Day Eight: Costa Rica

Dear Reader, Come with me as we wind through our harrowing escapade. And remember this, at least you have the luxury of knowing we made it as you are reading the account, unlike I who did not know if I would be accounting!

An early start as we have a very full day upon docking in Puntarenas, Costa Rica. We meet our guide Ivan and bus driver Juan at the dock for a full day's adventure. We drive out of Punta-Renas or Sandy Point (hey, we have a Sandy Point too! I'm from Massachusetts! [inside McDonald joke]). But we are not touring the town or the coastal area. We are beginning our two-and-a-half hour ascent to the mountaintops.

We are on the Jewels of Monteverde tour. We spend one hour on the Pan American highway and then our tour bus turns off onto the dirt and rock road. Bennett has already checked our motor coach and we are impressed to be in a rugged Mercedes Benz model. Ah, but the climb. Up, up, up 1,500 meters above sea level. Talk about hairpin turns. The road is a lane-and-a-half wide so when we meet another vehicle, they back up a while until we can pass.

On my right is sheer beauty but straight down a precipitous drop the whole time. And of course, no guard rails. But up we lumber. Ivan is another terrific guide. He is a professor at the community college, teaching the students a tourism curriculum as his English is perfect and his background is biology. So, a natural fit for the ecotourism rage. Grand indeed. He points out the living fences - branches stuck in the ground that sprout into trees that are of a special species that help innoculate the cattle against insect diseases when they nibble. And the cattle, everywhere.

Finally, we reach the top. We are in Monte Verde (green forest or green mountain). We follow Ivan on a two hour walk across, atop the forest. We navigate across eight swinging bridges. oh, they are spectacularly fun. We could be in a movie but we are not - this is for real! We look down down to the dense greenery. Ivan points out trees and birds. Butterflies (mariposas) flutter. The air is cool. Life is good and green.

When we return from the walk, the beginning point has a lovely restaurant. The food is simple but delicious. Sea bass, arroz (I still savor the arroz), veggies, salad. Then Ivan takes us into the Hummingbird Garden. A small delight where hummingbirds whiz past your ear. You can see their purple throats, green wings, so many varieties and Ivan knows them all. You could touch them but they are too fast; you can certainly hear them hum. A "gumbolimbo" saunters in (part possum, part racoon, part who knows, it is certainly something I have never seen before).

Then the museo de insectos. Dedicated to insects, butterflies mainly. The butterflies are the Jewels of Monte Verde. Everywhere the wall is covered with art objets comprising oh so many glorious butterflies and other bugly critters. Don't worry, there is a whole explanation of how this is fine for the environment. The guides are proud of their ecology and of their English. They are Ivan's former students. Everywhere, is a former student of Ivan's. As our bus had passed through a small (small) town, his cell phone rang. Another former student had spotted our bus and called. Ivan is a man of accomplishment. He truly knows joy for he has shared it with natives and visitors.

Time to lumber back down the mountain. I am looking forward to a siesta on the motorcoach ride back as it has been a pleasantly exhausting day. We will be back three hours before the boat departs and all is well. I start to fade and then crack crack crunch crunch. We go a few hundred feet more and Juan stops the bus. He gets out. He is gone a long ten minutes. He comes back and speaks excitedly to Ivan. Finally, Ivan says he will "diga el gente" and he then turns and says we have a small problem, the suspension hose has broken, but not to worry, Juan can fix it. Juan works on the bus for half an hour or so. Now, mind you, dear reader, we are on that dirt road hanging off the mountain. Juan returns and keeps speaking excitedly to Ivan but he does get behind the wheel and drives us on. The bus cheers, I do not. I know to wait and see if the repairs will take.

Ivan explains that the "air bag" that keeps up the left side of the bus (the suspension) has a problem but that Juan can drive us through it, slowly and carefully. Only we have nearly the entire dirt road to go as we had not been on the road long, when the hose or whatever had broken. So we lurched at a snail's pace. And scraped bottom. And thought about that long tumble off the side when we took the hairpin turns but the bus did not lean properly. Luckily, Juan is un driver excelente. But alas, he cannot keep the bus moving for long as the scrape scrape scrape continues. He stops again, he fiddles again. He gets back behind the wheel again. We stop three more times for twenty minutes or so. He has to take the long way back (the long way!?!?) to avoid the gully we had just managed to transverse with a healthy motorcoach on the way up. Ivan tells us a rescue bus will meet us somewhere; we must keep scraping forward and leaning to the left until then. It is a long way down. Pretty soon, I begin to wonder if the ship's captain is really serious when he says the ship leaves on time, whether you are back on board or not.

The scenery is beautiful but . . . . We see an occasional cowboy. We see a teeny church and can see the people on their knees praying, pray for us! It takes seemingly forever. Which is more harrowing - turning the corners on the cliff or thinking of that ship leaving us for Panama? At long last, Juan makes it to the Pan American Highway. As we drive slowly down the paved two-lane highway, we see oncoming cars pointing and gawking at us. Hmmm. We do get to see five monkeys climb on the tree right over us. Now that is a treat.

And finally, we make it to the pier, twenty minutes before shove-off. We never spotted a rescue bus . . . But we do give Juan a hand. When we get off the bus and walk away, I turn back. Now I see why the people were pointing at us. Our bus was literally listing to the port. It must have been a good six to ten inches lower on one side than the other. A lopsided Mercedes Benz.

We get back on board. Go up to one of the outdoor bars. Get a table on the very aft. Have a drink (well, two) and watch as beautiful Costa Rica fades away into the night horizon. A repast to accompany the drinks: sushi, salad, stir fry all with the freshest ingredients you pick yourself so nothing you don't like and everything you do like. And finally to bed. Home sweet home, our royal suite.