Costa Rica

Today has been one of those days you never, ever forget!

Micky - if you read this, when you get to Monteverde you just have to do the zip line and hanging bridges trip. I've never zip lined before, so once I'd done the practice one I thought it was a piece of cake ....

....then they put you in the sky tram and take you way up to the top of the mountain, into the cloud cover, way above the forest canopy and that's when you start to question your sanity! 

From the start, on a clear day you have the Pacific Ocean on one side and the Caribbean on the other. Today we just had cloud and it was blowing a gale! There are 6 zip lines in all and on the first two you step off the staging post and vanish into the cloud ....fortunately on the lower ones you get the benefit of superb views down to the forest canopy and across to the ocean. Sadly, they don't let you take pictures on the line itself for safety reasons but it's just the most exhilarating experience! At the end you have to do a 60 foot vertical drop - not quite a bungie jump because they lower you quite slowly on a rope and pulley system. The whole thing is an absolutely unforgettable experience! 

Here's the sun setting over the Pacific Ocean - the view from our room! 

Sounds like a wonderful experience. I' not sure I'd be brave enough though 😲😲

Sounds great fun. I don't think I would get my OH to do it though.

Well that's something different to read about on CT! 

Thanks Moulesy, what a great thread and a great trip, thanks for posting

Yes, Mrs M declined the opportunity too! 

On a couple of the wires where you're going into the wind you have to zip in tandem with your legs wrapped around your partner's body. Because I was on my own it meant I had to wait for one of the instructors.

No great hardship as it  turned out! 

Well, thanks for your latest update, Moulesy.  I was looking forward to this then, at first reading, I suddenly had my doubts, now reading to the end I'm strangely excited!  Trouble is, MrsSf is far more up for such experiences than I am these days, not that I'd ever admit this to her. 

So now 'we' have to do it mind, on your recommendation. 👍 It better be that good!!

We left Monteverde yesterday morning heading for our final destination at Guanacaste on the Pacific Coast.  But not before an early morning visit to the hotel's humming bird feeding station. It's a fantastic little spot, so many beautiful colourful varieties of humming bird, but the little blighters move much too fast for my photographic skills - you need lightning reactions to get any more than these little blobs (you'll  need very good eyesight to spot them!). It was a fascinating 30 minutes. 

(We also had an early morning visit from this little fellow, a raccoon looking for breakfast tidbits right outside our window!)

Guanacaste is very different from any of the other places we've stayed at on the tour - right on the Pacific Coast,  it's  very modern and brash but still a nice place to spend the last couple of days of the holiday.

Today we had our final river tour on the Tempisque River and it turned out to be a spectacular one as far as wildlife spotting was concerned. 

Right at the start we saw this Banded Anteater asleep in a hollow tree stump. (We think there were actually two snuggled up together.)

Once on the river there were loads of crocodiles basking on the mud banks. Then this family of white faced monkeys who came right down to the boatside. A great place for bird watchers too with lots of different varieties of egrets and herons including this strange looking boat billed heron. A wonderful spectacle.

(And for the bird aficionados, through the binoculars we saw a pair of brilliant pink roseate spoonbills, a group of black backed stilts and a rare huge bird called, I think the guide said, a jabiru.)