6/6 Volcan Poas

Field trip to Volcano Poas in Tropical Ecology class.  Its in a cloud forest so it was really cold (which we did not know ahead of time) and hard to see anything.  We seem to have very good luck though because when we actually made it to the volcano everything cleared up enough for us to see the whole thing!  The same thing happened for the lagoon on the other side of the volcano.  We saw plenty of hummingbirds (los colibris) and they were all a metallic blue color, very pretty.  Everyone slept on the bus ride home, worn out from our long weekend and early morning class.  Class til 4, and we had to make up a story about butterflies.. (it makes sense because its in the context of the verb forms we're using) but it was very odd-- silly at the least. Dance class at 7 and this time it was a lot less crowded and apparently Monday classes are more pair oriented.  The girl to guy ratio was lacking  though so I danced with Casey a lot and we were actually pretty good! (If I do say so myself)  Its quite the workout but we learned how to do the merengue and the cha cha, slower and easier to understand this time because the first class was kind of like a taste of what everything would be like.  It was a lot of fun and I think I'll actually be able to remember this when we're finished!! Should have been a dancer, its amazing!! 

Arenal Pictures

Volcán Arenal

SO exhausted right now, but I figure I'll update now before I forget everything and fall asleep lol

Friday: Didn't leave 'til 5pm and its a 3 hour ride and we stopped for dinner along the way so we didn't get to our hotel until around 10pm. The ride there was a little sketchy, everything was dark and we had this massive bus that couldn't fit on any of the roads (it took us half an hour to turn around in a parking lot because we were blocking traffic with our 15 point turn).  There were little tiny bridges without railings that I though for sure we were going to fall over but we finally made it and we were pretty excited! We stayed at Hotel Arenal Pariaso and our rooms were like little villa houses.  Saturday was Casey's birthday so we were pretty excited and jumped around on the beds like we were 5 and took lots of crazy pictures until we got so tired and just went to sleep.

Saturday: We had to wake up very early and it was the first we could actually see of where we were because there was daylight.  So we opened the shade and low and behold theres the volcano!! As we were looking out the window there was this little high pitched crying and so I looked at one of the chairs on our porch and there was a cat!! So friendly, I named him Tigre (tiger in spanish) because he had stripes and spots and it just seemed appropriate :)  loved him, we cuddled for half an hour that morning hahah then off to hike to the observatory spot next to Arenal.  It was a ridiculously hot day (Tico's said it would be cold, but I think they have different perceptions of cold that New Englander's do!) but the hike was fantastic.  At the top there was a beautiful view.  I've never seen anything like it.  We climbed up a whole pile of black volcanic rocks and on one side there was a view of mountains and lake Arenal and on the other side was the volcano itself. Everyone told us that its always surrounded by clouds but the day was so clear nothing covered it up, so it was great!!  We picnicked up there and climbed back down.  Lounged around the pool for a couple hours until it was time to go to the hot springs at 5pm.  The place we went to was huge! There were so many pools of incredibly hot water but Casey and I wanted to walk around first and find the tropical garden.  By that point it was starting to rain a little and it was kind of dark out.  We found the garden and it was a large archway of flowers and trees and the ground was covered in little grassy stone squares.  Then we started following this little side paths of stone walkways that went into the thick groves of plants.  It was the coolest thing, we walked through so many different paths and there were so many new noises and beautiful scenery, but it all seemed so surreal, we joked around and called it our Alice in Wonderland.  The pools themselves were very nice too but you can only stay in hot water for song long.  the pools were from 93 degrees to 153 degrees F, it was insane!   By the time we left we were starving and met at a little place in Fortuna where we were served volcano shaped dishes of rice and all sorts of meat.  By that point everyone was exhausted and wanted to go to bed.  Back at our room though I found a huge spider while Casey was in the shower, and of course I'm too wimpy to kill anything so I found an ashtray in the room and trapped it lol  We didnt know what to do after that so we called one of the boys over.  It was the funniest thing I think I have ever seen.  Between our friend crawling on the ground trying to get it to a place he could uncover it and kill it and Casey screaming and laughing hysterically it was just too much hahah I laughed so hard, needless to say we slept like babies.

Sunday:  6am up for breakfast and a shower (A WARM SHOWER!!) because today we're going zip-lining!  While we were waiting for the bus to pick us up we saw a sloth, a toucan, and a hummingbird that hit the window so he was just chilling with us for a little while (don't worry hes fine now).   Once at the zip-lining place they gave us all sorts of safety instructions, in Spanish mind you, and sent us up on a tractor ride to get to the platforms.  20 minute tractor ride and a 30 minute hike with our gear on (sooo heavy) and we finally made it to the first platform.  I was definitely freaking out.  300 feet up, and they want me to just let myself go off the edge of something thats 600m long... uhhh a little too scary for me.  But the first couple were practice runs and I wanted to get the anxiety out of my head so I just went first hahah.  It was SO fast, and they told me not to break so the stopping system on the other side got me, which was a lot of fun, but no one came in quite as fast as I did! I had a double pulley system so it made me go so much faster.  after a few practice cables (which were just shorter and slower cables in the forest) we headed to number 5- 600m long WOW it was insane!! gorgeous view, unlike anything I had ever seen, past the Fortuna waterfall and over the canopy overlooking the town.   that wasnt the longest one though, 980m long, and 100m high.. but at that point nothing was scary anymore and it was just so much fun!! Its literally the coolest thing I think I've ever done and I would love love love to do it again!  everything else that happened that day was just being late and stressful group coordinating so nothing too exciting, now though I'm home and so tired so I'll probably end up going to bed soon even though its not even 5:30 here yet lol

:D

6/3 Arenal

No classes today! We're leaving for Volcano Arenal at 5pm and basically just hanging around until then.  Can't wait, it should be awesome, everyone says how beautiful it is!  Papa says its cold though.. but I'm pretty sure what they think is cold, is probably like 70 or something, so I think I'll be ok.  He also said it rains a lot more sooo basically everything I'm bringing is going inside a plastic bag :)  Every time I talk with him and I don't understand he just thinks its so funny.  If I look confused he just starts laughing hysterically at me lol but I guess that's better than having him lose his patience.  Really excited for tonight! Can't wait to get there! update when I get back, hope everyone has a good weekend!! <3

6/2 uneventful..

Not a whole lot happened today, I took a nap, which was fantastic I must say.  Classes were kind of  boring, except I had to make a robot poster? I'm not entirely sure why.. but that was interesting. I skyped with my Stephi Loeb :D anddd nothing else really happened. sooo ya see ya later!!! :P

6/1 Just Dance

so I slept in til 8 today! that's the latest so far, and I was so tired I didn't even want to get up.  No class until 2 and I was home alone for a while so I just went to the instituto and hung out there for a while.  Class was boring today but afterwards I went home for dinner before dance class.  I had mama and Deivy help me with my homework about costa rican sayings and that was fun because they explained it all to me and then quizzed me on it to make sure I understood.  Mama tica was telling me that its usually just her and Deivy around during the day so he gets sad when I leave, aww so sweet, and I wish I could hang out with him more, but oh well, they'll be time.  Dance started at 7pm but we had to walk through a super sketchy part of town in that dark to get there, there were about 20 or more of us though so I wasnt too worried.  It was from 7-9 but it ran a little late and the first section of it was kind of like an aerobic class but it was a lot of fun because she used all sorts of different dance moves to help us learn at the same time, and the latter part of class was all sorts of different dances, some with partners some without.  we did Salsa, Chacha, Romba, Kumba  (I think thats the name?), Classic, and some others I didnt know the names of.  I loveee salsa though and it was a lot of fun to do the turns and everything.  At the end they turned off all the lights and had this awesome disco ball going around and we all just danced however we liked, me and casey were basically the best ones there (not really) but we werent afraid to get wild into it hahah we never knew we could move like that! Spanish dancing teaches you everything you never knew about your body lol  we went for icecream afterwards, coconut and guanabana flavored, soooo good! it even had real coconut in it!  my feet are killing me though, I cannot even walk right now, hopefully they'll be ok by tomorrow, or I won't be a very happy camper walking to school!
Dance class is every monday and wednesday now until we leave and I'm so excited about it!!! Maybe I'll actually learn something and remember it hahaha :D

5/31 presentaciones y piratas

I had two presentations to do today, one was assigned just yesterday though so I just improvised when the time came because I definitely didn't have time for it lol  the first one for tropical ecology I had to research the Scarlet Macaw, but in spanish of course (Guacamayo Rojo) and I had to present for 8 minutes but it ended up being kind of long anyways because our teacher interjects random facts and stories all the time.  so that went pretty well and my other class was just a presentation in the past tense, so that was pretty easy.  Later on, I went to the movies in Heredia to see Pirates of the Carribean (in 3D!!!) with two of my friends from school.  All of the previews were in spanish but we were told that only movies shown in spanish were childrens movies and the rest had spanish subtitles.  The first word of the movie was "Capitán" so we were like oh no!!!! but then the next few words were in english and the subtitles popped up! yayyy!!! but it was a close one hahah
we had to take a bus to get there but we're still pretty new with the whole system even though one of us (not me) is fluent in spanish because its his first language, we still ended up getting off at the wrong place and having to walk for a while until we could find a taxi haha but it was pretty funny and the weather was still nice so I didn't mind.  We hung out for a while after that too and had dinner at his house because we left too early for the movie to be fed at home and my family goes to bed very early. 
When I came home (half an hour ago) my brother mario was still up waiting for me! I always feel so bad when they stay up, but its very nice of them and I appreciate it, they're so good to me!  anyways I have school tomorrow and then dance classes!!! can't wait! :D