Las Tortugas

We rallied at 4:30am and hit the beach.  Our guide along with his headlamp, took us down to the black sand beach of Ostional.  The locals believed this arribada (turtle laying frenzy)  to be very small.  As we walked along the dark beach we had to cross a small stream flowing into the ocean.  We say our first olive ridley turtle laying her eggs.  We were all in awe.  As we walked along and the sky got a little bit brighter we could see more shapes reflecting on the wet sand.

As the sun came up this is what we saw.  The guide estimates there were roughly 9000 turtles.  A couple of months ago there were close to a million turtles at one time trying to lay their eggs on this 3 mile beach.  One reason they are believed to come to this beach in such large numbers is to overwhelm their predators (mainly turkey vultures).

It was like a crazy racetrack with turtles coming out of the ocean to lay their eggs and others heading back into the ocean after their eggs were laid.

The turtles were on a mission and not distracted by us humans.  They are focused and will crawl over your feet if you are in the way.  They were also pretty darn fast.

Sofia communicating with the turtle and giving her encouragement.

The turtles dig their nests with their back flippers about a foot deep.  They literally throw the dirt all over.  They lay close to 100 eggs in one nest.

At the top of this picture you can see the turtle shell....this is an action shot.

Eventhough they are one of the smallest sea turtles the olive ridley look big next to Fairy2.

There were lots of eggs on the beach that turtles dug out trying to find a place for their own eggs, Fairy2 ran around trying to bury the eggs again.

After we had our fill of nesting turtles, our guide walked us down the beach to see some hatchlings.  The Costa Ricans love children and have been super sweet with our kids.  We have not found anyone put out by our children especially in restaurants.

The gang, BB with a baby turtle.

The day has begun.

BB and AuntieL set off to head back to Boston.  Lots of sad faces. BB and Fairy1 have been attached at the hip since BB arrived.  We really enjoyed sharing some of our Costa Rican adventure with them.  I know some of the blog readers thought you were going to hear how crazy AuntieL was going to make us.  Just the opposite.  She was adventurous, flexible and FUN......so ha! 

MomT and Fairy1 are heading to Guiones to surf!!!

Back At the Beach

MomT and AuntieL woke up and went to an early moring yoga class at a beautiful temple at PachaMama.  It was just what the dr ordered.  Meanwhile back at the ranch the kids went in the pool.  Fairy2 can go in by herself now.  She can jump in from the side and swim to the other end of the pool.  Here is a lizard sunning himself by the pool.

Next on the menu was a couple of hours at the San Juanillo Playa.  On our hike down to the beach AuntieL spotted a bunch of monkeys in the trees.

Getting ready for takeoff.  Fairy1 could spend her life in water.

Lord of the Flies

Fairy2 , DadD and BB constructed this road with shell cars on it.  Fairy2 is still freaked out by the waves at the beach.

The beach

Fairy2 sitting by the pool....naked of course.

For the last supper (with AuntieL and BB) we went to Hotel Luna Azul.  The food was wonderful and the kids loved watching the huge toads, turtles and grasshoppers around the restaurant.  The 4 inch grasshoppers were buzzing around the open restaurant and banging into walls, ceiling fans and people's heads.  Very entertaining.  I think we are all pretty used to the supersize wild life at this point.  Home to bed and up at 4:30 am to view the arribada (mass of turtle

Last Day In Cloud Forest (Sunday update)

We woke up and had a wonderful home cooked breakfast of fresh fruit, eggs and tortillas.  AuntieL and BB headed out for a canopy tour and tarzan swing (like a bungee swing).  BB didn't want to go first so AuntieL took one for the team....wish I had the video to post her scream.  They had an exciting time as you could imagine.

The fairy family headed to the Don Juan Coffee Tour.  We were surprised how much we enjoyed this educational and hands on tour.  Our guide Brandon was 18 years old. He was full of knowledge and love for the coffee farm.  Here is a picture of us before our tour.

Child labor....gotta pay for this long vacation

I didn't pick many coffee berries but I sure look cute.

The red berries are the ripe ones.  We were walked through the complete process from start to finish on this organic coffee farm.  We got to see new and old methods of the coffee process.  This farm only sells it's coffee to local businesses and online not to any commercial establishments.  It is actually hard to get a great cup of coffee in Costa Rica.  Most of the country's quality coffee is exported.  Starbucks buys almost the entire Costa Rican coffee crop.

Brandon also educated us on sugar cane.  Here he is peeling the outside off with his machete.

Yummy sweet sugar cane.

This is a wheel from a coffee cart the ox  pull through the coffee fields.

At the end of our tour they offered coffee tasting and some little snacks (rice pudding with ground coffee on top, cheese & cornmeal fritters and chocolate covered coffee beans).

Here we are at the Treehouse Restaurant.  This is an actual tree the restaurant  was built around.

Our little lunch spot. The fairy family had yummy indian food.  One of the girls in the kitchen had been to Laconia, NH....go figure.  We haven't met many locals who have heard of NH.

The kids chose to eat inside at the table on the floor.

After lunch we drove back to Ostional, had dinner, and hit the hay.

Monday will be AuntieL and BB's last full day.   BOOHOO!

On Our Way To Monteverde, The Cloud Forest

So on Saturday we attempted to drive from Arenal to Monteverde.  Part of the route was awarded worst road in Costa Rica.  This is kind of a scary thought since we hadn't been on any "good" roads yet.  We were thinking we should give AuntieL a tranquilizer!

The drive ended up being beautiful, it looked like Tuscany, Italy.  It was a long road but much better than we had anticipated.  We arrive unscathed and after we checked into our B&B we got a guide and hit the cloud forest.  

The girls in front of cloud forest entrance

Hummingbirds, tons of hummingbirds.  The birds loved MomT's red rain coat and were buzzing all around her.  Yes, MEE we saw a ruby throated hummingbird.

Kids running across the suspension bridge.  DaddyD discovered he had a problem watching his beloved family on the wobbly bridges.  He was glad when the tour ended:(

Cloud Forest bridge

We toured the primary forest and the trees could be as old as 400 years old.  One tree can have over a thousand other trees and plants living on it.  The parasitic plants do this to get closer to the sun without using a lot of energy and also use the nutrients from their host tree.

Sloth, come on can't you tell this is a sloth?  The guides here can spot everything.  Guides were a must and without them we would have missed all of the cool stuff.

Need I say more.

After a huge meal we hit the hay.  In the morning the fairy family planned to go on a coffee tour and Auntie & BB planned a canopy tour.

Coati, Leaf Cutter Ants and Poisonous Dart Frogs OH MY!

We woke up on Friday to a beautiful morning in Arenal.  Here is my family gazing at the lake.

The adventure of the day is hot springs for Fairy1, DadD, BB and AuntieL.  MomT and Fairy2 are going to visit crocs, dart frogs and butterflies.  Later on we planned a guided hike around the base of the volcano.

There were about 20 coati begging for food.  These animals have been fed by humans who think they are cute but have lost the ability to forage on their own....bad humans.

Here are some leaf cutter ants hard at work.

poisonous dart frogs

Fairy2 enjoying some fresh coconut water after a little hike.

Fairy1 in the hot springs.

Fairy1 at the base of the volcano before our guided hike/tour.

The kid listening to our guide give history on the volcano's activity.  This volcano was belived to be a mountain until 1968 when it errupted for the first time in 500 years.  The locals did not notice the signs nature was giving them.  The temp of the rivers reached above 100 degrees, the animals fled the area and the earth got warm.  When it errupted it exploded huge boulders, not lava, and gave off poisonous gases which killed around 90 people.  Since this time the volcano has been very active.  Unfortunately for us the volcano was not completely visible and had not erupted for about 3 weeks.  Oh well it is pretty much a hit or miss.  We still got to hike the base and feel its mammoth existence.

As we started our hike the sky turned a very strange color and the sky dumped tons of rain on us.  We had on our headlamp & rain gear and marched on.  Here is a picture of the girls in front of quetzal nests.  Yes they are soaking but they enjoyed the night's adventure.  Fairy2 really liked jumping in the puddles.

Time for dinner.  Fairy1 with her Comida Typical (typical food plate).

AuntieL with her non-typical comida???

This was a very interesting meal served in a coconut....lots of shell fish carcasses.

FYI

I can not figure out the spell check on the blog since everything is in spanish!

Happy UnTurkey Day!

Nuevo Arenal is on a man made reservior which supplies 50% of the energy to Costa Rica.  The Arenal Volcano is the big attractions along with hot springs and rainforest.

AuntieL and BB were ready for adventure but the fairy family wanted a hanging out mellow day.  The adventurers decided to go on a hanging bridge tour and were greeted by this macaw. They got to see two viper snakes close up in the wild.

This painting was in the lobby of the Arenal Observatory Lodge where the fairy family had lunch.  Check out the clouds.....

This little guy was snatching bananas from the deck that the waiter set out for him.  He is a  tayra and is in the weasel family.  He was at least 4 feet long, a little bigger than the ones at home!

Here are the kids posing at the Gingerbread.  We didn't get enough the first night so we decided to have our un-turkey meal.  No Turkey!!! the owner told us.

love this girl

Here is Eyal serving up our tri tip meal along with a lot of other nontraditional fixins.  MomT brought an inflatable turkey with her on the trip to surprise her family.  Eyal served it up on a platter and it got a big laugh from the family.  The turkey served as our entertainment for the rest of the evening.

Vegetarian AuntieL....her favorite kind of turkey

We love the turkey,no cooking,  no clean up and no mess

more turkey love

now that is a plate lickin desert

This was an awesome way to spend our holiday and talk about what we are thankful for.  No fuss just a lot of clean (well mostly clean) fun!