Monteverde is a beautiful small town with old world charm
1 horse power or 100 horse power…
and a modern life style with lots of shops and tourist adventures like zip lining, rock climbing, and hiking the nine hanging bridges. We opted to take the morning off and just walk around town.
Remember these Kodak signs…
We went in and out of the many souvenir shops and looked at the unique items.
Souvenirs abound…Butterflies of Costa Rica…
There is a lot of beautiful hand crafted wood furniture available in this area and they will make to order if you know what you want.
Wood table tops…Mango wood vases…
Suzi loved these hand carved mango wood vases.
In the afternoon we joined our other tour mates for a tour of the Don Juan Coffee plantation.
Don Juan Coffee, Monteverde, Costa Rica…
We saw the coffee plants
In the coffee fields…
and Cacao trees growing and learned about harvest techniques,
Coffee & chocolate drying…
drying, grading,
The coffee roaster…
roasting and finally
Which roast do you like…
drinking and eating.
Fresh ground chocolate…Suzi meets Don Juan…
We also got to see the process used to turn sugar cane
Hand grinding sugar cane…More grinding…
into brown and white sugar,
The syrup of their labor…
molasses and Costa Rican moonshine known as “Guaro”.
Our “chariot’ arrives…
One final treat was a ride in a true Ox cart.
Twin ox boost…The view from behind the tails…Seating for as many as you can pack in…
Who knew ox carts have no suspension?
Our hotel in Monteverde…
Our last day on the tour was a travel day back to San Jose, Costa Rica. We checked out of our hotel in Monteverde and boarded our bus back to the big city.
On the bus again…
Along the way, we saw beautiful vistas,
Costa Rica countryside…
and even some wild life just hanging out in the trees.
We awoke the next morning with the Arenal Volcano as our daily wallpaper.
Arenal Volcano…
After breakfast, we checked out of our hotel, boarded our trusty bus and took the short drive to the trailhead up the side of the volcano to the lava flow.
We were there…
Positioned within Costa Rica’s fertile northern lowlands, the Arenal Volcano, Costa Rica’s best known volcano, is an unavoidable presence while traveling within this part of the country. It is tall and imposing and has a reputation that precedes itself. Arenal’s perfectly symmetrical shape makes it a sightseer’s dream. Until 2010, it was Costa Rica’s most active volcano. Much to the enjoyment of its visitors, Arenal spewed enormous amounts of lava, gas and ash on a regular basis. That eruptive cycle – which began with the infamous eruption of 1968 – ended recently. In October 2010, Arenal entered into an indeterminate resting phase. For the time being, visitors will be unable to watch the much-loved explosions, although that could easily change anytime.
The trail…Blueberries, NOT for eating…Natural grasses…Whip Tail Lizard…Beautiful wildflowers…Another Whip Tail lizard…Tour friends walking the trail…Stairway to lava…Lake Arenal…Top of the trail, still that far to the top…
We then boarded our bus for the trip to Monteverde, Costa Rica, home to the Monteverde Cloud Forrest Reserve and one of Costa Rica’s major ecotourism destinations.
Just a short note here. On the way to Monteverde, our bus had a cooling issue.
Losing water…
Ricardo and our driver, Jose, tried everything they could think of to nurse the bus to the next stop. Finally, when it was to no avail, Ricardo called the Don Juan Coffee plantation
Don Juan Coffee…
and they arrived shortly with vans to take us on into Monteverde. A big thumbs up to Ricardo and our driver for all their efforts and a “thanks” to Don Juan Coffee for providing rides for us, NOT in the ox cart.
which first headed to Arenal, the home of Arenal Volcano. As we traveled through the countryside, one stop we made was in Sarchi, home to the Guinness Book of Records’ world’s largest ox cart
The World’s Largest Ox Cart…
and also an ox cart factory where ox carts are built and meticulously hand painted.
Artist hard at work…
Ox carts started out as a way to transport goods and people from town to town and from inland towns to the sea ports.
History, by the wheels…
In the early 20th century, families began painting the carts and the style of painting could be used to tell what area and what family the ox cart came from.
History on wheels…
As more modern ways of transporting goods and people came about, ox carts were used less and less but the painting got more elaborate.
A wheel being renovated…Work in progress. All done by hand….
Currently, ox carts are used mostly in parades and celebrations but are even still used for transportation for some local farmers.
Another stop on the way to Arenal was at a local school that Gate1 Tours has “adopted” and provides with some support. As we drove up,
Anxiously waiting for the bus to arrive…
all the kids were waiting for our bus. As we got off the bus,
Being escorted to class…
a child took each of us by the hand and escorted us into their school. We sat down and watched as the children performed local dances for us.
Tiny dancer…Even coaxed some of the Gate1 folks to dance…
They sang the Costa Rican National Anthem and
Singing for us…
God Bless America for us. Then, they showed us around the school,
The computer lab…
the computer lab, lunch room, and playground. It was obvious to us that they took great pride in their school. Our visit came to an end and we loaded back up in our bus and headed to our first overnight stay at the foot of the Arenal Volcano.
Arenal Volcano…
It’s much cooler in Arenal than San Jose and the cool air was a welcomed pleasure. We stayed in La Fortuna at a lovely hotel
Our “Hotel”…
with a great view of the volcano.
The volcano from our casita…
Our first full day by the Arenal Volcano, we hopped aboard our trusty bus and headed toward the border of Nicaragua and Costa Rica to the town of Cano Negro for a boat ride down the Cano Negro river. As we headed across the green country side, our tour guide, Ricardo, said we were going to stop and see some of his “family”. We stopped and he went to the fruit stand and bought some bananas. As he came back,
Did you say bananas???…
several LARGE iguanas
We LIKE bananas…
appeared from the bushes and began clambering for the bananas.
Bananas good…
A real feeding frenzy.
Just hanging out…
Back on our bus again, we made our way to the Cano Negro river. Once there, we got on the boat, said good bye to our fans on the dock,
Our fans…
and headed down the river. Our guide, Ricardo, was excellent at pointing out all of the various wildlife along and in the river…including a crocodile with babies, bats on a tree, lizards, turtles, monkeys and even a water cow!
Momma and the “kids”…Crocodile…Great American Egret…Can you spot the bats?Here they are…Long Nose Bats…I’m flying…NOT…High up in the trees…Montezuma Oropendola…The border…
Time to turn around…
Sitting in the shade… Cormorant…Hanging around…Howler Monkey…Watching for food…Boat Billed Heron…Laying in the sun…River Slider Turtle…Drying the wings…Colorful lizard…Basalisk LizardMore wing drying…Anhinga…
Once we arrived back at the dock, we boarded our bus and headed back to our hotel, looking forward to the next adventures on this tour. Oh, here’s the picture of the water cow…
Our good friends from New Mexico came down to spend a week with us and see why we were so excited to go to Panama.
Wayne, Penny, Suzi and Me…
So, one of the places they wanted to see, was the Panama Canal. We boarded our little coaster bus to the main road (30¢) and caught the bus into Panama City and Albrook Mall. ($2.50)
Bus station at the mall…
From there, we went through the mall and got a ticket for the Hop-On, Hop Off tour bus. It’s $30 a head but you can hop on and off for 24 hours.
Hop-on, Hop-off bus…
We enjoyed the tour until we got to the Miraflores Locks Visitor Center. We got off the bus and bought our tickets for the locks.
Once inside we went right to the theater and watched the 10 minute movie on building the locks. It has early history and even later history including what led to the American turn over of the locks to Panama. Once the film was over, we went into the museum. The museum has four floors and includes exhibits about building the canal up to and including the new canal expansion project.
Early Steam Shovel…Early Dredge…Info Card…
There were displays on the different wildlife that can be found in the area.
Native Butterfly…Beetle…
There were displays of the lock control room…
Lock Control Room…
And even a chance to “pilot ” a ship through the locks…
Suzi tries out for Captain…The view out the windows…
Info and pictures about the expansion…
The Expansion Project…
It’s a very informative and well done museum. Once we were done with the museum, it was time to head out to the viewing decks and see the locks and hopefully a ship going through the locks in person.
You can view the locks from 3 locations. The top floor of the museum, which has a snack bar, the second floor, which has a full restaurant, or the ground floor. We decided to check out the restaurant on the second floor since we had a bit of time to kill before the next ship came through. At the time of this writing, ships DON’T go through the locks between 10am and 2pm. Turns out, there is a very nice restaurant on the second level. It was a buffet ($37.00 per person) the day we were there and the outside seating was by reservation only. However, inside seating was open. So we ate from the buffet and then we saw the first ship coming toward the locks
First of two ships…
We watched as it drew closer and they lined it up with the channel…
Making adjustments…
Just a tip here, you can reserve seating outside to watch the ships go through the canal, but if you do, those of us who are eating inside will just come out and crowd the rail anyway.
The crowd gathers…Fourth floor viewing area…Heading to the gates…These locks are small…Everybody’s watching now…Young…And old alike…Going down…Almost there…Locks open and…The journey continues…Going down again…Almost finished…The Pacific Ocean awaits…
My wife and I loved coming here because it was just a year and a half ago that we were viewing the visitor center from the deck of a ship
The view from ON a ship…These engines keep the ships centered in the locks…The gates of the locks…
Without that cruise, we wouldn’t have known what a beautiful country Panama is, and we might not have decided to come here at all.
