Goodbye Manuel Antonio, Hello Monteverde!

Well, well, well. Here we are again, coming to you from a new locale in Costa Rica. This time we are in Monteverde, up in the mountains to the North-west of San Jose. After a brief stint in Manuel Antonio, and an insanely long travel day (more on that later) we are now posted in an an incredible hostel called Cabinas Vista Al Golfo. We scored a special online deal, and ended up in an apartment style hotel room for less than we've been paying at some of our other hostels. Not only that, breakfast is included, which consists of fruits (pineapple, banana, watermelon), coffee (f***in' important), toast (with all the works--jams and butter) and eggs to make up your own scramble. So, we left for our days adventure with our bellies full and zanged on caffeine.

Since we're up at a higher altitude, the temperature is down to the Northern California briskness that we miss. And, as luck would have it, we've managed to capture another incredibly beautiful day of sunshine with relatively little rain. The only other interesting weather report is that there are occasional misty showers and a howling wind that sounds throughout the day (but really picks up at night--Tawsh even thought the sliding glass windows in our room were going to fall over when we were sleeping). But, the most important part to mention about this hostel is that we are smack dab in the middle of an amazing landscape.

The hostel, built up on the crest of one of many hills, overlooks one of those oil paiting/watercolor dreamscapes, where we see hill after hill coming face to face with the rolling clouds which make up the area's many cloudforests. We have wonderful views of the montainous regions from the huge windows that line this whole hostel (and from the huge balcony from our room!) We are on top of a hill so, what we're left with is a canyonish canopy where rolling greens and setting suns leave us breathless (in the clouds).  At the clearer times of the day (read: when the cloudsw aren't enveloping everything) you can see all the way down to the Pacific Ocean. If you can imagine all this, and then add to it the slightly chilly temperature and the rush of gusts of winds, then you can understand what it would feel and look like to be sitting here next to us.

We had spent the last two days in Manuel Antonio, a small tourist town on the central Pacific coast. The national park is what brings people from all over to this town, not to mention the white sand beaches, mangroves, dense forests and tropical wildlife. Our hostel there was recommended to us from a friend due to its cleanliness and great views. It too was situated at the top of this hill and overlooked the ocean. We spent the first day inManuel Antonio on the beach, sippin' on coconuts and reading our books. The next day we woke up early and took the trails through the park. We took a path along the peninsula in the park that took us up and up and up. We were surrounded by tall, dense plants and really had no idea where this was going to take us. We finally got to a lookout point at the top and we realized what all that hard work was for!

Manuel Antonio Park (the view from our hike up the mountain)

As you can see, the views of the ocean were amazing and they only got better and better from there. We walked all the way around and eventually got to a small white sand beach that was filled with cute hermit crabs and staggering palm trees. We ate a picnic of freshly baked bread, avocado and salami, and enjoyed the solitude for a while. We kept on going, occasionally stopping to identify a bird or eat a snack. There were a lot of iguanas and monkeys all along the trails throughout the park. The monkeys were really accustomed to people so they would just hang out a foot or two away from the people. We even saw one steal a granola bar and eat it! It is sad to see them eat human food but we realized that it is an easy way for them to forage. Some of the iguanas were about 1-2 feet long and really quite exquisite. They definitely looked like dinosaurs. After we hiked our pants off, we took a short ferry back to the main beach and headed off for a midday cup o' joe. The coffee down here rocks our socks off. We ended that night with a great dinner, some live music, and of course, some lovely conversation.

An iguana basking in the sun.

A BLUE MORPHO! A "famous" butterfly in Costa Rica!

Grant, looking fuzzy.

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's A HUGE TREE!

A secluded beach we found in the Manuel Antonio park.

When we left our hostel in Manuel Antonio, we were literally out the door at 8:45am, and when we walked into our new hostel the time was right around 7:00pm. According to our online sources, a bus would leave from Quepos (a 30 minute bus ride from Manuel Antonio) at 10:30, which would put us in Puntarenas in time for the bus which would take us up to Monteverde. When we got to Quepos, we ended up having to wait an hour longer than we thought we would because the bus actually left at 11:30 (though there had also been one at 9:30). So much for our reliable online sources. When we arrived in Puntarenas, at first we were unsure what to do. As the gravity of our situation starting getting clear, our nervousness levels proportionately started rising. After talking to a few people, we found out that we might still make a bus to Monteverde if we made it over to the Pan-American highway a few kilometers a way. But, the only catch was, the bus would get to the bus stop at 4:30 and it was already 4:00! Needless to say, we hopped in a cab, and luckily we made it to the bus stop at 4:20. The bus station was really just two little benches and a little hole-in-the-wall soda (soda=small restaurant). We already felt like this was going to be pretty sketchy, mainly because it was in the middle of what felt like nowhere. So we sat there and waited.... and waited.... and waited. None of the busses that passed said Monteverde and we were beginning to lose hope. Soon enough, it's nearly 5:00 and we're considering ourselves S.O.L. Our only options at this point (so we think) are to take a cab, stay in Puntarenas, or try and rent a car. Trying to figure out what we're going to do, Grant runs over to a nearby cab and asks how much it would cost to get to Monteverde. $100. Okay, a taxi ride is not happening. But, good news; the cab driver tells him a bus is still coming to this stop. He points to his watch and shows its 4:15!!! We had our clocks set to the wrong time (aka Tawsh doesn't know how to tell time). The bus we'd been waiting for this whole time hadn't come at all. Phew. Sure enough, right at 4:30, the bus pulls up, and we're back on track to make it to Monteverde. We couldn't stop smiling the whole 2 hours up the mountain.

The BUS! WOOOOOO!

We woke up this morning at 6:30am (this has been a regular event since our stay at Mastatal). We enjoyed the view in the daytime and enjoyed a great breakfast while deciding how to spend our day. We decided to go to the cheese factory (our list of options included biological reserves, canopy tours, zoo type establishments etc...but we chose the cheese). We later found out how important and excellent this decision was. It was a beautiful day so we decided to walk 2 kilometers through the cute little mountain town that is Monteverde, to the factory and of course, stopped along the way to get coffee (twice). Eventually we made it to the tour and our guide began to tell us the amazing history of this cheese factory. We learned that this cheese company is the main provider throughout Costa Rica (we were not expecting it to be this one; we were so used to the company name being another label in the dairy section). It is huge here and throughout Central America and suprisingly, the company began with a couple of Quakers from America. They came to Costa Rica to flee from the draft set forth for the Korean War. They found an empty plot of land (now Monteverde) up on this mountain and bought the land. Back then, it would take them 3 months to get up to Monteverde but eventually they were able to establish themselves up here. They decided that they needed to somehow make money and making cheese was their best option. (High value to weight ratio, cheese is.) Eventually the business/town grew into what is now a wonderful, popular place to visit and live. It was really cool to witness the whole process of making cheese and we learned that all the milk for their cheese comes from around 150 small milk farmers. Everything the company does is local (to own stock in the company you have to either be from Monteverde, be one of the cow farmers in the area, be an employee of the company, or be a Quaker in Costa Rica). It was a really wonderful experience and it was a great introduction into this small town (we were in for the cheese but ended up getting a great lesson in history!)

The Monteverde Cheese Factory

One of our many coffee breaks

Taking a small break from walking.

What a day! Now we're in bed with some local/interesting looking beers for our own beer tasting flight. We miss you all very much.

<3

Tawsh and Grant

PS. Thank you for all of your wonderful comments! We'll leave you today with haikus we wrote.

Blue Skies, Grey Clouds

By Grant Hartell

In Monteverde

The wind howls loudly. SNAP!

Trees just fell over ..

Haiku de Queso

By Natasha Meir

Quakers are pansies

They fled to Costa Rica

Now they make good cheese