Well I started today with the so called jeep-boat-jeep trip from La Fortuna to Monteverde. The bus apparently takes 8+ hrs to negotiate 136kms of bad roads. The jeep-boat-jeep option cuts it down to a 3hr trip. But there are no jeeps involved…. just minibuses and a slow boat to cross the lake rather than drive around it.
The last 2 hours were on bad roads and I mean bad. Yet when you get to the main town of Santa Elena in the Monteverde area the roads are all paved and all the conveniences you could need are here. I have a room at the Pension Santa Elena. No bathroom, but its a very friendly place and for $8 a night I’m not complaining about having to use a shared bathroom.
Besides I need all the money for the things to do here.
After lunch I went to an orchid garden. It was pretty nice and interesting. The guide was handy because the worlds smallest orchid is just 1 mm across and I’d have never found it or many of the other orchids.
Orchid
Then one of the highlights of my trip so far. A visit to the Ranarium. The Ranarium is full of frogs and some very colourful and incredibly small frogs as well, plus they have cane toads as well, my guide was fully aware of the habits of Australians and their creative ways of killing them. The tour was made all the more interesting when a german girl wanted to know if the female frog was always bigger, how do they have sex. The guide explained that the male massages the female and she lays eggs and he fertilises them. Nothing to it really.
Frog
Anyway tomorrow I’m off on what is known as a Canopy tour. Its really just alot of really long flying foxes totalling about 3kms in length and one of them i think is 600m long. Plus there are also alot of bridges through the canopy to explore. Chances of seeing wildlife are slim, but I’ve been assured I will have fun.
Well adios again. Feel free to send me more email and messages.
Frog