I Should Have Never Got On A God Damn Boat

There would be no white Christmas for us in Costa Rica.  Although we were up in the clouds, the temperature still hovered around 70-plus degrees Fahrenheit.  I took a 6 AM stroll along some of the Monteverde Lodge's trails.  The only thing to see were a couple of birds, but it was a peaceful walk. 

A blue-crowned motmot sits on a bridge at the Monteverde Lodge.

We said our goodbyes to the Montaverde area and took a bumpy road down towards Guanacaste.  Once we were at sea level, the heat was a quick reminder that we were close to the equator.  At least the roads were back to normal.  The entire drive took us less than four hours.

By the time we had made the decision to come to Costa Rica, many of the hotels were already completely booked.  We eschewed the all-inclusive resorts because they wouldn't be worth it for us on this trip.  We had many activities planned and would be away from our hotel most of the day.  After much debate over the remaining options, we decided on Hotel Sugar Beach on Playa Portrero, just north of the Playa Flamingo area.

None of the hotels in Costa Rica have private beaches.  It’s a law that beach-side properties have to allow public access to everybody.  While this is a great policy that allows everybody to have access to the best beaches, it could also make them very crowded, especially during the holiday season.  We decided on Hotel Sugar Beach because it is far enough away from the major towns and tourist areas.  While it doesn't have the prettiest of beaches (black volcanic sand), it is sparsely occupied.  Pretty much everybody there is a guest of the hotel.  In fact, Hotel Sugar Beach does a good business with destination weddings.  Random beach-goers won't crash the ceremony, and those great wedding photographs won't be ruined by fat men in tiny Speedos in the background.

We would be staying in one of the master suites for the next few days.The Kids liked the room because one of the three English speaking television channels continuously reran old "Simpsons" cartoons.

This half of the suite was air-conditioned.

This half was useless as it remained too hot during the day.

 

The bathroom facilities were fine.

But the shower pressure was  a bit
too much on the weak side.

We would have had an incredible view of the beachfront... 

...from our balcony, but too many large trees blocked our vision.  

The view of the hotel's infinity pool from our balcony.

We had a late lunch at the hotel’s al fresco restaurant.  The food was okay but the service was very slow.  I suspect the waiters all moved at a snail's pace so that they wouldn't break a sweat in the heat and humidity.

Chicken tenders from the kids menu

Grilled chicken from the kid's menu

Ceviche

Guacamole with chips

Fish tacos

We spent the afternoon at the beach.  The hotel has snorkeling equipment and boogie boards that guests can borrow for free.  We tried boogie boarding.  It was a disaster.  The beach has several large rocks just at the edge of the water.  The Wife wiped out on one on her first attempt, getting some serious road rash on her leg in the process.  The Boy got his pinkie finger tangled in the board’s wrist strap, leading to a pretty deep gash.  The Girl didn't make it but just a few feet into the ocean because the rocks were hurting her feet too much.  I didn't get hurt, but I didn't have much success going fast on the boogie boards.  I guess the waves were too weak to push fat guys.

The beach in front of the hotel has very little crowds...or shade.

Under a copse of trees, amenities such as lounge chairs and massages are offered.

We also ate dinner later that night at the hotel’s restaurant.

Pita pizza

Seafood rice

Garlic shrimp

Chicken breast with passion fruit sauce

*****

Friday, December 26

I was awakened early the next morning by large waves crashing on the beach.  It was pretty windy outside making the ocean pretty choppy.  The hotel's restaurant doesn't open until 7 AM for breakfast.  We made do with cheese sandwiches and bananas.

Several white-throated magpie-jays flocked to our balcony hoping to get a nibble of our sandwiches.

We were picked up at 6:45 AM by Vicky, the owner of a sports fishing boat called the Wet Ass II.  She was an ex-pat who had moved down to Costa Rica six years ago.  She bought the boat from a long time sports fisherman and hired a crew of some Ticos—Glenn, the captain, and Manuel, the first mate.

The western coastline of Costa Rica has some great offshore sports fishing.  People can catch large sailfish, yellowfin tunas, mahi mahi, rooster fish, wahoo’s, etc.  Inshore there are smaller, easier fish like bonita, jacks, mackarels, etc.  We had the option of ½ day (4hrs inshore only), ¾ day (6 hrs offshore and inshore), and full day (8 hrs offshore and inshore).  We went with the ¾ charter hoping to mainly be offshore fishing for the larger sports fish.

There is no dock at Playa Flamingo.  Boats are accessed via water taxi.

Our ride for the next six hours

The Wetass II has all the amenities including a fighting chair, a powerful motor, and plenty of shade in the cabin.

Our view of the captain for pretty much the whole trip

There was plenty of space to deploy four
reels with some backups just in case.

During the trip, we used exclusively
artificial lures to attract the fish.

The inside cabin provides plenty of shade.  The only problem is that it gets really hot.

Sadly, we would have no use for this large hook.

What the boat didn't have was shock absorbers.  We weren't aware that the waves tend to get pretty rough during the end of the year.  The boat headed out to Catalina Island just west of Playa Flamingo.  Outside the protection of the Cove, the winds caused the boat to heave up and down on the larger waves.  In less than an hour on the boat, The Boy was leaning over the side vomiting.  Children’s dramamine is crap. 

The Boy gets busy fertilizing the water.

The crew trolled the waters around Catalina Island for an hour using artificial lures but didn’t get a single bite.  Then they turned the ship around and headed back into shore.  For the next 4-5 hours, the captain made loops back and forth as we caught about a dozen bonita.  There’s absolutely no challenge in catching these fish.  Plus, nobody (except the Japanese) eat these fish so we threw them all back.  It was nice that The Kids were able to catch some fish for the first time.  But after landing 2-3 of them with minimal effort, they were quickly bored.  It’s sad when a fish poses little sport for a 7 year old.

The Boy took time off from his vomiting
to try his hand at landing some fish.

Our first catch was a bonita.

The Girl found the strength to reel in the fish by herself.

Yay! Another fish...another bonita.

Sigh...yet another bonita.

We kept some small fish to use as bait for some bigger sports fish.

I asked our deck hand if we could sail out any farther to try for some bigger fish.  The captain went out a little farther but not that much more where bigger sports fish would be.  They never did switch over and use the small fish that we caught as bait.

I did land two slightly larger Pacific crevalle Jacks, but they weren't much of a consolation prize.

It was a hard pill paying $1,000 for six hours of boredom.  To say that I was very disappointed is an understatement.  While I know that nobody can control the weather, there were many things that the crew could have done better.  For one thing, there was zero communication between us and the captain.  In fact, we really only saw him when we boarded the boat and when we left.  All communication was through the first mate who either had limited English or was pretty much not interested in speaking with us.  He set the lines, unhooked the fish, and made us a couple of sandwiches.  Otherwise from that, we had no significant interaction with the crew.  They barely communicated to us where we were going or what we were trying to catch.  It was an extremely frustrating experience.  I gave the crew a 18% tip just out of generosity.  However, I regretted it almost immediately.

The Kids were so bored on the boat that they spent most of the time napping.

Vicky, who truly seemed like she wanted us to have a good time, said that she radioed the captain to see if we wanted to switch the tour to just half a day.  She suggested that he sail to a nice spot and let the kids jump in the water to change things up.  However, none of these options were ever relayed to us.  She was even shocked that we were never offered her signature deviled eggs during the 6 hours we were aboard.  Apparently, the recipe was handed down from the previous owners and are supposed to be for good luck.  She said that she spends a long time making them for each charter.  Maybe skipping this tradition cursed us with bad fishing luck.  Whatever the cause, the fishing excursion was the low point of our Costa Rica vacation.     

After recovering back at our hotel for awhile, we went to the Beach House restaurant for dinner.  They have a deal where they cook up your freshly caught fish for about 3,000 colones/person.  Usually people bring in tasty fish such as mahi mahi, snappers, grouper, etc.  I was a bit worried that our Pacific crevalle jacks would taste awful since they do have a reputation for being marginal table fare.  We shared the four fillets and they grilled half and deep fried the other half.  Their deep fried batter was really good, making it the better of the two options.

The restaurant has an eclectic decor.

The Beach overlooks some docks where locals fish.

Ceviche again?  Sure, why not.

A $250 plate of jack fish.

How Green Was My Mountain

I thought that the road in Arenal National Park was bad.  Our next destination was even worse.  Having done our homework, we knew that the roads to Monteverde were complete and utter crap.  They made the area essentially inaccessible to non 4-wheel drive vehicles during the rainy season.  The bad reputation of the infrastructure compelled us to rent a SUV instead of a much less-expensive sedan.  Some folks even believe that the locals intentionally keep the roads in bad condition to minimize traffic to the region.  Monteverde National Park is not very far from La Fortuna on a map.  So why go to this area if we are already visiting Arenal?  Mainly because there is a significant difference in elevation.  While Arenal has a rain forest, Monteverde’s altitude makes it a cloud forest.       

However, the steep increase in elevation from Arenal to Monteverde has prevented the locals from building a road directly linking these two areas.  Instead, visitors would either have to make a 3-4 hour circuitous drive around Lake Arenal or cut across it by boat.  Since we had our own rental car, we were going to take the scenic road.  And scenic it was indeed.

As we left our hotel, the clouds finally cleared so that we could see the volcano's peak.

The area to the west of La Fortuna was less sparsely developed and touristy.  There were great views overlooking the picturesque Lake Arenal.  Small farms, boutique shops, and B&B’s dotted the landscape.

We made a pit-stop at one such placed called the Lucky Bug Gallery.

We had read some good reviews about the place on the TripAdvisor.  While that website is wrought with bogus reviews and people with horrendous taste, they were spot on about Lucky Bug.  It is a quaint B&B, art gallery, and bird sanctuary all rolled into one. 

The Wife mainly wanted to peruse their gift shop full of unique art pieces crafted by local Ticos.

The Kids were drawn to...

...their friendly cats and dogs.

Because the property looked so impressive, we decided to relax and order some smoothies.

The smoothies (blackberry, mango, guanabana, and passion fruit) were so big we couldn't finish them.

The place is run by Rob, a retired California expat, and Monika, a widowed German lady who built the place in the mid 1990’s.  They have several different types of birds that flit around the trees near the restaurant.  Unfortunately, we just missed a pair of toucans that had been there the previous day. 

Grey-headed chachalaca

Black-cheeked woodpecker

A female great-tailed grackle

A Baltimore Oriole

Great kiskadee

We also spotted a huge male iguana across the pond.

We resumed our journey which took us through the town of Tilaron on the South side of Arenal Lake.  Immediately from there, the quality of the roads turned terrible.  Instead of smooth asphalt, the streets were “paved” with uneven sized rocks juxtaposed with large craters.

There were literally boulder sized rocks sticking up in the middle of the road.

Our average speed for the 1-2 hour journey was a mere 20 kilometers per hour.  It was so bad that we gave The Boy some Dramamine because we thought he was going to get motion sickness again from the bumpy ride.  The worst part of the trip was that my cheap Styrofoam cooler kept making an annoying squeaking sound on every bump.  

Although the roads were rough, the countryside was beautiful to behold.

We pulled into the Monteverde Lodge and Gardens a little after noon.  This ecolodge is geared towards those who are more interested in getting in touch with nature.  The hotel has walking trails, a butterfly garden, and no televisions.  They had complimentary snacks and Café Britt coffee in the lobby as well as rubber boots and umbrellas available to loan to guests.

The secluded Monteverde Lodge and Gardens

Since it never rained while we were there,
we never had to use their equipment.

Since the butterfly garden was adjacent to the lobby, we stopped by to look at some of its inhabitants.  The structure was essentially a greenhouse with lots of plants and flowers appealing to butterflies.

The large blue morpho is colorful while flying...

...but fools predators with its false "eye" when it lands. 

Postman butterfly

Tiger longwing

Sara longwing

A creepy looking moth also made the garden its home.

The butterfly population is replenished by this wall of cocoons.

Our hotel room included an observation nook, but we never saw anything outside.

The bathroom had nice toilet paper and
enough bath towels for all four of us.

For lunch, we drove less than five minutes to the town of Santa Elena.  We dined at a unique restaurant called the Treehouse.

The eatery is build around a large tree that grows...

...through the center of the dining
area located on the second story.

This tree and the nice view overlooking the main street are the main draws for this establishment.  The food was merely mediocre.

Milkshakes and fruit juice smoothies.

Treehouse pizza

Seabass fillet with garlic

An assortment of traditional Tico meats and sides

We had arranged for a private night hike with a company called Forest Alive!  It is another local company that got excellent reviews from TripAdvisor.  Being the peak season for tourism, the owner was unavailable to lead our tour.  However, his associate met us at our hotel and then turned us over to Jorge, an independent guide contracted by the company.  These guides can be hit or miss.  We scored big with Jorge.  As a third generation inhabitant of the Monteverde area, he was extremely enthusiastic about showing us the local plants and animals.

We were first driven to the Monteverde Wildlife Refuge.  It consisted of a private estate accessed via a long driveway which led to surrounding trails.  We wanted to do a night hike because many animals and insects are more active and easier to find once the sun has set.  We had brought along our headlights from home specifically for this hike.  However, we ended up leaving them behind at the hotel because they would hinder the guide’s nighttime vision if accidentally shone in his face.  Instead, the company provided us with flashlights which were actually more useful as we mainly used them to illuminate the wildlife.

There were several other groups doing night hikes, some with as many as a dozen people.  Jorge tried to steer clear of these larger groups.  However, the guides did work together and let each other know when they spotted something interesting.  This cooperation maximized the experience for everyone.

This pygmy tree frog...

...was even smaller than this centipede.

This grey fox and this coatimundi
showed no animosity to one another. 

Despite all the flashlights pointed at it, this kinkajou tries to catch some sleep.

The Mexican orange-kneed tarantula

Though brown under normal light, bark
scorpions are luminescent under UV rays.

The bulge on this side-striped palm pit viper
means that it has eaten in the last two days.

A keel-billed toucan rests in a tree.

The Wife really hoped to see a sloth in the wild on this trip.  After having been unsuccessful in finding one in Arenal, we were running out of chances.  Jorge took us to a spot where there was a high chance of spotting one.  It had been there the night before, but it wasn't there this evening.  Over the next two hours, Jorge looked up and around every tree looking for one for us to see, but to no avail.  We were very fortunate in finding lots of other interesting wildlife, but the sloth eluded us. 

After two hours of fruitless searching, we finished the tour and headed back to the building to catch our ride back to our hotel.  However, Jorge was not to be deterred.  He was a man on a mission.  After checking that The Kids were still fine with doing more walking, he led us up the long driveway while examining every treetop in the process.  It was not until we emerged onto the town road did we find our elusive prey.  We had finally found a sloth.  Instead of being in a tree, this male sloth was shimmying across some telephone wires.  Cognizant of our discovery, the sloth made his escape across the wires, down the telephone pole, and into the nearest copse of thick bushes.  He was so slow that the process took about fifteen minutes.

The sloth shimmied down this telephone line.
His claws are prominently displayed.

The large eyes of this fully-grown adult sloth gave it some "cute" features.

We finally called our taxi to come and get us.  By far, we were one of the last groups to leave (the other Forest Alive private tour was also finishing at that time too).  Most of the other groups had missed seeing the sloth.  We were really grateful that we had Jorge guiding us.  Although he had been up since 6 AM giving an all day tour to other clients, he took the extra half-hour to find that sloth for us.  He even wrote down every interesting animal or insect we saw on the night hike so that we could remember the experience.  We saw and learned more in those three hours than we had in three days in Arenal.

*****

Wednesday, December 24

We were planning on doing a lot of walking on our one full day in Monteverde.  Unlike most of the other hotels that we stayed in while visiting Costa Rica, the Monteverde Lodge opened at 6 AM for breakfast.  This would allow the guests to have something to eat before their early excursions (bird watchers keep ungodly hours).

Typical Costa Rican breakfast

Eggs Benedict with bacon

Fresh fruit with yogurt

Jorge again would be our guide today for a half-day tour in the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve.  Since we had our own car, he met us at our hotel and guided us to the place.  Tickets were fairly inexpensive.  With the higher altitude, the air was cool enough that shorts were unnecessary.  We brought along our binoculars and camera equipment while Jorge had his high-powered spotting scope.

Unlike the previous night, our expectations on finding wildlife were low.  During the daytime, forest animals are just not active.  However, we did hope to see the jewel of the cloud forest—the colorful quetzel.  In both Mayan and Aztec mythology, the quetzel was a divine figure, representing the god of the air.  Leaders would wear headdresses made with quetzel feathers.  Nowadays, their numbers have severely diminished with continued loss of their habitats.  Jorge noted that only about 100 individuals still inhabited the Monteverde park.  

Along the trails, Jorge pointed interesting plants and insects, explaining their roles in the cloud forest ecosystem.

There's only one season in the rainforest so trees never stop growing.  Therefore,
they don't develop internal rings.  This makes it difficult to tell a tree's age.

It's hard to imagine that this caterpillar may grow into a beautiful butterfly.

Monteverde has over 400 different orchid
species including this one with tiny flowers. 

This is a full-sized fruit from a ripened wild tomato plant.

These huge gumballs are used by monkeys to groom their hair.

The bright red leaves have caused people
to name this the "hot lips" plant.

During our hike, we could hear the calls of many small birds including this sooty thrush. 

We stopped at a viewing perch across from a large avocado tree.  Queztels are more apt to be found feeding off the fruit in these trees.  A solo birdwatcher was camped there with his binoculars and gear patiently looking for the bird.  We waited for about half an hour before we finally decided that one was not coming.  We started back along the trail with Jorge in the lead, and me pulling up the rear.  Not but five minutes later, I saw a blue streak hopping around in the canopy above Jorge.  Indeed it was the previously elusive Quetzel.  It only stuck around for 2-3 minutes before flying off.  But we got a good enough view of it to realize that it was indeed resplendent.

We continued onto the path leading up to the “continental divide.”  This is a ridge that stretches from Canada down to Argentina.  Theoretically, this geographical location indicates whether a falling raindrop will end up either in the Caribbean Sea or in the Pacific Ocean.  The walk up there was steep for a few minutes before we reached the highest point in the national park.  At that elevation, the wind is strong enough that it will topple trees that grow too tall.  Thus, this area is known as a “dwarf forest” as none of the trees are much taller than 10-15 feet high.  The winds blowing down from Canada were quite chilly and strong on the Caribbean side.  But on the Pacific end, there was nary a zephyr and it was quite hot.

The Kids were getting quite tired after walking for three hours.  We took the path back to the park entrance.  Along the way, we passed several other groups, none of which had been fortunate enough to see a quetzal.  When we arrived back at the viewing perch across from the avocado tree, the solitary birdwatcher was still there, but this time staring at the tree with his binoculars.  Even with our binoculars, we had a hard time finding this second quetzel as the entire tree was like a shadow against the backdrop of the sun.

We exited the park and made our way up to the hummingbird gallery.  It is simply just a bunch of hummingbird feeders hanging up in the trees beside a souvenir shop.  However, the place was like a beehive.  Thirty to forty little colorful shapes darted around us.  Apparently there are over 50 different hummingbird species in Costa Rica—about 30 of which can be found in the Monteverde cloud forest.  The birds were so used to humans that we could just put our hands on the feeders and the birds would land on them to feed.

The hummingbird garden was a fun ending after a long hike.

This large violet sabrewing acted like
an alpha male around the feeders.

Even smaller than some of the hummingbirds, a bananaquit gets in on some of the nectar action.

We said our goodbyes to Jorge as he was sticking around the park to lead another group on a hiking tour.  He was truly an enthusiastic and amazing guide.  He pointed out one last thing to us in the parking lot—a group of white faced capuchin monkeys swinging up the trees above our SUV.  Instead of visiting the many nature parks in the Monteverde region, maybe we should just hang out in their parking lots.

Jorge gave us one last tip on our way out.  He highly recommended stopping off at the Monteverde Cheese Factory on the way down and getting some milkshakes.  In the 1940’s a group of Quakers from Alabama had left the United States and settled in the Monteverde region.  Since they were pacifists, the abolition of Costa Rica’s military fit their religious philosophy much better than the U.S.’s compulsory military service.  The region was perfect for raising cattle and making cheese.  Now the area produces about a third of the cheese consumed by this nation.

We didn't have time or the interest in doing the cheese factory tour.  We headed straight for their small cafe.  Their menu was all in Spanish and the man behind the counter spoke no English.  However, he was very patient and friendly with us.  The guanabana, the combination (lime, pineapple, an strawberry), and the napolitano were all amazingly good.  However, the best by far was the fig milkshake.  I've never been a fan of figs back home, but here in Costa Rica, they use it so well.

Aside from awesome milkshakes and some cheese, there wasn't really anything else being sold.

A viewing window allows visitors to watch the cheese-making process.  How amazingly boring.

After finishing our milkshakes, we stopped by Stella's Bakery and purchased some pastries for lunch.

We relaxed by the pool at the Monteverde lodge while enjoying our lunch.

At mid-afternoon, a van from the El Trapiche plantation picked us up for an afternoon tour.  They must do pretty good business as there were four different groups of around 15 people each going on the tour.  Our guide was Diego, whose great grandfather started the coffee plantation.  It’s a family-run business as his parents, siblings, cousins, etc. either work as guides or grow and process the coffee.

Diego took us on a very in depth and informative tour detailing the growing, collecting, processing, and roasting of coffee beans.  He did the same for the sugar cane and chocolate plants that they also grow on their plantation.  At every step, we were invited to try the coffee and chocolate.

The red cherries on this coffee tree are ripe for the pickin'.

Coffee trees only bear fruit for about 5 years.
New shoots have to be grafted on afterwards.

Each coffee fruit usually contains two beans.  About 5% of the time, a peaberry results
where there is only one bean.  These are considered to produce higher grades of coffee.

The Boy carries a coffee basket used 
by laborers on these plantations.

The Girl demonstrates the traditional method of separating the coffee beans from their outer shells.

Coffee beans must be dried either by the sun for a few weeks or quicker by industrial processes.

A small roaster produces the final coffee
product that we usually find in markets.

After a thorough education about the coffee-producing process, we moved onto the world of chocolate.

The thick cacao pod must be opened to obtain the bitter seeds.

This display shows the cacao seeds in different stages of drying.

After they are fully dried, the beans are then
roasted producing the dark brown color.

After removing the shells, the cacao is put through a grinder.

This produces a still-bitter dark chocolate

Sugar is then added to the dark chocolate...

...to make it more palatable to conventional tastes.

It’s hard to imagine that people were able to figure out that these plants were worth eating.  It takes lots of steps to produce the product that we get from stores.  Only in the last few stages do the coffee or cacao beans even slightly resemble something edible.  Sugar, on the other hand is different.

Sugarcane originates from India.  It
arrived in the New World after Columbus.

The Kids share a piece of freshly cut sugarcane.

We hitched a ride on a carreta which Ticos used to transport crops like sugarcane from the fields.

This plantation is named after a trapiche (sugar cane mill).

This traditional one was hand-fed and powered by oxen.

This more modern mill is water-powered and much more efficient.

The sweet liquid is collected in buckets
and transferred to large cooking pots.

The sugar water is then boiled down...

...and placed in molds to produce these bricks.

Alternatively, the hot sugar water can be stirred...

...to produce a crumbly, caramel-like candy.

At the end of the tour, there was tasting room where we were invited to try the coffee either made with a traditional chorreador or with a modern espresso machine.

This distillery is just for show as it is
illegal in Costa Rica to make moonshine.

Meat and vegetarian snacks were made by Diego's mother and aunt in the tasting room kitchen.

That night, we had reservations at our hotel for a Christmas Eve dinner.

Enyucados (yucca dough stuffed with beef)

Sweet corn and ginger cakes

Sugarcane beef kebab

Jumbo shrimp with salsa, guacamole, and black bean sauce

Argentine chorizo beef loin

Spinach and cheese raviolis

The food at the hotel was good.  Although it was not Michelin-star caliber, it would be the best meal we would have in Costa Rica.

As a nice touch for Christmas, we were left a tray of milk, cookies, and spiked eggnog in our hotel room.