The Forgotten Post

So the posts have seriously been slacking off, but I'll just do an enourmous recap and then maybe go into some more detail. I'm workin on it.

So starting with last weekend. We went to Poas Volcano. Its just like a fun park you get to walk around and see some sweet volcanoes. I wouldn't say its super special, but its pretty. The park really consisted of like 2 walking paths and some scenic overlooks, not enough footpaths for my taste, but it was beautiful. Also we went to some like crazy spa/zoo thing. I really don't know, but I saw a sloth, and I hated it. End of story. It opened its mouth at me and like snarled, and I got scared, naturally. Then there was the first buffet I've had in Costa Rica, SUPER SATISFFYING. I basically ate everything and in the end found out I still had to walk quite a bit down to the sweetest waterfall ever, well maybe second sweetest, its all in the eye of the beholder here.

But ya waterfall walk was like a mile walk down, so naturally I just sat and started at a massive waterfall for a while because I did not want to walk back up like a thousand stairs. I'll try to throw some pictures of those two waterfalls down. But it was legit because water was just spraying everywhere and you were soaked just from standing there. So I loved it forever.

So that was a fun trip. Then white water rafting went down and everything was great. There was a point in White Water rafting were adrenaline was high, team spirits high, blah blah blah. We were coming up on a class 4 rapid, which is the hardest rapid that is aloud for a public rafting team, and basically the entire raft jus sat there and screamed so we couldn't hear our guide tell us to stop paddling and my roomate and I ran the raft straight into a wall, and we almost flipped, but we didn't so it was legit. Good story huh?!

Anyways so that was a very quick recount of the long ago weekend. Now for a more recent weekend, which would be Monte Verde. Very pretty. First night we were in a small town that had a sweet hot springs resort with this wicked fast waterslide that totally would not have passed any safety laws in the U.S. so basically you had to sit up on it otherwise you would just smoke your head on the bottom of the slide. But in this slide, it dives down so quick that you essentially free fall for a while, real crazy.

So that was that, that day we hit up some of the most gourgeous scenery ever. We drove through the mountains on, as usual, some horrible roads, but very scenic. Then we took a boat across I wanna say Nicoya Lake, I may be wrong about the name there. But that was about a 30 to 40 minute boat ride just chillin on this awesome lake surrounded by hills and green. Really pretty, I think I have pictures, and if I don't I'll make sure I get those goin from someone else. Logically I should have them, but for some reason I feel like I don't. Wait, I don't but someone does. FOR SURE.

Anyways, that was some thinking out loud. That night we stayed in Monte Verde at a real chill little hotel that was probs the most beautiful thing ever. It was situated on top of this long hill and from it you could see the gulf of something, I think Nicoya, yep Gulf of Nicoya, and the lake definatley wasn't Lake Nicoya. Anyways, you could see the Pacific Coast pretty much from the top of this hill and it was real awesome.

They had this little I guess what was local fast food, never real seen like a mom and pop joint pullin off the typical american definition of fast food, but this place totally did that. And it was sit down so this little resturant has a lot of redeeming qualities.
(Side Note: I really enjoy knowing absolutley nothing of where to eat or where to stay because it really pushes me to do things I usually would not have. Like I would never have found so many awesome little resturants if I was straight up told where to go and what to do, but because I have no idea what I'm doing I just find all of these real small mom and pop joints that are really inexpensive and super delicious. Same goes with really anything, like bars and all.)
But ya anyways we were trying to order our food and basically what went down was that none of us knew the word for wing or breast in spanish so we resorted to actions and we ended up like acting like chickens in the middle of this chill little resturant and had a good lil time with the owner who was taking our orders. I really love the language barrier because its just something to laugh about with the locals. I mean I'm at a point where I can communicate, but its bad communication essentially. So really I can covey we needs to be conveyed pretty easily but my phrasing is real bad because of Spanish grammar and sentence construction and what not. So overall its just great.

So anyways the next morning we woke up real early and went ziplining through the jungle, most epic experience of my life. I can't really explain it, and I don't have to many pictures simply because I didn't wanna drop my camera, but the final zipline went a little like this.....

They said we had to go in pairs for stability purposes because it was really windy. So naturally your sitting there thinking, hold up what does that mean, I mean we had been zipling through the jungle, there hadn't really been a whole lot of wind. So, we walk up this like 50 or 60 ft platform and just look out over this valley. This line they had rigged was so long, you couldn't see the end of it and I wanna say our ride lasted maybe, I don't know, like a minute or so. Anyways so naturally Tyler and I hook into this harness and were preppin for this, high fives, you know that whole deal. Then it starts, at first were traveling throught the rainforest maybe about 30 or 40 yards off the ground until suddenly we emerge and just watch this cliff just fly underneath us and suddenly we are probably 300 yards off the ground over the top of the rainforest just flyin down this line. From every direction was trees and greenery and everything. I really can say I have never experienced anything quite like that. One of the greatest sites ever, if your in Costa Rica and don't do that, you are seriously missing out.

So that concludes that weekend. Now lets see, anything interesting. Well elections are today and I think were gonna try to check out how these things work. There elections are run in a much better way, oh and let me tell you some of this. Alright so presidential canidates are given only so much from the government to run, so basically anyone can run then because there isn't all of that random run offs early in the year where canidates really need money for themselves and stuff like that. Anyways so they are only allowed so much money and basically can only spend that much, which I personally think is awesome because it becomes more of a legit presidential race than a popularity and flash contest which I feel is the direction of United States politics. Anyways.... also the voting turnout is huge, people really love the voting thing here. I think US turnout is like 30 or 40%, I'm not really sure, while Costa Rica turnout is like definatley at least 70% and it would not surprise me if it was higher than that. Also the president... check this out, lives in his own personal residence and just like walks to work. He has a presidential car, but its just like a chill little Toyota Camry. Not bullet proof. No armour on it. The president here is just another citizen. That would never fly in the United States, our president would be dead within a week if he were to travel like that. But it's pretty cool that Costa Rica is able to do that. Like the president just walks the streets, my Tico padre was saying that some foreign diplomat of sorts came to Costa Rica and was walking around just chillin and he ran into this guy, a little bigger, and basically they struck up a little conversation, I wanna say this guy was from Argentina. But essentially the conversation came to, so what do you do for a living, and the first guy was like, "Ya I'm a diplomat here for Argentina" and then this other dude was like, 'Oh yeah, I'm the president of the country". So thats how the president does his buisness. Like he just rides the bus and everything, its totally chill. I don't know if you saw a few months ago that Englands queen rode on their metrolink deal and it was this huge deal that was real publicizied. The pictures are actually really funny because she's just chillin out starin daggers at whatever publicist was making her do that.

But ya Costa Rica is awesome so far, highly recommend anyone who gets the chance to come down here. I would only say make sure you do your research. It can be very safe as long as you know whats up, otherwise it can be kinda dangerous because there are definatley ways to stand out and look American. Basically no fanny packs, and don't were your backpack in front of you, thats a dead give away, everytime I see that I just shake my head and die a little inside. You just gotta know who's gonna try to rip you off and when to keep your eyes peeled and all of that kinda stuff.