Day of the Cameras

As you may recall, Nicole and I had both gone to bed on Monday night sans camera. I was scheduled to see the guy about the thing at 10am, so I slept in. Nicole actually got up at 7am to go ask the receptionist to call the zipline company to ask about her camera. When Yselia told Nicole that 'oh, so sorry, you must have left it somewhere else, Nicole took a cab out to the tour office to look around herself. When she didn't see her camera, she told the receptionist that the driver of the shuttle van must have her camera and then somehow guilted the driver into confessing that he did indeed have the camera, and then, she went with him out to his home to retrieve her camera from the driver's wife. All of this before I even woke up.


When I heard this story, I was thrilled for Nicole, and for myself, since at least I can have copies of her photos, but I was even more upset about my camera. Why couldn't I have gotten my camera back? I decided to head over to the Gray Line office in town and talk to someone myself rather than continue to rely upon the dubious reliability of hostel workers. The guy in the office was very helpful and started calling drivers and looking into the whole story. He told me to return that afternoon and to check back with him.


Feeling better now that I had finally taken action, Nicole and I jumped into a taxi out to the trailhead for a grueling hike up the inactive Cerro Chato volcano. At first, we were very disappointed. The "trail" was actually a road, with barbed wire to the sides and cows grazing in pastures. After about 1/2 an hour, we realized why this hike was so highly recommended. It was amazing! We entered the rain forest and started climbing straight up the volcano. The footing was treacherous, muddy with many exposed root systems. The heat was intense and I was dripping sweat within minutes. We continued for another hour (hah! we summitted in 1.5 hours, not in 2 like everyone else) and then the torrential downpour began. When the sky opened up above us, we were just at the lip of the crater and still needed to hike down to the crater lake. That was exciting - pretty much straight down, clinging to tree roots to keep from falling. We took some photos posed on a tree branch that extended out over the lake and then climbed back out of the crater.


It was a little sad, one of the highlights of this hike is the opportunity to enjoy some fantastic views across the crater, but in the rain, we just saw lots of grey and white. The hike back also took 1.5 hours, because it rained pretty much the whole time. The trail turned into a stream and the footing was even more treacherous. Of course, we felt pretty good about the whole thing when we passed a guy hiking this trail barefoot! He seemed OK when we passed him and his lady friend on our way up the mountain, but when we lapped him, in the rain, on our way down, he was a-slipping and a-sliding down the hill. Oh, I almost forgot the best part...on our way up the hill, at the start of the hike, we were picked up by a canine guide. He hiked with us, leading the way and then stopping to wait for the slow humans, for about 1/2 an hour, then we ran into Carlos, our guide from the Rio Celeste hike, who was leading a private hike. Carlos stole our dog. Seriously, he lured that dog from us with nothing but his extreme cuteness. Oh well.


Down the mountain in one piece, or actually, in two distinct human-shaped pieces, we phoned for a taxi and rode back into town with a lovely Australian couple who were in Costa Rica doing a house swap. Nice. The cab dropped us at the Gray Line office and I rushed in with baited breath hoping that my camera would be waiting for me. Or, I actually rushed to the doorway, since Nicole and I were both absolutely covered in mud and the floors in the office were too clean to desecrate. No camera. He said that the driver was not answering his cell phone and that I should come back in the morning. He also said that there was only a 10% chance that I would ever see that camera again. I actually appreciated his honesty, but I felt, like Quagmire from Family Guy, when told that a woman will only sleep with him if he's the last man on earth, "so there's a chance then?"


Disheartened, we returned to the hostel, where a long shower went a ways to cheering me up and then a trip to the Chinese restaurant across the road, did the rest of the trick. It was amazing, probably the best meal that I've had in Costa Rica, and this has been a wonderful trip for food. Carlos had pointed out a particular palm tree to us on our hike and told us that it was the palm that yields the most delicious heart of palm in the world. Now, I have had heart of palm. It's pretty much cellulose and water, with no discernable flavor, but Carlos insisted that this stuff was so delicious that Costa Rica doesn't even export it, since they just eat it all themselves. Intrigued by this description, I decided to order a heart of palm salad, and oh my goodness, wow, wow, fresh heart of palm in the rainforest is a completely different thing from the canned stuff that I have eaten in the past. It has this amazing mineral-rich flavor and a wonderful texture. I loved it! That plus some Szechuan tofu with vegetables was a perfect meal.

After dinner, we decided that we really should wash our clothes and try to salvage our filthy hiking shoes. We dropped everything off at the laundromat for wash and fold and toddled off to the internet cafe for some blogging and photo downloading. After that, we concurred that we were both exhausted and would love to turn in for an early night. That hike was really intense and we were beat!

But soft, what light through yonder window breaks??? It is the disco ball and we were helpless in its thrall. Walking down the main road, we ran into about 10 people from the hostel, including our new dormmates, all headed off to the disco. We wavered, and then fell victim to peer pressure. After a minute spent sprucing up, we went off to the disco with Chris (US Navy) and Pat (Aussie). We each had one drink and danced for less than an hour. Most of our time was spent watching our extremely drunk female dormmate be chased around the dance floor by the shirtless, drunk, and amorous, Ed the Autralian, who could be excused only by virtue of his possession of a mere 18 years of experience on planet earth. Otherwise, one would consider him extremely obnoxious.

After the thick smoke and groping men managed to overcome the scant pleasure we derived from the frankly odd mixes of the DJ, Nicole and I said goodbye to our gentlemen admirers, including one of the zipline guides, and went home, escorted through the dangerous streets of La Fortuna by Chris and Pat. Nighty night!