Long time, no see

Sorry for the delay. Not only was the internet in Monteverde unbearably slow, but come on, I'm in Costa Rica! Sometimes I have better things to do with my time than make sure my parents know I'm alive (but granted, that's important too),

So where did I leave off? Oh yeah, done rapelling, going to hike Cerro Chato. Did I mention that it was up a volcano? Well, I think the key word there is UP because boy was it tough! Basically an hour and a half of hiking straight up, two thirds of which were not very well maintained steps, some of which were about the height of my waist. Needless to say, I was EXHAUSTED by the time I got to the top. In fact, I saw the sign saying it was 120m down to the lake in the crater, looked at the stairs down and seriously considered not going down there because of the thought of having to climb back up them. But I had gone that far, I may as well get the satisfaction of going for a swim (and I was soaked by sweat anyways, so I didn't really have anything to lose). I am proud of myself for doing it though, and the crater was definitely beautiful.

The way back down was immesurably easier, and I felt bad for all the people I saw on their way up (only 5 of 6 groups), each of which asked me a variation of How much further? When I got back to the hostel, I had an hour or so to get organized, change and repack my bag a little before the Jeep-Boat-Jeep arrived. I've heard from other people that it's not all that fun, but my group was not very big and it was a relatively clear day so I thought it was pretty cool! The scenery was awesome and quite a bit different than what I'd gotten used to seeing (more clear fields... I still haven't figured out if they're natural or forrested, but either way it's beautiful).

Arriving in Monteverde, I again ran into my friends from Turrialba, so once I got settled in we went out for dinner again and were able to catch up one last time before our paths differed. Then I was exhausted (remember the hike was the same day) so I passed out and slept for about 11 hours. Yesterday was my only full day in Monteverde, and it was jam packed. I had decided that I would take a bit of time off from hiking, but I was still in the mountains so pretty much everything I did involved walking in some way. The first adventures was a canopy tour which, if you're not familiar, is a tour involving mostly zip-lining... kind of like this:

It was pretty fun, and the long lines went across a big canyon so you had like 20 or 30 seconds while you were going across to just admire the expanse of the view and being so high up the hawks were flying UNDER you. I was lucky too because I think yesterday was the clearest day here since I've arrived so I got quite the vistas.

Anyways, also included in the canopy tour I decided to do was a tarzan swing, which I originally thought meant swinging on a rope and jumping in the water. But I was wrong. As it turned out, I was the first one of my group to get to the tarzan swing. Basically I got to the top of this platform about 10m above a lower platform. The guide hooked me up to some ropes and told me to stand on the edge and bend my knees. Sort of like this:

I was a little freaked out, not really sure what was going to happen, but I eventually did it to his approval, at which point he pushed me off. Here is my reaction:
After the initial shock, it was just a big swing and was actually a lot of fun! Here I am actually enjoying it:

Anyways, I think that was the highlight of the tour for me, but I can't complain about the rest of it either because it was all awesome :-)

For the afternoon I decided to check out the Butterfly Gardens (again trying to avoid having to hike a lot, but it was about a 45 minute walk there), which turned out really cool. Included in the price of admissions is a free tour and our guide was very knowledgeable. I feel like I learned a ton about not only butterflies but other bugs too... and saw some beautiful butterflies also. As I was leaving the butterfly garden, a couple of travellers that had been on my tour were walking back also, so we started talking. Turns out they are the first brother and sister duo that I've met yet, which made me happy because it reminded me of when Tim and I were travelling together :-) They were pretty cool (and half Canadian!... but have lived in England their whole lives), and actually convinced me to go to the Serpenterium... Yup, you read right... I went to the serpenterium!! I was super nervous at first but I ended up enjoying myself, and the only thing I wouldn't do is go near the rest of the group when they were getting to hold a little snake. There's no way I was going near a snake that wasn't behind glass! And boy am I glad I didn't because when the guide took him out of his thing, it bit him!!! Needless to say, no one actually volunteered to hold it after that.

Anyways, I saw lots of snakes, some venomous, some not. I also learned how to tell if a snake is poisonous just by looking if you see them in the wild, so I actually feel much better about them than I used to :-) By the time all my adventures were over yesterday and I got a shower it was getting late so I decided to forego the internet and get to bed at a decent hour because my bus left this morning at 6am.

Now it's 4pm and I just arrived in Quepos where I am staying at a hostel outside of town which seems rather nice, but I'll find out later when I get more of a chance to explore. I think I'm going to spend my final 3 nights before I have to head back to San Jose to meet Stacey here. I'll probably try to just relax and hit the beach tomorrow, but I also kind of want to either rent a kayak or find a kayaking tour to go explore a nearby mangrove or something.

That's it for now! Hope this update makes up for the days away :-)
Kaila