Unfortunately, Andrew and I are back from our vacation to Costa Rica. We had the most amazing time you could ever imagine! As promised, I’m going to give yall some of the highlights from our trip! We will definitely be going back to Costa Rica and we highly recommend it as a vacation spot for any adventurous people!
We stayed at the Occidental Grand Papagayo Resort in the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica. It’s about 20 minutes from the Liberia International Airport. The resort is absolutely beautiful, although like most of the resorts in CR, it sits up in the mountain side (All the beaches are public) so there’s a lot of walking up hills and stairs. I wouldn’t recommend this resort for a handicapped or elderly person. There was so much wildlife on this resort property it was unbelievable! We saw pretty birds, howler monkeys, and coaties (raccoon/ant-eater looking things) every day.
The first full day we were in CR we went to another resort called Borinquen. This place is gorgeous! We got on horses and rode them up the mountain to the top of the zip line. Then we zip lined down the mountain through the rainforest. Zip lining was so much fun. The first two lines were over this huge beautiful waterfall! I’m not sure Andrew really enjoyed it as much as me, it kind of made him nervous. When we got to the bottom of the mountain we had lunch and then went to the bottom of the volcano (There’s like 11 active volcanoes in CR) and we took a mud bath in the hot volcanic mud. After rinsing the mud off we sat in the hot springs that are heated by the volcano. this water is like 248 degrees F, so it is cooled off with cold river water, but even then it’s still hotter than any hot tub!
The next day we went deep-sea fishing on a boat called the Black Marlin. This was the part of the trip that Andrew was really excited about. Before we left we got those sea sick patches from the doctor, but they didn’t help Andrew. He got so sick it was unreal! I felt so bad for him! We did catch 2 100lb sailfish and a big Mahi Mahi! It was amazing seeing those big fish jumping out of the water!
The next day we caught a ride to one of the national parks around a volcano and hiked through the park. I bet we walked 20 miles that day! Let me tell you, these are not Americanized hiking trails either! You are literally just walking through the jungle! There are places that are so steep and you are basically climbing up rocks on the side of a mountain! It was a pretty intense workout! We really enjoyed seeing all the volcano vents, boiling streams, waterfalls, and boiling mud pots. There’s also a huge beautiful waterfall that we got to swim in! The water was super freezing though!
Our last day in CR was probably my absolute favorite day of the entire trip! We took the Palo Verde river trip with a guide named Larry who has a degree in tropical biology. Before the trip he told us to bring a lot of bananas from the hotel so we snagged several from the buffet at breakfast. We were cruising down the river when we saw some Capuchin monkeys in the trees on the bank so we pulled up on the bank and offered them some bananas. One brave monkey came over to our boat to check things out and got some food from us. Then, all of a sudden, there were like 100 monkeys on the boat with us! They were all over the boat! In our laps, on our head, on our shoulders! They all wanted some bananas! They are pretty rude little creatures too, they would snatch the bananas from your hands! Our guide called them “White faced gangster monkeys” haha. Seeing all the monkeys and being that close to them in the wild was truly amazing! Ohh and Andrew got peed on! One of the monkeys was sitting on his shoulder and all of a sudden it just started peeing on him! It was absolutely hilarious!! We also saw giant crocodiles. Apparently this river has the largest number of crocodiles in one place than any other river. They were seriously huge too! Scary!
Overall, we had an amazing time during our week in Costa Rica. I would highly recommend visiting this country to anyone! It’s extremely safe! If anyone has any questions or wants to know anything about the country, please ask me! Comment, go to my contact page, or email me!
Raising Rowletts 