Rincón de la Vieja

From the Arenal to Rincón de la Vieja, 25 september
Of course we eat our last breakfast in La Fortuna on our porch and sure enough see a toucan fly by. Unfortunately they are not very much of a stay-at-home so we cannot enjoy it for long.

We decide first to go to the Arenal National Park and leave the luggage in the cabin in the mean time. There are warnings for theft from cars around here. At 7.30 we stand for the gate but the park is not open before eight. We linger around somewhat and see a coati cross the road.

On the stroke of eight we are again at the entrance to the park. The "ranger" is obviously just out of bed and has no mind to speak one more word than necessary. We walk a route to a recent lava flow. We actually don't know how we should picture that. At first we walk over an area that was totally wiped out in 1968 and where new vegetation starts grow again, especially a lot of reed. Very strange. We walk through a forest of ten feet high reed.

Suddenly we perceive movement in the shrubs. We see a couple of tails so we think that they are monkeys again. Through our binoculars they appear to be coatis that feed on berries. We can approach them up to about seventy feet. Suddenly they are disappeared, to emerge again unexpectedly in the grass. It is a large family of about twenty coatis of all ages. They don't care a bit about us and cross the oath about thirty feet from us. Just on the spot where the bag with films is, right at the moment that the film in both my cameras is full!!

After our encounter with the coatis we soon reach the recent lava flow. It appears to be a moonscape-like "river" of large rocks of melted lava. We are now so close to the volcano, literally at the foot of it, that we here the rumble loud and clear. The sound seems to be coming from large blocks of lava that rumble down along the sides. The blocks have the size of a house, we read. We also know that this area is in the risk zone. At an unexpected lava avalanche you can run how hard you like but it will catch you. Although the chance is very small, we still feel a bit unpleasant by this.

After we arrive at our cabina we see a boy on the porch. He wanted to clean it but found our luggage. That is why he waited outside. We apologize to him, but doesn't have a problem with it. We load the lot quickly in and leave for Rincón de la Vieja.

We drive all around Lake Arenal and get lost. But even without that delay the driving time is much longer than we expected. We arrive just in time to see the sun go down above the hacienda.

Because of the long drive and hardly any other alternatives, we made reservations yesterday for the Hacienda Guachipelín, through a central reservations number in San José. This now appears to have been fruitless. Our reservation never reached the hacienda. But lucky for us this place is also almost deserted so they have plenty of rooms left for us.

The complex consists of motel like rows of rooms and in one of those blocks is one room left. We tell the employee that checks us in that we don't like to be in a large group of Dutch people. He nods sympathetically and puts us right in the middle of a huge group of the Dutch tour operator Bex/SRC. Here we are 10.000 km away from home and hear only Dutch. Darn!

To make things worse the tour conductor has rented a "typical South American" band by which the group enjoy themselves by dancing the foxtrot. Let's just say that this is not our thing.

Above all that it is quit expensive here, certainly in contrast to what you get, but there is almost no other choice in this area. The rooms are big, that is for sure, but there is for example only one electrical outlet for both the ventilator and the bed light and than we also have to load our batteries during the night.

And there are huge insects in our bedroom in all kinds of forms and sizes. We will use our mosquito-net tonight. The praying mantis on the wall is very nice though. Especially if you watch him (or her) from close by.

Stay in Rincón de la Vieja, 26 september
Breakfast was not as good as what we became used to in Costa Rica. No fruit juices, which we cannot do without anymore by now.

After breakfast we drive to National Park Rincón de la Vieja. It is very "busy" here: two other cars and that so early in the morning. Therefore we decide to walk the loop in the wrong direction. We don't like the thought that the others might have chase the animals away just before we arrive.

But that is not the case since the coatis are so curious here that they don't even want to be chased away. For the rest we have to be content with sounds and shadows of animals as we are getting used to by now. We don't expect to see large numbers of wildlife and therefore we are satisfied with what we see. A lot of blue morpho butterflies and a lot of other butterflies. Several agoutis cross our path, among them a mother with two young.

We see two bush turkeys (hokkos) run away and for a while we watch the capers of spider monkeys. Of course it is here also teeming with leaf cutting ants. On the, now deserted, campground, there is an incredible stream of these hard workers. Without exaggerating we can say that there are hundreds of thousands of ants walking back and forth. As far as we can follow their path it is about 10 centimetres wide (4 inches) and a hundred metres long (300 ft). But we see no end and no beginning of this continuous stream of moving leaves. A bit further they all carry tiny little flowers.

The paths are often slippery and covered with tree roots. Every now and than we fall. We also have to cross streams, without a bridge of course. We can see from the trouser legs of others that they have a hard time as well.

This area is also known for its hot springs. The combination of boiling mud and rainforest is very peculiar. Every here and there hot steam is visible above the vegetation. It seems that you can bath in some of the wells because we pass by a group of loud noised Americans, from whom we can tell that they are not here for the peaceful nature. Both women and men are only dressed in bathing suite and walk on slippers. They carry only a towel, not even a bottle of water. We can't believe that they can walk on these slippery paths without falling. At least they won't have to worry about there clothes becoming dirty.

In the afternoon we visit Liberia. It is one of the larger cities in the country but it is nothing special. On the village square a school class of girls is playing football. One hussy addresses us after which the others also want to demonstrate their English to us. The whole class surrounds us and the whole P.E. lesson comes to nothing. They ask us all kinds of questions and the teacher proudly tells us that this women's team is champion of Liberia. We notice that the English of the girls is much better than that of their teacher.

We end our visit to Liberia at an Italian restaurant. We don't like the food at the hacienda that much and this Italian is very tasteful. When we receive the receipt it is not right at all. We think that it is much too cheap but everything we ate is on the receipt. As usual we have to leave the receipt behind after paying but we keep on thinking about it when we drive back to the hacienda. Probably the computer in the cash register didn't work properly, which is odd since one buys a cash register because it should be more reliable and easier than calculating by hand.

Night jars fly in front if our car in the dark. They stay put until the last minute and than suddenly flitter in the light of the headlamps and startle us.

Arriving at the Hacienda Guachipelín we find that the large Dutch group is gone. Only one German couple stayed behind. That is why they have kept the kitchen open just for us, which we feel bad about. If we had known this than we would have come here to eat anyhow. But on the other hand, the staff seems glad that they can close so early. Together with the cowboys that also arrived by now they now can have a long and noisy sit in front of the television.

Next: Montezuma