Turtles & Volcanoes That Fail to Fire

The border crossing here is notoriously painful so we decided to cross the border early despite being nicely hungover at the time. We however had an almost boring border crossing with the guys seemingly completely uninterested in talking to us or that we were leaving/entering the country, always nice when it works out that way. A short wait and bus ride saw us in the “so called” brother city of Bocas, Puerto Viejo.

This is much more like what I was expecting Bocas to be like with the town set on a beach and lots of cabins and other beach style accommodation available along the one road in and out of town. The place also has a lot more relaxed feel about it with much less hassle than Bocas. The strange thing is that so many people speak English here and its difficult to know how to start a conversation so I would generally walk in and say buenos/hello and see what they came back with!
The jump up in prices definitely continues from Bocas and despite the accommodation being a little bit cheaper the food even in the supermarkets is quite expensive and eating out is very expensive. With this in mind we hunted out the local fish man and found we could get marlin steaks for $2 each, this comfortably did us for dinner.

The next day we were there we rented bikes and headed along the beach out to supposedly the nicest beach in the area, Manzanillo which was a very nice beach full of white sand, warm blue water and not many people which was ideal.
After some lazing on the beach for a couple of days I took the long journey out to Tortuguero, by way of a 5 hour boat/wildlife trip from near Puerto Viejo. Despite being the more expensive way of getting there it was nice and the spider monkeys, raccoons, caiman and countless different birds offered a nice view than buses and cars on the road.
It was a nice trip though a bit more expensive than the alternative way however we get to see a few spider monkeys, a couple of raccoons, a few caiman and countless different birds along the way which helped break up the trip.
The main reason for coming to Tortugeuro was to see the giant greenback turtles that are currently laying eggs on the beach and as soon as I arrived I organized a tour to see them that night. True to form it rained all night but after assurances this wouldn’t bother the turtles we set off towards the beach. With the turtles being cautious and easily disturbed and Costa Ricas willingness to conserve their environment we not allowed to use torches or cameras which was a bit of a shame but understandable. The tour took us along the beach where they have spotters there using infared lights to see where the turtles are at that time, given the whole on beach process takes somewhere around 2 hours. Just as we arrived we were able to see a giant mother turtle slowly (and I mean slowly!) making its way down to the water. The amazing this about the incredible creatures is their size as they are over 1m long and atleast 30cm high as well as living past 100 years old! Next we got to see a turtle laying its eggs after digging out a giant hole for a nest, the turtle will lay over 100 eggs that are reminiscent of ping pong balls and whilst she is laying she is in a trance undisturbed by her surroundings. However as an idea of how cautious they are, since it was raining and there was lightning they were nesting as close to the trees on the beach as possible. After they finish laying they take a good amount of time to camouflage their nest covering them with sand, something that was made more difficult by where they decided to lay. After they are happy with their nest they make the slow trip back to the water and prepare for another cycle of laying in about 7 days time. Given the turtles lay up to 6 times a cycle and over 100 eggs each time its hard to imagine these incredible creatures are still endangered. However such is the amount of predators that are after the eggs and the way in which the turtles move within the nest as well the survival rate for these eggs is only 1-3%.

After seeing the turtles laying their eggs it was time to leave Torteguero and return to the mountains hoping to catch a glimpse of some lava at the continuously active volcano Arenal near La Fortuna. This town name translates to “the fortune” and it was changed to this after the last eruption happened on the side away from the town otherwise the town would have been demolished. The town here has a beautiful but quiet little setting amongst the mountains and after a full day of travelling (a boat and 5 buses) I decided to rest up and prepare for the night tour of the volcano. The night tour is supposedly the best time to see the volcano as during the afternoon the clouds come in and completely cover the volcano whereas in the early morning the view is very clear. Despite getting up at 2:30am to get to the viewpoint nice and early the volcano failed to perform and other than a few grumbles and some smoke we saw little. Still afterwards we got to have an early morning dip in the hot springs which was a really nice start to the day.

After this I was still full of energy and decided to hike up cerro Chalto which was a once active but now dormant volcano with a lake inside it. The hike up there was quite beautiful as once you get to the trailhead (and take the free entry trail – check in hostels for instructions) you climb up through the rainforest which provides a lovely backdrop as well as plenty of shade for the hike. The climb is only a couple hours but given the heat and humidity I was glad to get to the lake and have a swim in its cool (actually make that cold) waters. The lake was a beautiful shade of green when the sun came out and then became very eerie looking as the clouds came in and covered the lake. A really nice day despite the disappointment of not seeing lava but how often do you get to swim in an old volcano! Tomorrow its off to cross the border to Nicaragua.