Hot Springs, Horses, and Canopies

This weekend's adventure was definitely much different than the last! Instead of beautiful beaches with white side and clear waters, we were off to a volcano and a cloud forest! This weekend, Amber and I left bright and early Friday morning to head to the Arenal Volcano (I think the most "famous" volcano here in Costa Rica) We had booked a hostel online and wandered around town for awhile trying to find it. We walked past one place about three times before we went in because it had the name of our hostel on a sign but also a different name. We told the lady we had a reservation and she didn't ask my name, had no idea how many nights we were going to be there, no idea how many people, and we just plain got a terrible impression from the place. After she brought us to our "room" she told us she didn't have a key for us.. YEAH after about 3 minutes of contemplation we left and went to a tourist place, got on the internet, canceled that one, and looked up a different one. We ended up at a cute little hostel called Hotel Dorothy with a very welcoming man named Carlos that greeted and helped us out right away. He told us that if we could be ready in about an hour he would take us to Baldi Hot Springs (a resort made in the hot springs of Volcan Arenal) from 1:00-3:00, pick us up to take us on a hike of the Volcano from 3:15-6:00, then back to Baldi Hot Springs for some swimming and dinner until 9:30. The lunch that was included, was FANTASTIC!!! We each got to chose an appetizer, so I had heart of palm salad, then garlic sea bass with veggies and cheesey mashed potatoes for main course, and a delicious cheese cake for dessert came out as soon as we were finished! It also included a delicious mango smoothie! I attempted to take a picture of the sea bass, but it just didn't up too great. However, the picture of the excellent cheesecake dessert showed up just fine =) So after we had our fantastic lunch, we wandered around the place for awhile and let our stomachs digest before heading off to the volcano hike. We went to a place called Arenal 1968. It is called that because, obviously, the name of the volcano, and then in 1968 there was an eruption so bad that it destroyed three small villages.
This website talks a little bit about the eruption, I'm sure you could google more to find out all about it!

http://www.arenal.net/arenal-volcano-1968-eruption.htm

On our tour, our guide stopped and told us all about the plants and what they are used for, such as making mosquito repellent, helping with fevers, curing diabetes, etc. It seemed as though every plant had some sort of purpose in natural healing, it was pretty cool. And then... our tour guide ate termites.. EWWW.. they were "natural" and apparently are full of protein and taste like carrots. He told us that if we were ever stranded that we could eat them and be fine. Then we hiked up further to the volcano and saw huge boulders of lava rock that destroyed the villages, it was pretty crazy. This is apparently one of the "smaller" boulders that crashed through the villages. It was seriously crazy seeing all of this and realizing that just 40 some years ago it was three villages. We continued hiking up and went to two view points of the volcano, very pretty.

I was kinda bummed that a cloud was covering the top of the volcano, but still pretty cool!

That night we headed back for some dinner, time in the hot springs, and just 1 drink.. they were 8 DOLLARS a piece.. our tour guide told us that during "high season" drinks are like 11.00 or 12.00 dollars.. ridiculous! The hot springs ranged in temperatures from 52 to 152 degrees Fahrenheit. Obviously the one that was 152 degrees was not for going in, more or less just for show and for people to feel, it was INSANELY hot. So we hung out there, met some fun people, and headed back to our hostel for a good night sleep!The next morning we were off to Monteverde (a town not too far away but up a lot higher) to meet the other girls! Now, we didn't just hop on a bus to go over there, oh no. We started by getting picked up from our hostel, drove down to Lake Arenal, took a boat across Lake Arenal (gorgeous views), walked up into the woods, and got on our horses!! My horse's name was "Rocky Balboa" oh dear goodness were my first thoughts! Turns out he was 4 years old, has been doing this trail for awhile, and was a very gentle, fun horse.

Our horses were buddies and were constantly "joking around" on the trail! It was pretty entertaining and made it a lot of fun!

Rocky seemed like he was bored and liked to go "off-roading" with me and tried going down a trail he wasn't supposed to! He was always going back and forth along the trail and fighting over the lead with Amber's horse. Our guide also had a VERY adorable little dog that came the whole way with us! She was sooo cute and added to the adventure. Another thing that added to the adventure was the SNAKE we saw just hanging out in the middle of the path. I thought that horses were spooked by snakes, but thank goodness we just trotted right on over that snake.

Yeah, the guide took this picture. NO WAY was I going back.Amber and I in front of Arenal Volcano

Our horse back ride was about 3 hours, and manoman was my behind SORE! Definitely not used to riding horses, that's for sure! When we got to Monteverde, we took a nap =) The girls and I went to grab some dinner, then went to get some wine/chocolates, and just sat in the hostel talking until we all hit the hay. The next morning we woke up to go zip lining through the canopy of the Cloud Forest in Monteverde. Unreal. I have never been zip lining before, so I was a bit nervous. But, wow, it was such an amazing experience! I brought my camera, but it was impossible to take pictures of my views from the zip line. There were 11 lines, a bridge, a repel, and a tarzan swing. The tarzan swing was so fun! They didn't really tell us what we were getting into until we got to the top. I took a video, and I will try to put it on here, but basically we walked up a bunch of stairs, the strapped us in, told us to hold onto a rope, and PUSHED us right off.. we went FLYING up to the top of the canopy and then back toward the platform we were pushed off of. It was quite the rush and I would definitely do it again! Another cool thing was the very last line we got to "superman". So instead of just sitting like a typical zip line, we were hooked up by our butts and backs and we "laid down" so we looked like superman flying through the sky. The views were so pretty and we actually zip lined through the clouds, pretty cool!

We got a little bit dirty!With two of our guides, they had fun messing with tourists!

It was quite the eventful, fun weekend, and muuuch different than our weekend at the beach! My next big adventure begins a week from Wednesday when JOSH AND HANNAH GET HERE!! I am definitely very excited to see them and spend time with them on the beach and I am definitely taking them zip lining!
Last week at placement number 1, onto placement number 2 next week!
My internet works a lot better now and I will be adding plenty more pictures to the Picasa site.. miss everyone so much!