Saturday, February 12
The nightly rate at Guachipelin included breakfast so we headed over to the restaurant when it opened at 6:30. We were up at 5:30 because the time there is one hour behind ours at home. They had a nice buffet set up with glass in front of the food and servers ready to fill our plates as we pointed out what we wanted.
The grounds at the resort
In the morning there were tons of birds in the big tree near our room. They were extremely loud! We don’t have a great camera, but I think these are Crimson-Fronted Parakeets. We also saw our first Mot-Mot of our trip.
The first activity I had planned was a self hike in Rincon de la Vieja National Park. It was a short drive up the road from our resort. We saw some Brahman Cows on the way there.
In the park there were two main trails to choose from. For our first visit we chose the path less travelled. By which I mean the path to the waterfall. There was only one couple ahead of us so we didn’t see any other people until we arrived at the waterfall. We saw a small reddish coloured animal dart across the path but it was so quick we couldn’t identify it. We also saw many large blue birds but were unable to get a picture.
The terrain and scenery was quite varied as we headed up toward the top of a mountain. At the top you could almost see the pacific ocean. We passed a few streams and crossed a couple of bridges.
We enjoyed seeing all the different types of plant life. We then had to follow the path back down to reach the bottom of the waterfall. This is where the trail became a bit more technical. The last 500 metres to the waterfall was very tough- both going in and out.
When we reached the waterfall another couple was relaxing on the large rocks. They finished their snack and headed back to do the other trail. We had the waterfall all to ourselves for about 15 minutes.
Even though it said you weren’t supposed to go in the water, we did of course. We had a short swim and a snack. The water was cold but not as cold as the waterfalls in Hawaii. Shortly after we left the falls we met a young local couple and chatted for a bit. They were very friendly and said they were hoping to move to Canada. We saw them again later and they waved goodbye like we were old friends.
There was quite a bit of climbing- my watch says we climbed 570 metres. Some were steps, some were rock. It was a bit technical so a bit challenging in spots. The total distance was about 12 km. It took us 4 hours including stops. We started to see more people as we got closer to the ranger station.
We carried water with us as well as a filtered bottle. We were able to get some water from the river when we ran out of what we brought.
After we finished the hike we headed back to the resort for lunch. The salad I ordered was very good. We spent the rest of the afternoon reading and relaxing by the pool. It was a bit windy but not too hot.
Each afternoon some clouds rolled in and it looked like it would rain, but we only had a bit of rain one afternoon.
We enjoyed our dinner back at the resort while watching the sun go down. They had a buffet set up and the chicken was excellent. Mike chose a striploin steak but had the buffet the following evening so he could enjoy the chicken as well.
Cindy Southgate's Travels: Costa Rica 