Costa Rica - La Fortuna

Flying back from Cuba I had a few days before another treat, my parents were flying out for a visit! I got to the airport just in time to surprise them before we picked up the hire car and headed to a resort overlooking San Jose. We only spent a night there before heading to La Fortuna, where we stayed in a resort with an amazing view of Arenal Volcano and multiple hot springs at various temperatures. It was lovely to relax in one of these watching the hummingbirds zipping about.

Our first activity was a trip around Místico Arenal Hanging Bridges Nature Preserve, where we walked through the forest and canopy viewing a multitude of snakes, frogs, insects, bats, and birds. Costa Rica is one of the most biodiverse countries in the world, so there's plenty to see! But of course the most famous animal is the sloth. So the next day we headed out on a specific sloth safari, where we headed to certain patches of trees that were known to house sloths. It didn't take long to find some thanks to the beady eyes of the guide. We watched one three toed sloth climbing around in a tree, they both seem to move in slow motion and are faster than you'd expect. While viewing this sloth we also saw a large toucan hopping about, which is another very cool sight! We moved on to see some more sloths in other parts of the area, seeing a few more three toed sloths, and a couple of two toed sloths, which had longer and shaggier fur. As you watch them through the binoculars you can see the moths that live in their fur crawling about. They're lovely creatures but I can't imagine that they smell too good!

On our final rainy afternoon in La Fortuna mum and I headed to a chocolate farm, where we saw some chocolate trees and learnt a bit about how they grow and make chocolate. We also got to see a small part of the process and taste some at different parts of the process. Best of all was trying spoonfuls of melted chocolate with different flavours such as spices, fruits, nuts, or liquors. You could go back as many times as you wanted to try as many different combinations as you wanted. My favourite was probably the Mayan spice mix, as I became such a fan of that while in Mexico!Lue lisää