3rd January – La Fortuna, Costa Rica

Yesterday Tan and I made a deal that we would go white water river rafting on the Class 2 / 3 rapids (I preferred the 3 and 4 rapids) if Tan come canyoneering. Canyoneering is a mix of walking along a caonyon and abseiling down cliff faces next to and within waterfalls. Sounds like fun doesn’t it!!

Last night we were woken with some really heavy rain falls and it rained for most of the night. The hotel we are staying at, Lomas el Volcanes, is a lovely spot with cabins spaced apart on the flanks of Arenal volcano, Costa Rica’s most active volcano. The aim of staying in La Fortuna was to see the volcano erupting with glowing fountains of lava. This morning the volcano was covered in cloud.

Our bus picked us up and then we hit a gravel road where we transferred to the back of a four wheel drive. After 20 minutes in the back on the rough road we made it up the hill. We geared up and walked down to our first waterfall. Now due to the geography, the first abseil happened to be the biggest, 55m or 165 feet tall. We got our safety briefing and I was glad to see they were double roping. That is, a guy on the bottom could pull the rope to stop you and another fellow could control your ascent from the top if needed. Tan at this stage was a little concerned, mainly because she doesn’t like heights, pushing herself past her comfort level and she was still unsure on throwing herself off the 55m cliff without a practice. Two people could descend the cliff at the same time, so I hung over the edge waiting for Tan. It took her a little while to get the courage up to start descending and she didn’t enjoy it all. Once she got to the bottom of the 55m, I could see she was scared.
After some reassurance, Tan (in the blue helmet, mine was white) was now fired up to do the next one. Albeit, somewhat smaller, this time is was down the centre of a ravine with water falling through it. This abseil was awesome. At the bottom you got pummeled by the water, which was definitely an experience. The water levels were up higher due to the amount of rain we had the previous day and night.

Tan at this stage had conquered her fear and was hitting the descents with fun and laughter. Yay!

A 25m dry canyon wall and two more waterfalls ascents and we had finished. Canyoneering is so much fun! (Tan wants to do it again!) When we got back to the cars we found out the white water rafting was cancelled today due to high and fast flowing water levels which was a shame. We ended up having some rice and beans, a traditional Costa Rican dish.

After being chilled to the bone with the cold water, all we wanted was a hot shower. To our bitter disappointment, the high winds blew out our pilot light so we had no hot water. To make it even worse, every single cabin belonging to our group members had no hot water either and this was the case last night as well.

We all headed into town, after asking the hotel to fix it, cold, miserable but still buzzing from the canyoneering. The group had a few beers, yucca chips (it a root of a tree which tastes similar to potato with a different texture) and guacamole at the Lava Lounge. Yum. Tan, Elaine and I walked the streets of La Fortuna looking in souvenir shops (yawn), galleries and ended up in the soda. A soda here is a cheap eatery. We ended up swapping travel stories over a cup of hot chocolate.

For dinner, the Lava Lounge (again) was the spot where we met the rest of the group. The sea bass was good but not as good as the one in San Jose.

We had 90 seconds of hot water that night, not enough to get us warm after a pretty poor fix up job by the hotel.

At 3am the sea bass didn’t agree with me, but my stomach isn’t always the best when I travel. Still, it doesn’t stop from trying different foods and beverages.