Hihi, all!  I'm still kicking about down here in the tempestuous latitudes of Central America.  The weather here in San Jose has been cloudy and what the locals consider "cold", but this last weekend I went to the pueblo of Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean, and it was as hot and humid as I've felt so far in the time I've been here.

This last weekend was a "free weekend", meaning that we had no school organized trips planned.  So, some of the kids broke up into groups and went to a few different places.  Eight other kids and I went to Puerto Viejo in the province of Limon.  We left on Friday afternoon after classes (at 2:00) for a 6-hour bus ride to the coast.  It was cloudy when we left San Jose, and dark, hot, and sticky when we arrived in Puerto Viejo.  Checking into the hostel was a bit confusing after the long bus ride, but we got things sorted out then went out to dinner at a pretty terrible restaurant called Chile Rojo.  Yuck.  The best thing about the restaurant was the 2 for 1 cocktails. 

After yuck dinner, we went to a couple of bars, the first one to collect part of our group who had gone to a different hostel, and the second one was a club that we had gotten a flier for from some random odd guy walking around handing out fliers and chatting up prospective party goers.  This was seriously good times.  The kids at the other hostel had met some other English-speaking kids, and we were all hanging out, dancing, drinking...you know, Friday night stuff.  And I say English-speaking, because two of them were literally British, which made for even more good times, simply based on speech differences alone.

We left that bar around 230AM to walk home, and it was POURING rain.  Like monsoon style.  And we were walking.  And we got so, so, so wet.  And those clothes never really dried out.

Saturday, the entire group of us (kids from OSU, Brits, and three other Americans) rented bicycles and took a waaaaaaaay too long bike ride to a really pretty beach that I was able to enjoy for about 20 minutes because our group had gotten separated and the ones who were in the back never met up with we who were in the front.  One of the Brits was with my group (the front one), and he had locked his bike to a tree, however the other Brit (who was with the other group) had the key.  Yep.  So, two girls and I went off to find the other group, who we eventually found after much more bike riding at a beach that had way more rough waves and loads of coral, which made for a nearly impossible swim.

We had to have the bikes back by 6PM, after which we met for dinner at another not so great restaurant.  Yet again, the saving grace was 2 for 1 cocktails.  After that, we headed to the other group's hostel, Rocking Jay's, where there was supposed to be a party of some sorts, but it was pretty mellow.  There was a fire dancing show, and then we took off to another bar/club for some dancing.  However, the rain started earlier, like around midnight, and most of the group wanted to walk back before another thorough drenching.  Also, this bar was ridiculously packed with people.  So.  Many.  People.  I missed the first group walking back, but walked back with three others with the luxury of two umbrellas, one per pair.  Still got wet, just not wet through to my undergarments.

Sunday, half of us boarded the bus to come back at 1PM, and after a 4.5 hour bus ride, got back to San Jose, walked to the city bus stop, then rode home.  So tired.  Still so tired.  But it was probably the most fun weekend I've had so far.  And, a couple of the kids we met in Puerto Viejo are also in San Jose, so we have the chance to visit more with them.

Anyhoo, I've put up loads of photos on my photobucket page.  I'm trying to decide whether to go to sleep now and miss dinner, or wait for dinner then pass out.  I've basically had about 5 hours of sleep every night since last Wednesday.  The hang-out nights are understandable for no sleep, but the week nights were because of homework.  :/  However, I think I'm pulling an A- so far in language class, so that's pretty OK.  I just really want to sleep for a good 15 hours or so right now...

Tortuguero

All-diddly-right-skis, it turns out I'm bad at blogging.  Or lazy.  Probably lazy.  But in my defense, I did try to blog on Sunday night when our group got home from Tortuguero, but the interwebz was being all wonky.  Anyhoo, this post is going to be about Tortuguero, the national park area our group went to this last weekend (the 30th and 1st), and the pictures of which I have already uploaded HERE.

Y'all, Tortuguero was awesome frosted with amazing with a side of kick-ass.  Definitely the kind of place that, when one thinks of Costa Rica, this is what they imagine.  The travel part to get there was kind of pain and included a lovely 35 km of gravel road in a huge tour bus with an hour-and-a-half boat ride to our lodge, but it was worth the leg cramps and slight seasickness.

The Tortuguero national park is a rainforest near the sea, of which I posted an info link in (one of) my previous blog(s).  The sea isn't the gorgeous Caribbean that you're probably thinking of with the white sands and azul waters, though.  Our guide told us that if we tried to swim here we might very well be swept away.  Or eaten by sharks.  Most likely both, I would guess.  It looked like the Oregon coast.  You know, except for the palm trees and coconuts.

Beach at the Pueblo of Tortuguero

Our lodgings were basically what would make people say, "This is what paradise is like."  They were little hut-like buildings in the middle of the forest, so we saw large lizards in trees, heard howler monkeys (or some kind of boar, I never really got the definitive word) screaming in the morning, that kind of thing.  There was a little pool, a little bar, wifi in the direct vicinity of the reception building.

The view from the door of my room at Pachira Lodge

The best parts really were the animal-y parts.  Saturday night we went on a turtle watching tour.  Apparently, turtle watching season had literally just started, like, the day before.  We crossed the lagoon at about 930PM on a lancha and hung out on an airport runway while the guide explained a bit about the turtles.  After about 30 minutes (40?  I don't know) our other guide, who had gone off to wander about the beach in search of turtles, called to us to hurry up and get ourselves to the beach.  We scampered down the beach, and I got there just in time to see an enormous green turtle scuttling into the surf.  Wow.  Then we got to see two more.  One scootching to the sea, and one just finishing its egg-laying business then off to the sea it went.  The moon was almost full, and though the sky was clear where we were, there were clouds and lightning out over the sea, and the whole evening really was amazing.  I'm sure someone with better wordcrafting skills could write poems or novellas about it.

In the morning, we woke up bright and early to go on a canal tour by boat, which was basically an animal watching adventure.

Our group on the way to see some wildlife

 It poured buckets on us just as we started the tour, but luckily, the tour included ponchos.  We still got wet.  Once into the canals, the rain eased up, and we saw iguanas, caimans, toucans (and loads of other birds), one sloth high up in a tree, two different species of monkeys, and one of the biggest ugliest spiders I have ever seen.  Then, as we were returning to the lodge, it decided to rain like crazy again.  And it's so humid here in Costa Rica, so I pretty much did not dry out all day.  It was just an amazing experience all around, rain and bugs and motion sickness and all.

Someday, I might get better at conclusions, but until that day, hasta luego!