Canopy Zipline Tour near the Observatory Lodge in the Arenal National Park. We flew (literally) from 15 stations over and through the rainforest with views of the lake and the volcano (for the skies cleared for us this entire time)—and then poured raining right after we finished (weren’t we the lucky ones).

What an experience to lean our heads back, lift our feet in a crossed position, hold the handle bars with all of our might in full harness gear and helmets….and glide through the jungle! I couldn’t breathe when I started or even look down. I noticed how tight my grip was on the handle exhausting my strength.

We were told that if the guides signaled us by shaking the cable, (meaning we needed to slow down), we were to move our bodies left to right. I mistook a signal (that wasn’t a signal) and got stuck almost half-way through one of the stations! I turned myself around to pull myself back toward the next platform and after awhile I just couldn’t go any further. (I got the message now – it is time to start lifting the weights). So then one of the handsome Tican guides zipped down to rescue me (which entailed me wrapping my legs around him (or so I thought – he said, “No you put your hands around the metal bars here. “ Oops…..Then he pulled me back to the platform)…Ah well…I guess it wasn’t such a bad experience after all. (other than the laughter which greeted me from my dear comrades).

I learned so much from this experience….how much we supported one another – this is really about caring about your teammates; and how in the beginning I allowed my fears to have me just want to get through the experience rather than be in it! I finally released my grip more and turned my head enough to see the vast beauty all around me. Then I felt like a bird in flight and I soared. WHEEEEEEE! Yippee!!!

We stayed in a large one room chalet perched on the hilltop overlooking the lake, the rainforest, and the Arenal Volcano (when it chooses to reveal itself). Fortunately we are all close friends and compatible as ‘roommates’ as this was quite the ‘togetherness’ experience.

One night very late we all watched the volcano explode time and time again with its red fury…it looked like a line up of cars going down the mountain with brake lights on – yet no, we experienced the magic of Mother Nature firsthand! In 6 nights we saw this volcanic eruption only once and like a fine wine we savored every drop.

We bussed here from San Jose with seats assigned (WOW), no one in the aisles (a blessing), air coming in through the windows (yet hot), and still no bathroom (a bit painful). I spent the entire 4.5 hours watching a baby so full of giggles, smiles, dimples and coos – she drew me into her state of wonder. How simple, how amused!

Since we were nearing Christmas during the bus ride several sales people got up to pitch their wares such as; an English tutorial; Christmas music c.d.’s; and even folks working with non-profits passed their hats around for collections.

And then the bus pulled into the station…..we’d read that this town was worth the visit because of its colonial architecture so we’d prepaid two nights at the Best Western in the heart of the area. The guide books had been mistaken…there were no colonial buildings to be found and Liberia was definitely not worth our time.

We walked around the area kicking trash out of the way and nearly bumping into the crowds of Ticans out on Sunday – generally their only day off. Some young people approached us to let us know they had, “Whatever we wanted.” …..I believe they meant drugs….no thank you!

At least the grounds of our motel had many tall trees and lush vegetation so we camped out here much of the time. We had picnics by the pool from the local grocery (as we had so enjoyed in Eastern Europe) though the cheese and bread did not compare here in Costa Rica.

We’d hoped to take in the nearby national park yet it was closed on Mondays…so we did our laundry instead. And when one has almost all dirty clothes in one’s bags – this is a grateful occasion.

Though Liberia did not live up to what we had heard – it did give us time for errands and to sit back and decompress (well, sort of). And the moral of the story, one cannot always believe what one reads! Check more than one source. And bottom line, learn to make the best of wherever you land. Life is too short and sweet to waste any time suffering.