Costa Rica

February 2018 - April 2024

An open-ended adventure by Evelyn Read more

Currently traveling

32footprints
1countries
2,247days
193photos
1videos
551kilometers

Follow Calendar Share Bucket list

Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Feb 27, 2018, 7:31pm
- 🌧 16 °C
- Altitude: 235 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47754, -84.6440910°28’39” N 84°38’39” W
1 1
Arenal Volcano, La Fortuna
February 27, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ 🌧 16 °C
We arrived in San Jose safe and sound at 7:30 am today after almost missing our connecting flight from L.A. We were sleeping in the airport and missed the text telling us what terminal our flight to San Jose was leaving from. Of course, we were in the wrong terminal and had to run to the right one to catch our flight. Our private shuttle was waiting for us and we took the 4 hour drive to La Fortuna.

Once in La Fortuna, we went to one of the Sodas for lunch. Soda's are where the locals eat and cheap. Our meal cost us around $5.75 CAD including a bottle of water. We looked in some stores and then went to our room and had a nap.

Tonight we did a night hike. On the tour were a couple from Wisconsin celebrating their 70th birthday, a young couple from Calgary and two young guys from the Netherlands. We saw a LOT of frogs and a snake. After the hike, Jose our guide had a snack for us, an empanada and sugar cane tea with ginger that was delicious. We all then enjoyed a typical Costa Rican meal with beans and rice of course and delicious home made ice cream on a stick.Read more
Traveler Looks awesome!
2/27/18Reply
Traveler Looks yummy!
3/1/18Reply
Traveler Awww. Would love to see one of these
3/1/18Reply
Traveler Looks fabulous! Was looking at time on Monday and thought to myself. She is in LA...
3/1/18Reply
1 like
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Feb 28, 2018, 12:25pm
- 🌙 -9 °C
- Altitude: 495 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna Palma 10.5011, -84.7083210°30’4” N 84°42’30” W
Day 1
Hiking around Arenal Volcano
February 28, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ 🌙 -9 °C
Another hot and sunny day in Costa Rica (31). Today we are hiking two volcanos and going to hot springs. This is the first park of our hike. We are now stopping to eat lunch and the afternoon hike will be more strenous. We hiked around Arenal Volcano and were introduced to lots if plants, saw bird of paradise, citronella, banannas and lime trees. We stopped at a waterfall midpoint.Read more
Traveler Hi Eve! I’ve got Mom all set up on FindPenguins so she said she’ll follow you here. That way you don’t have to email her separately.
2/28/18Reply
2 likes
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 1, 2018, 9:33am
- 🌙 27 °C
- Altitude: 233 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47761, -84.6443710°28’39” N 84°38’40” W
Day 2
Hike 2
March 1, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ 🌙 27 °C
This is hike 2 from yesterday. It was a 6 km hike.We climbed up Arenal as far as we were legally allowed up to old lava road from the last erruption which was 2010 I think. There were a lot more people that joined us for the afternoon hike. On our morning hike we had fellow Canadians from Nova Scotia and Quebec as well as a Dutch couple and a group from France.

Tracy brought an extra pair of hiking poles for me, of which I was very grateful. This hike alternated between up and down and was muddy in some parts. Our guide Julio had a rule that if anyone fell they had to buy him a beer when we got to the hot springs. Luckily I did not fall but I still bought him a beer.

Julio promised us dessert. Dessert was a termite. Seriously I ate a termite. It was very small and did not taste like much.

We stopped at a lagoon midpoint and some people went swimming.Read more
1 like
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 1, 2018, 9:41am
- ☀️ 24 °C
- Altitude: 244 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47769, -84.6441710°28’40” N 84°38’39” W
1
Day 2
Hot Springs
March 1, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C
The end of our hiking day ended at the hot springs with beer! Amazing after a day of a sweaty, hot hike.

Hot pools, cold pools, jacuzzis (sp?) and water slides.
Traveler Wow, that looks amazing!
3/1/18Reply
Traveler You look so relaxed!
3/1/18Reply
2 likes
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 1, 2018, 7:36pm
- ⛅ 15 °C
- Altitude: 233 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47763, -84.6444310°28’39” N 84°38’40” W
1 1
Day 2
Chocolate Tour
March 1, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ⛅ 15 °C
Today we went on a chocolate tour. We learned how cacao grows and how chocolate is made. Tracy ground cacao nibs and I made a chocolate bar! We also got to eat chocolate and had chocolate fondue.

The rest of the day we spent walking around town and looking in the shops. Lots and lots of walking. I bought a sarong with elephants. We went to a sloth place, walking in a forested area where sloths are in the wild. We did see a few sloths but they were quite high up in the trees. We ended the day with pizza and a margarita. Tomorrow we are going on a 12 km hike with natural hotsprings.Read more
Traveler Looks awesome!
3/1/18Reply
Traveler Showed Vern all your pictures.
3/2/18Reply
1 like
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 2, 2018, 7:24pm
- ☀️ 26 °C
- Altitude: 233 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47754, -84.6444410°28’39” N 84°38’40” W
Day 3
Lost Fumaroles Hike
March 2, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C
The Lost Fumaroles Hike is a 12 km hike in the rain forest. Today was an early breakfast at 7am and our driver and tour guide picked us up at 730 from the hotel. It was a small group, Tracy and I as well as Mark, a retired surgeon. We picked up the local guide Uriel along the way in a small town called Los Angeles. The drive to the rain forest was about an hour and a somewhat nerve wrecking experience for me but for Tracy having lived in Africa for two years, it was no big deal. The roads are narrow and got very bumpy as we got closer to the hike area. We bounced along up and down hills and windy roads. The van was really working! At one point we could not make it up a hill. We all had to change seats and get into the back seats for traction. We slowly sputtered up the hill. There was a lot of cheering and clapping when we made it up the hill.

The hike was good, a bit harder than the other one. It is classified as a "physically demanding trek." We did a lot of uphill and downhill, more uphill. We stopped along the way and looked at plants and bugs. We ate some petals for a plant used in salad. It was really tasty. We learned about a plant used for arthritis, one for the liver and one used for pain control which we tasted. It was bitter but they make a tea out of it.

The hike was two hours in and then we stopped at a little house and ate the lunches that were packed for us. We had a really nice lunch of a sub sandwich with ham, cheese, lettuce and tomato as well as a pack of cookies, a granola bar, a bag of chips, a banana, apple and a passion fruit.

We then changed into our bathing suits and headed off to the natural hot thermal sorings which was about a 10-15 min walk.Read more
2 likes
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 2, 2018, 7:47pm
- ⛅ 11 °C
- Altitude: 233 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47747, -84.6443610°28’39” N 84°38’40” W
Day 3
Lost Fumaroles Hot Thermals
March 2, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ⛅ 11 °C
The Lost Fumaroles hot thermals are two natural hot mud pool springs with many minerals and are great for your skin as a volcanic mask. You could not step down for long in the water as your feet felt like they were burning. Uriel, Tracy and I all lathered ourselves in the natural mud for the skin benefits.

After playing around in the mud we washed ourselves off and headed back to the little house, grabbed our packs and started the two hour trek back. Horhay, the other guide who was a bit of a character kept telling us we looked so young after our mud masks. We think he may have had a few drinks before the hike. Mark took some good pictures of us mudding ourselves up but as they are on Tracy's camera, I do not have any pictures to upload until I return home. I did take a selfie though.

After the long day we went for supper and rewarded ourselves with a beer! I really never drink beer but here it seems to taste good.Read more
2 likes
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 3, 2018, 5:43am
- ☀️ 15 °C
- Altitude: 240 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Alajuela La Fortuna 10.47074, -84.6435410°28’15” N 84°38’37” W
Day 4
En route to Montezuma
March 3, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ☀️ 15 °C
Goodbye Arenal Volcano! We awoke today at 4:30 am this morning to a rooster crowing - chickens behind the restaurant - and rain.

It is 5:30 am and we are leaving La Fortuna for the long journey to Montezuma, a 4 hour drive and a 1.5 hour ferry ride. The shutlle picked up three others along the way.

Some pics from our hotel. We had a banana tree right by our cabin. It was our landmark getting back to the hotel in the dark. There was also a coconut tree directly across from our little cabin.Read more
1 like
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 3, 2018, 1:49pm
- ⛅ 18 °C
- Altitude: 122 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Puntarenas Cóbano Montezuma 9.65128, -85.073379°39’5” N 85°4’24” W
Day 4
Pics from prevous post
March 3, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C
Pics that did not upload from previous post.
0 likes
Traveler Costa Rica
- Show trip
- Add to bucket listRemove from bucket list
- Share
- Mar 3, 2018, 2:04pm
- ⛅ 9 °C
- Altitude: 122 m
- Costa Rica Provincia de Puntarenas Cóbano Montezuma 9.65133, -85.073459°39’5” N 85°4’24” W
Day 4
Anamaya Resort
March 3, 2018 in Costa Rica ⋅ ⛅ 9 °C
We finally arrived at Anamaya Resort after 12pm. Shuttle-ferry-shuttle. Getting off the ferry we realized how hot it is (31 degrees). The vegetation here is different and you can see how dry it is. The last 15-20 minutes en route was down a very bumpy, dusty gravel road.

A nice fruity juice drink was handed to us upon our arrival. We got a little orientation and lunch around 1pm. Now I am having a beer!

Waiting to check in and then into the pool. Tracy is already in the pool but I decided to wait.Read more
1 like