We have imagined visiting Costa Rica for years but somehow kept choosing other destinations. Maybe it seemed too close to Mexico and too easy to visit. It should just be a gap filler. Well the right gap appeared and we were off to Costa Rica in mid-March.
We arrived in San Jose and had lunch at Il Vicolo. Pat had carbonara and Bill had a pappadelle al ragu accompanied by focaccia and a nice Primitivo. Lunch was so late that in the evening we decided to have chips and bubbly at the Executive Lounge.
The next day we had a roughly 2.5 hour drive to the Pacuare River along which we planned to raft to Pacuare Lodge. Enroute to the river we stopped for a traditional breakfast of rice and beans with fried eggs. As we continued the drive we stopped twice to see sloths hanging out in the tree tops.
Estación Basílica is the entry point to the Basilica de Nuestra Señora de Los Ángeles, a revered pilgrimage site in Cartago, Costa Rica.
The river has a nice mix of class 2 and class 3 rapids. Enough to be slightly scary at first and then just downright fun.
The rooms at the lodge are named in the ancient local language. Our room was Gavilán (Hawk).
For lunch we had - mushroom pasta and Tri Tip Steak - with Erasmo, nice red wine from Chile, a blend of Barbera and Garnacha.
Our luggage arrived via a combination to 4WD vehicle and a suspended basket for crossing the river. The same cart used for our departure.
We settled into our room and later went to the bar and had glasses of chardonnay. At the bar we met up with with new friends Adam and Beth (from New Hampshire) who joined us for dinner. The calamari and the fish tacos, accompanied by sparkling wine, were clearly very fresh and well prepared.
The highlight of the next day was the Canopy Tour by Zipline. Ziplining was fun but the highlight of the tour was having to wait while our guides coaxed a young sloth off of the zipline. By the time we crossed to the next platform the sloth had taken up residence on the corner of the platform.
We planned to do a nocturnal tour but preferred to enjoy the downpour from the room, hoping for better weather to come.
We were up at 5:30 for the Birding tour. Pat struggles to see birds that are sitting still but is good with motion. She was thrilled to see a toucan land on a branch and point it out to others, especially because by then there were two toucans. It turns out there are 3 kinds of local toucans and we saw at least 1 of each, including the keel-billed Toucan (which sounded like the "Kill Bill" toucan when the guide said it). We also saw Bitterns (a water bird), and a blue morpho butterfly (but it is only blue when its wings open up).
Later in the morning we went to a water fall not far from the camp. An easy walk to a quite pleasant little falls.
At lunch we were taken into the "wine cellar" to see the broader selection that was not on the wine list. We enjoyed a nice Gavi de Gavi with salad, calamari and sea bass.
Later we had a nocturnal tour. We spotted a lizard, a large butterfly that looks like an owl's face when it is closed up, a baby snail eating snake, two frogs mating, a huge grasshopper, (its body is roughly 3 inches long), a striking red spider and another frog peaking around a plant stalk.
Our last outing at Pacuare Lodge was to learn about the local Cabecar people. Today they maintain some traditions and a dialect of their local language. The dialect was developed to simplify communications with the local Spanish speaking people. Their buildings, called 'hoods", have a pointed roof for the mens' quarters and flat roofs for the womens' quarters. For clothing they used strips woven material made from dried plants. The men required only a loin cloth while women added a strip fot the top. They have a very thorough lexicon of medicines. He demonstrated steeping one in a broth and drinking it from a liquid proof cup made from a folded banana leaf.
Some scenes from around Pacuare including the restaurant, our accommodation and the basket for crossing the river.
Some of the tasty food we had included portabella pasta with intense tomato sauce, grilled sea bass and vegetables, succelent fish tacos, personal size pizzas (pepperoni bacon and margherita), tri-tip steak and grilled vegetables, fried calamari appetizer and a chocolate tart.
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