Cloud Forest de Santa Elena

Our day began with a nice breakfast at Casa Tranquilo with some garlicky eggs I made for a protean rich breakfast. We set off at the suggestion of the great and hospitable owner David to find the strangler fig trees. One so large that James climbed inside! The fig stranglers begin as a weed of sorts and completely dominate their host so what is left is a hollowed out tree. I’ll post some pictures soon. We continued to the Secret Valley and bargained the $5/per person price down to $5 for the both of us to enter. Our time was very limited (we had to catch a bus back to San Jose at 2:30), so we moved quickly through it, No animal sightings to report.

We had a nice lunch (the best plato de dia to date!) at a place attached to the Tree house hotel called Coffee Bar. Tasty plantains with beans and vegetables cooked until perfectly tender.

Next we bought our tickets as soon as the la officina de billetes opened since we were afraid of having to stay another day in Santa Elena after exhausting the only free activity: hiking straight up a hill.

With enough time for a quick shower and to book a room at Gaudy’s Hostel in San Jose, we boarded the bus for the 4+ hours back. There was a really sketchy character monitoring our bags as we put them below the bus and James and I vigilantly watched as everyone got on the bus and the guy with the shifty eyes remained. Traveling with a laptop can be stressful.

We got back to San Jose around 7pm and took a cab to Gaudy’s (with limited success negotiating the price, we paid about $6) and James called Heidi to get an update on a group BBQ that was under way. We found out that it was wrapping up which was just as well since we had the grocery store a mere 3 blocks away and a hankering to make pasta. The proximity to the grocery store is one the few nice aspects of this gringos dominated hostel. We planned to meet Heidi and her group of 30 youths heading up to Nicaragua early the next morning.

After dinner we fell asleep exhausted and had a brief slumber. We were up in time (7am) for pancake breakfast and then set off to meet Marco (Heidi’s husband) at a Hyper-mas (big shopping mall) and hitch a ride with the group.