Our stay at Steve and Jocelyn, originally planned to last for two days finally grew to six. Steve was able to locate an additional problem in the transmission, and we had to take it down and replace a part that broke in the accident. He spent a lot of time driving me back and forth to Liberia for frequent visits to the Toyota dealership, and I hope one day I will be able to help him as much as he helped me.
Meanwhile, Jocelyn was cooking us delicious food that gave us a break from Central America meals.
On Sunday we stopped at Playa Conchal before saying goodbye. After a few hours brake, we took the road to the highlands, in direction of the Arenal volcano. Quickly, as we were going up, we realized the weather on the other side of the mountain was really bad.
What a contrast with the hot and windy weather we had previously. As we entered the rain forest it was – guess what – raining really hard. The visibility was low as well. To admire the Laguna Arenal, it was not a problem as the fog was adding to the dramatic splendor of the lake and the jungle. But we had to forget about seeing the active volcano.
We could not even see the base of it, in fact. Sad story, but I shall survive, since I already saw the monster in action a few years back.
At the end of the day, we passed the town of La Fortuna, and as the night was falling, we reached our destination.
Lucy and Mark invited us few days back to spend a night on the ground of their unusual hotel. Mark, another refugee from journalism, used to be a sports writer in a newspaper in Hawaii. He is now on a sabbatical leave with his wife, and together, they manage the tree house hotel. Guests rent a cabana built on trees and can enjoy fully the rain forest.
We had diner with the couple, and decided to go explore the vast forest behind the hotel the following day. I stayed few more hours with Mark drinking a bottle of red wine, and watching the rainfall. It continued all night and we got somewhat wet, which is not really a big deal, since last time we saw heavy rain was back in the U.S.
We woke up at 5:30 a.m. to go for a two-hours walk in the forest. There we got drenched. The rain hadn’t stop all night, and it looked like it will not stop for the next 200 years.
We found a lot of orange, banana and lemon trees in the jungle, as well as a lot of other fruits I could not identify. There was a cascade down the road, as well as a river, which brown water was flowing intensely.
Back on our campsite, I folded back the tent and we had breakfast with our hosts.
We are now back on the road driving south, toward the Pacific Ocean. Two more days in Costa Rica, and we will – hopefully – be in Panama.
