Another 2 hours spent standing in lines to cross the border back into Costa Rica ! Exit stamps, entry stamps, baggage inspection where you remove all your bags from the bus, haul them in a huge line-up, only to have a border guard give them a casual look without even opening them. Our original plan was to stay in Liberia once again but we managed to make it that far by noon so we decided to stay on the Interamericana Highway a bit further until we reached Cañas. After parking our bags at a little hotel near the bus depot, we headed off to explore the town. The Catholic Church in town is famous for the psychedelic mosaic tiles which cover the walls and tower. Later, we visited Las Pumas wild animal shelter just outside of town. It is home to recovering Pumas, jaguars, ocelots, and many exotic birds which were orphaned or injured. It was incredible to be so close to such powerful creatures.
Upon returning to the hotel room, the key broke in half in the lock - this time we couldn´t get into our room ! After several attempts with everything from pliers to tweezers, we finally managed to pry the broken piece out with a tiny nail. The next morning we jumped on a rumbling old bus headed for Tilaran, a tiny mountain village which serves local farmers. After several attempts to get information in Spanish about the next bus to Nuevo Arenal, we managed to hop on the correct bus and within a couple of hours we were there.
Nuevo Arenal is a relatively new village on the banks of Lake Arenal - at 88 square kilometres, the largest lake in Costa Rica. We had met an American ex-pat while in Tilaran who now lives in Arenal and he just happened to have a friend who owns a hotel and .... yes it turned out to be quite nice, and a clean room with a hot shower for $20 is always a good find. We really enjoyed this lovely little town -especially the cooler temperatures after the blazing, dusty heat of the Guanacaste area on the north-west coast. The next day at noon we caught the only local bus heading east to La Fortuna next to the Arenal Volcano - with fireworks every day, the second most active volcano in the world. Our plan was to jump off the bus about 20 kilometres before La Fortuna and stay in a little town called El Castillo where the volcano views were supposed to be the best. We managed to get off at the correct place only to realize that the town is 9 kilometres waway on a dusty gravel road. It sure looked a lot closer on the map we had ! As we pondered our situation, a car happened to come from the direction we needed to go and the occupants soon realized our predicament. They asked where we were headed and when we told them we were booked into a B&B some 9 km. away, they turned their car around and drove us right to the front gate. Turns out they are two young guys from Nova Scotia !
The B&B sits high up on a hillside and is surrounded by spectacular gardens which attract birds of all kinds. The huge bedroom windows face directly toward the Arenal volcano. The best part, however, was the view of spurting and flowing lava from the huge outdoor hot tub. Well, in theory anyway, as clouds covered the top of the volcano for the next three days. We did manage to visit a fantastic reptile research facility where we saw several species of poisonous snakes, poison dart frogs, butterflies and the famous gaudy leaf frog with its bulging red eyes.
We moved into the town of La Fortuna for a couple of days in hopes that the clouds would part - they didn´t, so we packed up and headed for Tortuguero.
Hasta Mañana !
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