Today was certainly an interesting and new experience for me, both culturally and personally. I will start off with this morning. I got up at 6AM and was ready to roll out the door by 6:30. Just as I predicted, my father and I arrived at the airport about 45 minutes early but I soon, and happily, found out that James was already there so I wouldn’t be waiting alone. We waited around and everyone showed up one by one, and as soon at 8:00 rolled around everyone was there except for the Doug, Linda, Jack and Noreen (who called to say she was running late). I then decided that I needed breakfast. The Wendy’s kiosk thing was open so I figured I would get a hamburger but much to my surprise they had breakfast. I never knew that Wendy’s had breakfast, so I guess that was a new experience. As I was eating we sorted everything out among the group and then went to check out luggage. After that, we waited through the security line (Doug got us into the short line because he is special or something) and I had two interesting conversations with security people. The first one went like this;
“How tall are you?” Said the security guy.
“About 6’7’’”, I said.
“Wow, I could still dunk on you though,” replied the security guy.
“I’m sure you could, I don’t play basketball” I laughingly replied.
After I got past that the woman who was checking the baggage x-rays pointed at my stuff and said “Is that yours?”
“Yes.”
“I need you to walk over there and put your hands on the wall.” She said, sternly.
“Okay…” I said, confused.
“Hahaha, I was just joking, you’re the first person who actually didn’t argue with me.” Said the lady, laughing. I walked off thinking how that was kind of an evil joke.
Eventually we all made it through security and boarded the plane. The flight was boring but there was a Guster song in the in-flight movie they showed, so that was kind of exciting (the song was Satellite and the movie was Martian Boy if you were curious). The man who sat next to me on the plane was really nice and one of the other guys near me ended up being the owner of a bar in downtown Athens. That was kind of a small world run-in.
After about four hours we landed at the airport in Liberia, which was a completely open-air airport with steps that they pulled up to the plane. It was kind of cool and interesting at the same time. I’ve never seen anything like that before; I guess it just shows you the difference between the countries.
As you can see, the airport was a far cry from Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta.
“Johnny”, our bus driver, picked us up and we headed on our way to the eco-lodge. Doug told Johnny to stop at a supermarket so we could get some snacks. That was another experience in itself. For one, I was getting strange looks because I am so tall and had to duck under things in the supermarket. I found out the difference between the dollar and the colón (the currency of Costa Rica). Things were really cheap and it was about 500 Colónes to the dollar. We left the supermarket and went through the town, which was really interesting.
As we were leaving Liberia we got caught in some kind of siesta parade.
There were a lot of people and it was kind of funny that we drove through the siesta. After we got out of Liberia we got onto the Pan-American highway, which stretches from Alaska to Argentina or so I am told. In Costa Rica it looks like this.
The scenery on the side of the road was a lot of this. It was very pretty, but nothing compared to what I saw later.
After about an hour or so, maybe 90 minutes, I wasn’t keeping track of time, we stopped at a restaurant that was all by itself on the side of the road and apparently Johnny was known there for bringing customers because as he sat down they brought out what I assume was his “usual” and then proceeded to serving us. We all got the chicken and rice, which turned out to be excellent.
It also ended up only costing about $6 a person, which is really cheap considering the amount of food we got. I also got a decent portrait of Doug.
There were some beautiful red flowers on a tree outside, so I took a picture of that as well.
We left after we were all done eating and stayed on the Pan-American a little while longer but then took a left off onto an all dirt road, which has a lot to do with my title. That road went up to Monte Verde and was the windiest, bumpiest road I have ever been on, and to top that off we were on it for two hours. However, there was a silver lining to this hellacious bus ride. The views were spectacular. I am talking views that blow Philmont out of the water, and this was just driving up the mountain. I took several pictures but it was difficult because for one, I was shooting over my shoulder and two, the bus was bouncing all over the place.
There were views like that around every corner. It was simply amazing, and the best part is that the views were beautiful enough to distract from the gut wrenchingly bumpy bus ride.
Everyone got really excited when we saw the UGA sign on and a turn off because it meant that the ride was coming to an end, which was good for me because I don’t know how much longer I could have taken it. We pulled up to the main center area, I forget what it is called and as Doug went to get the keys to out Cabinas we saw one of the local birds. I was inclined to take a few pictures.
The bird is called the Motmot and is really common at the Eco-lodge, but that didn’t take away from it being beautiful.
Doug emerged from the main office place and we headed to the Cabinas which are quite possibly the most beautiful “hotel rooms” I have stayed in. I will take some pictures tomorrow and put them up so you can see them. This place is simply amazing. I really hope we can get moved to the Cabinas on the other side (where Chris, Hudson, and Hunter luckily got to stay) because the view there is amazing and a lot like what we saw driving up. I can only imagine waking up and seeing that in the morning.
We had about an hour before dinner so we just relaxed and explored. I found out that I forgot two essential things, one of which was the good flashlight I intended to bring and the other was a watch or my phone charger. I guess I will just have to depend on other people for the time.
Dinner was simply splendid. I didn’t get to take a picture of it because I decided not to bring my camera, but I can just say that it was really good. Everything was fresh and I assume organic. The coffee was wonderful (I forgot to mention that I had coffee with lunch too and it was equally as good), the rice and beans were heavenly and the vegetables were some of the best and freshest I have ever had. I am really looking forward to the rest of my meals here.
I found out that tomorrow I am going to get up at 6AM and go bird watching, which should be a lot of fun. Then I have breakfast after that and I have no idea what the rest of the day holds in store but I know it will be fun. For now though, I am going to bed because I am exhausted.
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