Santa Elena, Friday

Fri 3rd 2042 A pretty full day. I'm going to write the night walk up first because there's more stuff I'm likely to forget. Got back to hostel about 2030, have started copying some photos (something I do most days) and had a not-that-quick cold shower (which will apparently do wonders for my health if I keep it up :-) ) and going to do some laundry soon because that will give it more chance to dry.

Picked up by guide on time, only me with him on way out as the other party members were making their own way there. Group of just 6 as advertised and worked well as it didn't feel to pressured or difficult to look through the scope or to get guide to take us all pictures with our cellphones through it.

I chatted with him in Spanish in the car, felt slightly stilted somehow but not bad as such. Paid the USD8 entry fee in colones (5k IIRC) at the venue (which is apparently only open at night; I had wondered if I should maybe try to visit during the day, even though I had booked transport for a second day at anti-plastic forest, but obviously not an option after all) and had a brief chat with Ryan from Chicago who is doing a kind of month-only pseudo-digital-nomad thing working remotely for his company from San Jose and just taking the odd day of holiday to make three day weekends and so on. Joined later by a couple from Portland and two Canadian guys. All youngish, probably earlyish thirties but not really sure.

Tour was very good really (and in English as I expected, BTW). FTR I took G5 and my regular camera but (reasonably enough) guide said the protruding lens on camera would scratch glass on scope so he used my smartphone to take me photos through that, and although I tried to snap the odd photo of not-tiny things with the camera at first the very low light levels meant long exposure times which wasn't compatible with hand-holding, so I didn't really use the camera much and (not that it was a problem having it) didn't really need to have taken it.

We saw some capuchin and howler monkeys apparently having a bit of a fight - I didn't see this exactly, but there were groups of both monkeys (I think former are herbivores and the latter carnivores and will eat the former's babies) in the trees. I need to check if I've got that the right way round, because I think those are the only two species here and so one of those would be the monkeys which were on the hostel terrace (way closer than I've seen in parks) this morning.

OK, web search suggests howlers are herbivores (foliovores) and capuchins are therefore probably carnivorous. And as far as I can just from the pictures, it was capuchins (two of them; one very prominent on the railing, another in the tree which may have escaped my camera) on the hostel balcony at breakfast.

We also saw (trying to get this in chronological order to xref with photos, but obviously take with a pinch of salt - and not all of these have photos) moss-mimicking stick insect, green pit viper, emerald (?) toucanette (fluffed up in a tree), leaf-cutter ants, a tarantula in its hole at the bottom of a tree, female (less colourful) and then male (more colourful, irridescent) hummingbird nesting (their beaks are so long they apparently can't put them under their wings as most birds do) (both violet something species), tiny frog (size of fingertip?) on a leaf (apparently small enough a raindrop might kill it), a rufus-eyed stream frog about the size of a human thumb inside a split log (the photo looks like a branch at first), a (blue) morpho butterfly coccoon (apparently you can just see the blue wings inside), a brown jay.

Fairly busy with different guided groups going round and the guides swapping info but not insanely so and there were significant amounts of time when it was just our group with no other groups obviously nearby. Not as creepy as I'd expected being in the forest at night; obviously this is fairly tame forest and we were in a group, but still surprising, given how I found the ranario (inside an actual building) at night creepy. We had torches as well of course (but then I did at ranario too).

Got lift back (of course) and Ryan also came with us as he'd walked out (25 mins apparently) himself but guide said it wouldn't be safe (probably because of traffic but I don't know) for him to walk back after dark.

Probably forgotten some bits but going to do some laundry now I've bashed that out and if anything comes back to me I can add it. Will write rest of day up later.

2132 Few extra notes re night walk... I was wondering if I ought to tip the guide by rounding the 35 up to 40 (as I would be handing over 2x20) but also remembered some stuff in guide book (though by this stage I certainly don't treat it as gospel) about this being unnecessary and perhaps not-quite-insulting-but-weird. I didn't obviously note anyone else tipping, and he did make a point of saying he would get me  5 change, so I didn't. He actually offered me 5 change a second time later on but (of course) I was honest and said he'd already given it to me.

I wore my shell jacket instead of fleece as I didn't want to take a backpack and I had been told to wear a rain jacket. There was a thinnish rain during maybe half of the tour, I would probably have been OK in the fleece but can't be sure. Anyway, this means I *did* wear the shell jacket, although (not that a lighter/less bulky rain jacket might not be better) the mere fact I took it and waterproof over trousers out with me to the forests even if I didn't wear them kind of justifies having them anyway.

Most of the stuff on the night walk I'd never have spotted on my own of course (probably the ants...) and even when you knew it was there and had seen it through the scope it was often hard to see with the naked eye unless the guide used a laser pointer to pick it out or (once) shone a torch through the scope.

2253 Right, kind of in bed and will write rest up now. Done some more laundry.

Felt rather groggy this morning but made it up for breakfast as usual. Other guests (not AFAICT Argentinian couple) not seemingly disposed to chat, but as I already mentioned there were a couple of monkeys on the balcony, which was pretty cool.

Tried to pay for room but told I could pay later. Went into town to use ATM but still not working. Didn't wear glasses to breakfast or town incidentally as I had the elastic on and didn't want to take it off or look slightly silly or go to effort of de-bubble-wrapping spare pair.

I popped into my usual tourist office and booked the taxi/jeep+boat thing to La Fortuna. Incidentally spoke to people today both at canopy tour and night walk and apparently (as I think guide book also says) LF is even more touristy than SE, and perhaps a little bit "young US travellers partying" . See how it goes I guess. I apparently can't cancel this trip (but I haven't paid a deposit and would/could they force me to pay?) but I can change the dates - I asked as although was 95% sure would want to leave Sun and didn't want to risk no availability, I also wanted if possible to keep options open in case everything went wrong today and I wanted more time to have another try at canopy tour or night walk. I am going to stick with the free cancellation hostel I booked - it's only IIRC three nights, if I like it and want more time in LF I can extend, otherwise I can try somewhere else if I want to stay in LF.

(Wind is blowing outside as per usual, perhaps a smidge less intense or maybe I'm getting used to it.)

I wasn't too edgy before heading out to canopy tour. As ATM wasn't working and couldn't get dollars, I decided I'd pay cash in colones rather than use a credit card on pseudo-privacy grounds, and to be fair I suspect they used a fair-ish rate (IIRC 33k for a USD59 price tag).

Extremo don't seem to have lockers but the only thing I had to leave was a bottle of water so not a big deal in practice.

I felt more confident having done it the other day, and this time they told us/I paid attention to keeping knees up when on ziplines (as well as having ankles crossed, which I think I always did) and that might account for much less difficulty in keeping facing the right way and not spinning round. I have a vague feeling once or twice there was a bit of a problem there but not as bad as the other day.

They told us at start because of winds we might not be able to do tarzan swing at end and if not we'd do a rappel. I was genuinely disappointed but by the time we got to the two superman lines at the end staff were saying it probably would be done and (spoilers) it was included, though I was (perhaps surprisingly to a-few-days-ago me) a bit worried they'd suddenly cancel it before I got to do it.

The zip lines were fun but not (this isn't a complaint) obviously more "extreme" than the 100% aventuras ones. Two of them we had to do in pairs - I don't know if this was wind-related or it's always done. This turned out to be a nice ice-breaker and I ended up chatting to my partner as a result, a Canadian woman called Juliet, and subsequently to a couple of Dutch (? one of them anyway) behind us as we waited for the first superman line.

I did feel a tiny bit less "hustled through" than I had on some of the earlier lines at 100% but this is probably highly subjective. They didn't point out the water-drinking options during the tour and I think a lot of people (including me, not that I was desperate - though it was quite warm at times, but I think wearing fleece was smart as it was also a bit wind-chilly at times too) missed them. Seemed to be quite a back up of people at first superman line (not particularly due to harness changes) for whatever reason, although generally the waiting wasn't excessive.

Perhaps it was just familiarity but the first superman line didn't feel quite as scary at the top as 100% aventuras one - *maybe* there was less of a feeling of pointing downwards while you were stationary at the top because of some quirk in the setup.

The second superman line was through their tunnel. This was super un-scary getting set up for, as you were basically at ground level a metre or so above the floor (and if fear of heights was a problem, that would not be an issue on any part of this line) I had thought the tunnel (no lights, of course) was a bit of a gimmick, and maybe it is (I genuinely don't know), but it was actually surprisingly satisfying to be flying through the dark watching the sunlit far end get closer.

I am not all that sure but I think the tarzan swing was higher than 100% aventuras one and consequently there were more and larger oscillations before you stopped. The launch was different and perhaps better - instead of stepping out of a gate, they retracted a bit of metal flooring under you, and lowered you a metre or so under control before releasing. I think this is probably the only thing which was more extreme than 100% aventuras. (To be fair, the *park* is called Extremo and they do other things like bungee jumps too.) The initial fall of a couple of seconds (obviously hard to judge) was of course scary but in a kind of good way and there was that weird feeling of relief and change in direction as the rope "caught" , and then it was sort of exciting but not scary during the swinging phase.

I think I would have felt short-changed if we hadn't done the tarzan swing (not that I could have blamed them as they obviously can't control weather) but as it is I'm glad I went, even though these aren't cheap experiences.

I had said to myself I wasn't going to buy the photos but in the end, partly because I enjoyed this a bit more probably just because I socialised a bit more and felt more "present" and partly out of (banked on, no doubt) fear of regret, I did (USD10 or I paid 5.7kish) buy the photos, although I didn't spring the extra USD5 for the videos as well (which TBH felt a bit chiselling of them, but also thanks to chatting with Juliet we took some photos/videos of each other and exchanged by e-mail this afternoon).

Got bus back into town, went to BCR cash machine and although there was a woman using it with no luck and I spoke with an American or Canadian couple who also had no luck (but said someone had used it just before that woman and got dollars), it worked for me - obviously one of those weird banking quirks - and I got USD200, though it only did 20s not 10s. Went to Raulito's for my usual, back to hostel where the "nicer" MoS took my USD60 and gave me (I think fair-ish) 4k in change for my slightly under USD51 bill for the next two nights.

Faffed around with photos on phone then went out to night walk which I already wrote about.

Oh, after Raulito's I went to my tourist office to book a bus to Santa Elena for tomorrow - there is "new"  stuff I could do (eg the free (?) hummingbird garden outside MV reserve, which would only cost me 1600 in bus fares to get to) but it would probably be good to go back to SE and I'm not *desperate* to see anything else and good to leave something for another time if I do come back etc etc.

The only real downside to SE tomorrow is I'd have otherwise like to have washed my mud-spattered (at back of legs) trousers tonight but I'd just end up getting a pair dirty tomorrow anyway, so I will probably try to wash trousers tomorrow night and hope I can get them dry enough to pack (or maybe to wear and let the final drying happen as I wear them).

Worst comes to worst I can always pay for laundry at LF hostel, though it's not *just* about money - it's about risk of loss, especially loss of the odd sock or whatever.

I think that's about everything and while not mega tired given groggy feeling this morning etc it wouldn't be bad to go to bed properly and fall asleep if I want. If I missed anything I can always mention it tomorrow.

Finally - if I didn't already say, SE has a laundry place or two in town. I haven't been actively looking but I have paid some attention and I hadn't seen any such places elsewhere. Maybe they are only ever in touristy places, but I have a feeling in eg Guatemala and Mexico (albeit that was a long time ago) they were everywhere. Not a big deal, just FWIW.