Despite my being ill and not fully recovered, we still agreed to continue with our planned weekend excursion to a nearby protected reserve, Braulio Carrillo. It was good we had planned to stay close to home, considering my condition. The drive was only around an hour through one of Clark's favorite parts of Costa Rica. He loves the ancient wild "Jurassic park" feel of the mountains here and there are small watersheds down the sides of the mountains along the road. It's also a pretty smooth drive; the road is well paved and maybe not quite so curvy as some other parts of Costa Rica we experienced. However, we did see an accident where the car appeared to have gone off the side of the road, which is steep. I hope whoever was there turned out ok? I am not sure if these kinds of collisions are documented somewhere as we do in the USA on the highway patrol website.
Up the mountain towards the park
Clark wanted to check out one of the little waterfalls. Hopefully this gives a good idea of how steep the cliff is if you compare Clark's height here. We weren't far off the road.
We crossed over this river called Rio Succio. Dirty River, aptly named.
A map of Braulio Carrillo. This part of the park is privately managed. There is a small sloth exhibit, orchid display (sadly not currently blooming), separate hummingbird and butterfly gardens, and reptile exhibits as well as some trails in the forest, including along a river. The thing to do here though is ziplining and the aerial tram. We chose the ziplining and we weren't disappointed!
In my reading, I often read about these "canopy tours" offered in Costa Rica at all the big parks...La Fortuna, Manuel Antonio, Monteverde...I assumed they meant bridge tours but nope! This typically refers to a ziplining tour over the canopy! It's one of the best ways to appreciate the beauty of the Costa Rican mountains. The views can't be beat from that perspective.
Children's tile art outside the restrooms. This is a common practice in Costa Rica. It adds character and beauty to some of these places.
Equipped with our helmets and starting towards the zipline. Craig prefers the 1800 style "serious" pose.
On our way to ziplining!
Ready to go!
Our journey began with some short "practice" lines. Then we hiked up further to the "real" thing even though these were all serious ziplines. The final 6 lines were higher, faster, and longer. At one point after the short practice lines, I wasn't feeling great and wished I had brought some candy to suck on to raise my blood sugar because I wasn't eating a full diet yet. My energy became a little low especially on the short steep hikes and climbing stairs. However, once we got on the faster lines, I felt immediately better, and I am contributing that to the adrenaline rush into my system. It was invigorating; a real rush!!
Waiting for Rosabel to come down the line.
Rosabel coming in on one of the fastest of the 10 lines we came down. I felt fortunate to get these pictures because we were told very firmly not to remove our gloves unless we were on the ground (off the platform) and not to bring out our phones. The gloves are necessary to hang onto the harness and also in case you have to pull yourself in a little since the guide doesn't typically come out on the line if a person comes up short. These lines did have breaks that the guides used. We didn't have to break ourselves (thankfully). They didn't want us to lose or drop our gloves in the process of reaching for our phone since the platforms are very high. This platform was at the bottom of a series and the guide saw me photographing from the ground and invited me up to the low platform.
A view from a platform before ascending further. This was a very long line; over 500 meters and reaching up to 30 mph. You can't really see where the line ends. The views were incredible and Rosabel even saw a toucan as she zipped over the canopy.
This is an interesting guttering system Craig pointed out. From the roof, the water runs down the chain and into the grate on the ground.
Look closely to see the hanging "teardrops" from this palm, a little like earrings. Those are bird's nests. The birds are the same type Rosabel and I saw in Hermosa when we stopped for our sushi roll lunch. The birds are black with yellow tail feathers and make the most interesting calls and songs.
Hunting and Gathering:
Clark's work buddy recommended we stop at this "famous" restaurant for "comida tipico" on our way back from Braulio Carrillo: Fogon de Lola. It was a beautiful open-air restaurant. The kitchen was open for us to see everything cooking!
Open air kitchen!
Waiting on our food and trying out Cas, a type of juice made here from the Cas fruit. It has a citrus taste.
In the mini food market of the restaurant, there were these marshmallow animals!
Pollo y queso
Faijitas
Chicken soup for me and my sore tummy. That's a boiled egg in there along with huge chunks of shredded chicken, a broccoli stalk, and large slices of zuchinni and carrot; perfect and fresh! Tico style with rice of course!
Costa Rica has a traditional costume, and they often use this in their arts and crafts. I loved these hand painted hanging decorations made from pots.
We stopped at a nearby produce stand and saw this bird perched on the fence.
Yucca and a larger type of root vegetable we thought was taro but I don't recall the actual name now. The nearest green veggie is chayote, similar to potato in texture and used in soups.
Plantains on the vine
This was a cart full of this cooked vegetable that looks similar to a tomato. They cook this in salt water. Clark declined buying it to try because I wasn't up to trying something new yet. But hopefully we will find another place later because our Tico friends say they are super tasty!
The Rio Succio on the other side as we returned down the mountain.
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