Happy Birthday, Mom! We woke to light rain and no view of Arenal. The lodge offered a good complimentary buffet breakfast: scrambled eggs, sausage, fried plantains, beans & rice, pancakes, several kinds of fresh fruit, juice, coffee and an assortment of continental breakfast items. While eating breakfast, we watched the birds feeding on the feeder platforms loaded with fruit outside the dining room window; Brennan must have taken 50 pictures of them.
Our day's choices for a hike included the Observatory Lodge, NP Arenal, Park Silencio, and Park 1968
. We opted for Park 1968, mainly because it was the only one we hadn't been to on previous trips. It turned out to be a good choice. The park's namesake is from the violent eruption that occurred in 1968, after Arenal had been dormant for over 400 years. The park doesn't seem to have a tree that would predate the 1968 eruption. The trails were perfectly maintained through open areas with views of Arenal, expansive lava fields, and jungle. We did have to don our raincoats twice during quick showers, but for the most part, we had mostly cloudy skies and 3/4 views of Arenal. We recreated a Brennan lava rock photo from when he visited Arenal in January of 2010. Pretty sure he remembers that trip only through pictures and our stories. Other than birds, the only wildlife we saw was one of those poisonous yellow snakes. The long trail was only about three miles and would be rated as easy to moderate in difficulty.
From the park we drove the 30 minutes back to La Fortuna for lunch at Soda Mima
. Being a soda, it didn't serve alcohol so Grandpa walked to a local market and got a couple of Imperials and Brennan had a sandia (watermelon) smoothie to wash down lunch of a wrap, palm salad and what the menu said was a taco (more like an overly fried taquito).
During lunch, from the open-aired eating area, we watched 20 minutes of probably the hardest rain of the whole week, but as we finished lunch the rain stopped. We were running low on colones so headed to the bank and got another 100,000 ($190). We walked though the church and said another prayer of thanksgiving, before hitting the gift shops and getting Brennan a double scoop passion fruit and chocolate/caramel/peanut ice cream cone. We also made a supply stop at the Super Mercado. We got to see baby chicks and rabbits at the shop next to the market.
On our drive back to the Arenal Lodge we ran into a real coati "jam". There must have been a dozen of them on and near the road. Back at the lodge, we did the Jungle Trail, probably not much more than a mile
. Getting to the trailhead, we passed by a herd of grazing cows, where Brennan took some great pictures. The first stop was the screened butterfly sanctuary, we only spotted a half dozen butterflies:( The trail was very cool, it was up and down and very closed in with primary forest. Being late in the day and not dropping any bread crumbs, we got a little turned around and we were all pleased to get out before dark - it was getting a little spooky.
We cleaned up and headed to the lobby and played cards before heading to dinner at Cascajo's del Arenal. It is the only place to eat between the lodge and La Fortuna. As we got there, Arenal was in full view, again only lit by the full moon. We were the only customers and shared: a steak covered in a great sauce, a sea bass filet and a heart of palm salad. We had a couple of cervezas and Brennan a bottle of coca cola that he would finish tomorrow (think we cheated them our of the bottle deposit).
Back at the lodge, Brennan hit the sack and we had a glass of wine while looking at a full view of Arenal from the foot of the bed. Reminding us of the one knock of the lodge, the room had no chairs.
Yet another great day!
1968 Lava Park
Monday, November 23, 2015
La Fortuna, Province of Alajuela, Costa Rica
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2025-02-15