Monkey See, Monkey Do

Posted by: Laura

I´ve always found it interesting to watch the herd instinct of people. Almost every person walking down the street will stop near a big group of people simply to see what everyone is looking at.

As an Art History teacher, I have thousands of images of famous paintings, sculptures, and architecture. I have spent hours on line collecting the best examples I can find. (Don´t worry this is completely legal). When I visit an art museum, I generally take pictures of lesser known works of art, that just happen to catch my eye. I´ve noticed a trend that whenever I stop to take a picture of a work of art, other people will gather around. Assuming that this painting has some significance (other than the fact that I like it), they will take a picture of the same painting.

Today, we took a two hour bus ride to visit Volcan Poás, an active volcano north of San Jose, Costa Rica. However, after we had paid the park entrance and walked to the lookout point, we saw nothing but fog. We could only see about 50 meters in front of us. We had four hours to amuse ourselves as we waited for the fog to clear, so here´s the game I made up:

You walk along one of the trails and start pointing at the trees and pull your camera out. Immediately other people will rush over. You exclaim in a loud whisper. “I think I just saw a monkey.” Then more people come over. Each person takes turns doing this, You have to count the number of people who have stopped to look. The person who can gather the largest crowd wins.

So far, we have been unimpressed with Costa Rica.  Basically, it”s like Florida without the pretty beaches.  We have heard amazing things about Corcovado National Park, so we are adding a three day camping trip into the jungle to our itinerary.

note: Chris´s mother told him if you don´t have anything nice to say, don´t say anything at all. Thus, he has not contributed to this post.

Costa Rica, Take 1

Posted by: Laura

If you need to hire a marketing firm, I recommend the one that advertises for the country of Costa Rica.  I have seen countless TV adds which show amazing beaches and exotic wildlife. Our guidebook described Playa Tamarindo as having “pristine beaches” and “a great beach town for backpackers.” From this description, I was expecting white sand, palm trees, and buget options for lodging and food.

When we arrived, we found a short stretch of beach patrolled by people trying to sell you package tours and transportation for $200 to Monteverde (another popular mountain town which cost us about $12 by bus).  It had rained the night before so the dirt roads had turned to mud and added a putrid smell to the whole town.  The cheapest hostel we could find was twice as much as we had been paying.  A meal at Subway cost us $14.

Not to be deterred, we decided to visit the town of Monteverde and walk through the cloud forest. We were able to find cheaper places to stay here, and the forest was nice, but nothing spectacular. We did however visit the Butterfly Garden where a fabulous tour guide showed us leaf bugs, leaf cutter ants, spiders, hummingbirds, and of course hundreds of butterflies.

We will head to San Jose to check out Volcan Poas, a huge volcano two hours north of the capital.

Click here for Pictures