Amy's trip to Costa Rica

On Saturday June 25, 2011, I went to the high school at 7:15 am. Our group, comprised of 14 LHS students and two teachers, Mrs. Heuschkel and Mr. Edmunds, drove down to the Denver airport. We boarded a flight to Dallas, Texas, where we had a short layover before our next flight to San Jose, Costa Rica. When we arrived there, we got our bags and went on our tour bus to our hotel, the Adventure Inn. We had dinner at the hotel and then went to bed. The next morning, we ate breakfast and then drove to the Pejibaye River. Once there, we got life jackets and helmets and went white water rafting in some rapids. It was really fun. They gave us fresh pineapple and watermelon as well. Here are some rafting pics:

After that, we drove to Turrialba to meet our host families. I had a host mom named Nohemy Sanchez, who was 66 years old, and a host dad named Oldemar Vargas, who was 71 years old. They talked really fast, but they were very nice. There was also another English-speaking family living there, because their daughter was attending language school. They were very nice and it was fun to have them as company. Here's a picture of my host family and the children of the other family:

 Here's my room in my host family's house:

 For the first week of my trip, from Monday to Friday, we attended a language school while we lived with host families. On a couple of the mornings, my friend and I walked around town and bought souvenirs, and every afternoon from 1:30 to 6:00, we went to class. Here are some pretty flowers in Turrialba:

The first morning, we were given a tour of Turrialba and we went to a bank to get Costa Rican money, colones. Here's a picture of part of my group and I during our tour:

On Tuesday morning, my whole group and I rappelled down 4 waterfalls and ziplined a little bit, which was a really cool adventure. Here are some pictures of that:

On Thursday morning, the language school gave our group dance lessons and cooking lessons. On Friday morning, we went to Guayabo, which are some ancient ruins. Here is a picture of the ruins:

 And here's my group:

My host family's house was about a 10-minute walk from the school, and I always walked with my friend Jojo who lived near me. On Friday after class, they gave us certificates for completing the class and on Saturday morning, we said goodbye to our families and met at the school with our suitcases. Before I left, my host mother gave me a really pretty jewelry holder.

From Saturday on, we toured around on a tour bus and did some cool activities. Here's a picture of us on the bus:

 During our drive on Saturday, we stopped at a Catholic basilica:

On Saturday night, we went to Baldi Hot Springs, which was a blast. There were 3 fun, scary slides and tons of pools with waterfalls. On Sunday, we kayaked on Lake Arenal.

Then we went ziplining, which was SO fun. The highest zipline was 636 feet above the ground and the fastest went 50 mph. I saw beautiful views as well. By that time, it was late and we were starving, so we went to lunch. Then we drove to our hotel and had dinner there. The food in Costa Rica was actually quite good, a lot better than I had been expecting. On Monday, we went on a boat tour in a river and saw iguanas, tiger herons, birds, howler monkeys and lots of crocodiles. Here are pictures of the animals I saw:
A sloth:

 An iguana:

 A crocodile (we saw probably a dozen of those):

 A pink bird:

After lunch, we went horseback riding. The trails were pretty intense for the horses and our legs got super muddy because it was raining. Here are the horses:

On Tuesday (July 5), we drove for a few hours until we arrived at our hotel. We then drove to Manuel Antonio (national park) public beach. The waves were really big and strong, but it was a lot of fun. We stayed for a couple of hours, then went to our hotel, where we swam. On Wednesday, we went to the Manuel Antonio private beach, which required a 20-minute walk into it. It was a stunning beach and it was a lot of fun. There were monkeys running right next to where our towels were and a raccoon stole someone's food. It was funny. However, my shoulders got a pretty bad sunburn at the beach.
Here's the beach:

Here's me and my friend, Jojo:

And here's a monkey that we saw:

On Thursday (my birthday!), we we rode in two 4x4 trucks up to a tiny little town called San Bernardo. Here's the view from the drive:

We ate lunch there, then began our service project, which was scraping rust off a chain-link fence. Here's a picture of the fence and the school in the town:

                                       

After a couple hours of that, we drove to our hotel. At dinner, Mr. Edmunds and Mrs. Heuschkel brought me a cupcake and everybody sang "Happy Birthday." On Friday, we drove back to San Bernardo and painted the fence. We all got covered in blue paint and we had to use solvent to remove it. They fed us a delicious lunch, and we worked on a mural there as well.

Here's the finished mural:

The people in the town were really grateful for our service. We returned to our hotel again and ate dinner in a restaurant by a waterfall. On Saturday, we got a tour of a coffee plantation, which was really boring. We drove for a while, then stopped at a mall for a few minutes. We drove about half an hour to our hotel, which was really nice. Then the teachers collected our tips for the tour guide and bus driver before we went to dinner. Afterwards, we went swimming in the hotel pool, then went to bed. On Sunday, we ate breakfast at about 4:00 am and then headed to the airport. We flew to Miami and then to Denver. I arrived in Laramie at about 1:30 am. It was a fantastic trip, but it was great to see Mom, Dad, and Josh again.