Monteverde

On Tuesday morning we left the wonderful paradise near the Arenal Volcano for a new adventure - the cloudforest of Monteverde. Only problem was that it was a four hour drive through treacherous and unpaved roads. It seems the original settlers of Monteverde (Quakers) did not want to share their land, so the friends made sure that no one paved the roads. The drive was arduous, but we made it thanks to Megan's pothole avoidance skills. On Tuesday afternoon, we stopped at Pizza de Johnny's for a bite and then checked in to the Montana Monteverde hotel. That night it rained and rained (I guess that's why they call it the rainforest). We dined at "Moon Shiva" - a cool Mediterranean place with live music. When we got back to our room, we found a small scorpion so Karyn and I slept under a mosquito net. It rained and thunderstorms lit the room with lightening every 10 seconds or so. On Wednesday, we visited Selvatura park. The rain subsided in the morning and we went on a canopy tour (pics and videos above!). We went swinging through the jungle on zip lines including a real life Tarzan swing (see my video). The canopy tour was much better than the one we did in Arenal - one of the cables was 500m long and I was going so fast that I felt the wind ripple the skin on my face. After the zip lines, we visited a butterfly garden, a hummingbird area, the insect museum and a reptile exhibit. Dan, Megan and Karyn went on a wet hike on the hanging bridges, while I chilled out and slept in the gift shop. We also met Charlie - a peccary, which is a boar-like creature (Click on the link to see what Charlie looked like). Coincidentally, Karyn sells peccary gloves!