Arenal: Joe vs. the Invisible Volcano

Arenal* volcano allegedly sits adjacent to the Arenal* river and Arenal* Lake, a man-made reservoir formed as part of a hydroelectric project in 1979. I say allegedly because despite the fact that I spent two days with my family at the Arenal* Paraiso Hotel, none of us ever spotted the elusive volcano.
*Costa Rican law states that all landforms and places within a fifty square mile radius of the volcano include the word Arenal in their title*
For much of the year, including the entirety of our visit, Arenal Volcano lies shrouded by mystery, reticent to show off its figure to the adoring masses. Clouds surround the peak, which stretches to the height of 5,358 feet, even when the rest of the sky is clear.
Things could have been worse I suppose. The volcano is still very active - an eruption on my birthday in 1968 presaged my ominous coming and also killed 87 people. Trees had grown inside the crater and the locals believed the mountain was dormant. Whoops!
The only warning Arenal gave came when the local streams began to heat, forming hot springs at an area called Tabacon that is still popular with visitors today as a natural jacuzzi. The town of Tabacon was destroyed in the 1968 eruption and many of the residents killed, but there are always trade-offs in the search for tourist dollars.
Arenal, the youngest of the Earth's Costa Rican vents, is still quite active today. I may not have seen the peak, but at least my family and I managed to avoid toxic gases, super-hot magma, and huge rocks falling from the sky. Word is none of those things make for a great vacation unless Chevy Chase is involved.
All of these disasters seemed possible when we took a hike in the area beneath the volcano's shadow on our second day. During the stroll we passed signs warning us that we went farther at our own risk. Sad that I had forgotten the volcano-appeasing virgin I always carry on such occasions, I vowed to run as fast as I could as soon as the mountain began to rumble. Fortunately, my plan never came into play, as statistics show fat ass out-of-shape people usually fail to place in a foot race with lava, gas, and ash.
The only injury occurred when my mother stumbled, suffering a minor laceration to her hand. She may have been distracted by the beauty of the lava fields, where, a mile or more from the volcano's base, we could walk amongst a symbol of the Earth's immense power. The pile of rocks upon which we trod told us all we needed to know about Arenal's impressive throwing arm. Clearly the volcano would be a number one draft pick if not for signability questions and the fact that its passes would burn off the arms of even the most sure-handed receiver.
The abundance and diversity of Costa Rican wild life also continued to amaze us on our hike, as we spotted an eyelash pit viper, two great curassows, a crested guan, and a bevy of olive-throated parakeets.
I guess that's the moral of the story of my Costa Rican vacation. I may never have seen the top of Arenal, but as I learned, the riches of Costa Rica don't ever disappoint you for too long. If you aren't able to see one thing, just keep on moving or better yet, sit still and pay close attention - never doubt that there will be something incredible and unexpected waiting for you there. At the very least you can get a volcano burrito at the Taco Bell in San Jose or a Mount Arenal Volcano dessert at the Paraiso restaurant. Personally, I bought a refrigerator magnet so I could see what the goddamn thing looked like.

Monteverde: Amidst the Clouds

After a climb up what is (hopefully for the sake of the country's inhabitants) the worst road in all of Costa Rica, we arrived in Monteverde. The clouds must hang a little lower nearer the equator, for despite the fact that the area is only 4600 feet above sea level, the feathery pillows of the sky were all around, above but also below us at times.
The rain was not like the steady showers we received in Tortuguero, but a light misting, quickly broken and followed by hours of sunlight before the precipitation returned. The odds of sighting a rainbow were high and we even spotted a double rainbow, which have been known to cause fits of endless spazzing in the uninitiated.
The natural bounty of the land continued to astound me, especially the colorful fliers known as aves to the locals. Never much of a bird nerd before, I was hit with a fever that was fortunately not cowbell-related or even malarial in nature. Or not yet anyway -if I keep forgetting to take my pills that could be next. Oh well that's just another fun part of the experience when traveling in the rain forest right?
Where was I? Oh yeah, I was admitting to my new found love for the birds of Costa Rica and there was plenty to feed my need in Monteverde. I saw the Motmot, the official bird of Nicaragua and the resplendent quetzal, the national bird of Guatemala, both spectacular birds with long tails and a regal bearing. I also saw about ten million clay-colored robins, Costa Rica's representative, perhaps the most boring bird in the world.
I was reminded by our guide Paulo that we almost picked the turkey for the same role in the United States. Well Paulo, Benjamin Franklin was a senile and no doubt syphilitic old man and the founding fathers wisely didn't listen to his incoherent, cracked-out ramblings, so suck it.
Even the insects were interesting in Costa Rica, as we discovered after being suckered into the Butterfly Garden, only to find out that much of the tour was about spiders, millipedes, beetles, and even roaches. I guess "Roach and Tarantula Garden" didn't have the same ring to it. I shortly forgave the dishonest bastards who are going to hell because of all the interesting information they gave us about the smallest of the nation's wild life - outside of the wonderful assortment of intestinal parasites also available there, of course.
The garden also eventually delivered on the butterfly pledge, giving us the chance to see the Blue Morpho, one of which was famously killed by Time magazine in order to hold the insect still enough for a cover story about Earth Day. The postman butterfly, known for always ringing twice, and the clear winged butterfly, known for the transparency of its lies (pictured above weaving a web of deceit), were two of my other favorites.
Although we also met a monkey and a pack of coatis in Monteverde, I tire of discussing smelly animals (reminder to self: take a bath sometime this week). One of the new experiences my mother had planned for us in Costa Rica was a chance to do something called zip-lining.
Zip-lining is great - unless you are scared of heights, so I pretty much spent the whole time pissing my shorts. Once I ran out of urine, however, I was able to settle into the experience and really enjoy the thrill, knowing that the equipment was safe and reliable and our guides were professionals who had been doing this job since they were eighteen (they were now grizzled twenty five year olds). At no point did our two helpers attempt to kill us, although the intent to injure my brother and I was clearly there on a couple of occasions.
I also recommend that you turn down their idea of rappelling, which involves being dropped from a great height at the speed of gravity until you are convinced you are going to die and have a heart attack. At that very moment, the guides stop your fall and you land gently on the ground alive, if the paramedics arrive in time to treat your cardiac arrest. Hopefully the ambulance doesn't have to drive to Monteverde.
Seriously though, I really enjoyed zip-lining quite a bit, as did my brother and my mother. I highly recommend that you give it a try, especially if you are a total ass hole of whose presence the world would be well rid. Sorry, I didn't mean that, just a little edgy from a lack of caffeine. Unfortunately, I don't drink caffeinated beverages anymore so sadly my state of mind is unlikely to change any time soon.

Sadly, our time in lovely Monteverde came to an end all too quickly. Another jaw-breaking, teeth-rattling journey lay ahead, as we left the cloud forest and headed to the live and very active volcano of Arenal. Don't worry about my safety, I brought my own virgin.

The Rain Forest: Truth in Advertising

Rain forest: a two word term which leads one to expect two things - rain and forest. Tortuguero National Park, with a yearly rainfall of about twenty feet and a seemingly impenetrable jungle canopy filled with enough green to make the Lantern, the Giant, and envy all jealous.
I spent two full days in and around Tortuguero National Park and only on the last day, as I prepared to depart, did the bashful sun make an appearance. Rain was a constant, barely letting up for much more than fifteen minutes at a time, killing my camera battery and drenching even my supposedly water-proof clothing. The sky's only variation in color during the day consisted of slight changes from one shade of gray to another. The Park, located on the Northeast coast of Costa Rica near the Nicaraguan border, boasts sandy beaches, but the ocean currents are so powerful there swimming is not allowed.
Maybe to you all of this sounds like a prescription for a dull and rather wet vacation, but Tortuguero was one of the most worthwhile destinations I have ever visited, for here I found the real heart of Costa Rica and the two keys to the country's recent popularity as a tourist destination: the wildlife and the tico (the word Costa Ricans use when they refer to themselves) guides.
Even for a place whose economy is largely based on ecotourism, the nation's biological diversity is astonishing. I had never in my short life seen such variety in so short a time outside of a zoo. We took three separate excursions while in Tortuguero, one through the jungle and two in an open boat down the rivers and canals that cut through the Park. At times it seemed as if there was a new species of bird, reptile, insect, or mammal waiting around every corner of the path and every bend of the river.
To list each animal I saw would be almost mind-numbing - with the help of my family (whose cameras survived), I took a picture of everything I could. There was really no other way to possibly remember the cast members of the vast menagerie of different species constantly crossing our path.
The oropendula, sloth, howler monkey, poison dart frog, great curassow, and Jesus lizard are just a few of the characters I saw that make up Tortuguero's star-studded cast. With 250 mammals, almost 900 birds, 225 reptiles, 175 amphibians, and over 500,000 total animals species living in Costa Rica the mere hundred or so I personally saw are just a drop in the bucket. The tremendous variety and uniqueness of the fauna alone give me an excuse to return one day. The elusive tapir will one day be mine.
The privilege of spotting so many of nature's wonders would have been impossible without the other key to the success of my travels in Tortuguero and elsewhere - the guides. The Costa Rican government has managed to make use of their natural wonders like no other country in Central America. They have concentrated much of their educational resources on training an exceptional group of people knowledgeable about every facet of the nation's flora and fauna.
All of our guides were also quite fluent in English, meaning that not only did they know the answers to our questions, they could communicate their knowledge to those of us whose Spanish consists of Hola, gracias, cerveza (fun fact: the Ticos say birra for beer instead of cerveza), and maybe a few curse words.
At Tortuguero our tour group was especially lucky, drawing the services of Jorge Luis, who grew up in the nearby rain forest and had spent many a day and night tracking through the jungle as a hunter in his early years. Now working full-time for the Tourism bureau, Jorge proved to be a Costa Rican Renaissance man with an encyclopedic memory of native medicine and a child's excitement for the various forms of life that kept appearing as if on cue.
Most importantly though, Jorge (and our other guides and drivers throughout the trip) had an extraordinary ability to spot camouflaged animals hiding in the thick jungle canopy. Without his keen eyes (aided by our also quite capable boat captains) I would have never been able to find some of the participants in the rain forest's version of "Where's Waldo?". On a couple of occasions I couldn't see organisms located only several feet in front of my face - and I was not alone. The Jesus Lizard and the caiman were two of the more ingeniously hidden reptiles whose discover by Jorge left myself and others stunned at what appeared to be his superhuman eyesight.
On the third day our boat left Tortuguero on the hour long ride to our bus for San Jose. A car ride of four hours lay beyond our planned noon arrival in the capital. Monteverde was next on the agenda and the trip there would be a challenging one, mainly in regard to the integrity of my internal organs, some of which are still situated in the wrong places.

Next: Bouncing all the way to Monteverde.

Costa Rica: An Act in Three Parts

As a traveler the process of passing judgment on a country's merits can be a hard task, especially when the time available to compile the case for and against is as measly as one week. For this year's trip to Costa Rica, the flimsy evidence would be based on short excursions to Tortuguero, Monteverde, and Arenal, as well as a quick stay in the capital of San Jose.
My first day was spent in Costa Rica's largest city, San Jose, where the main airport and an entire quarter of the nation's population is located. I wandered the streets of downtown San Jose encountering a variety of interesting products like Bimbo bread and Darky chocolates, although I sadly missed my opportunity to purchase a Darky (yes I am going to hell).
I was able to sample some of the other culinary offerings, however, and I greatly enjoyed my first tastes of the local versions of ceviche and beef churrascos. Also, patacones, fried plantains served with black bean dip or guacamole, are an excellent side dish.
I had been forewarned by several people that Costa Rican cuisine was somewhat bland, but I found that was true only of the food offered in some of our hotels, the local establishments put out some tasty products, although I will admit diversity is somewhat limited. Costa Rica will never be confused with Paris, but that doesn't mean you won't enjoy some very good meals there.
The beer was also quite tasty after the insult to the art of brewing that I was presented with during my trip to Spain last year. The Spanish should stick to wine and leave beer to the professionals in England, Belgium, Germany, Czech, etc. The Costa Rican strengths were Pilsen and Imperial (pretty much the official national beer) both of which proved to have a very crisp flavor, not too sweet and too bitter with an easy finish.
San Jose, although the central organ of commerce there, is not the heart of Costa Rica, it is a dirty, crowded place and I don't recommend spending more than a day there. Thankfully, the capital is not indicative of the country as a whole - as I would discover on my subsequent journey.

Next: an excursion to Tortuguero

Medicinal Porpoises

I ended a long run of success in the field of doctor avoidance last Friday, when I finally cracked after a long bout with parental pressure and visited the offices of Passport Health here in Greenville.
We are taking our family trip this year to Costa Rica and I was in need of a vaccine or eight, having not experienced the lovely sensation of being jabbed with a needle for seventeen years. My doctorless streak was a little shorter, dating back to a 1998 visit caused by the fact that the Court Ridge pool at that time was the only place on the planet dirtier than my friend Tim's favorite pornos. Apparently, chlorine can only be expected to do so much in the war against bacteria.
My absence from medical clinics really dates back from childhood trauma that occurred whilst in the office of my personal physician, Dr. Fairey. There are indeed certain effects on a child's psyche when a man named Fairey grabs your balls and asks you to cough. I'm not going to blame the guy for turning me gay or anything, but I figured I should continue to avoid doctors just to be safe. God knows what else they would do to me, right?
On Friday I found just exactly what they could do, breaking my long fast under pressure from my mother, who steadfastly refused to forget that I had not been given a vaccine for twenty years or that I was traveling to a country that along with rain forests and volcanoes, possesses many opportunities to obtain a vast array of exotic diseases.
Passport Health, which I visited in order to attain my vaccination, also managed to remind me of the dastardly dangers Costa Rica holds. As soon as I met my doctor she presented me with a portfolio on the country which explained the 250 different ways in which I could possibly fall ill or die during my tropical vacation. I'm hoping for dengue fever - I've never heard of it and I always wanted to be the first person on my block to die from something.
After having the life scared out of me by the pamphlet of doom, I agreed to four vaccinations (as well as a prescription for malaria pills). I wasn't too worried, thinking they would spread out the shots over a couple of trips to the clinic. Naive me! It turns out that they are legally allowed to pump various weakened viruses into my arm like I was a heroin addict in dire need of a week's worth of fixes.
I was then led into a room where two women awaited. I imagined one would give me the shots while the other held me down and covered my mouth so that the people in the lobby would not hear my anguished screams. Instead, they did the good cop, bad cop thing. One spoke to me about a book I was reading while the other jabbed my arms with pointy things. I highly recommend the technique, as I was distracted and hardly noticed the application of my many-flavored vaccine cocktail. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that the deed was done and I had experienced hardly any discomfort.
I have to say that all in all my experience was a good one, the doctor was very pleasant and helpful. She gave me vaccines for Hepatitis A/B, typhoid, and tetanus and managed to do it without causing me discomfort or giving me Herpegonasyphlaids. Despite their best efforts, though, I'm still pretty gay.