Tirando por el atajo

This phrase, which literally means "pulling the shortcut," is the Spanish equivalent of "taking the easy way out," which I definitely did for this year's spring break. For the first time in a few years, I didn't go "out" anywhere because I stayed in Costa Rica. And the 10-day tour included a lot of long bus rides that I would hardly call "shortcuts." I didn’t have enough time or energy to plan a trip for myself, much less for my father and his girlfriend, so I signed up for something I normally dislike: an organized tour. 

Usually, I think such tours are too confining for my traveling style, but this time, it was the best choice to see a lot of the country in a short amount of time, without having to arrange all the details. After spending a night in San José, we took a day trip to Volcán Póas, an active volcano just north of the capital. We were lucky enough to have clear weather, so we could see the highly acidic lake in the volcano’s crater. If we hadn’t been able to see, though, we still would’ve been able to smell the sulfur of the surrounding fumaroles. On the way back from the volcano, we stopped for lunch, where we saw a traditional indigenous dance. At one point, two tribe members aggressively danced to dispel the evil jaguar spirit. Although not yet invented in tribal times, Velcro came in handy as the two women ripped off their skirts for a butt-shaking native boogie. Apparently, Velcro is a Costa Rican tradition because it was used for the same purpose in three other shows we saw during the trip. The next day, we left our hotel for Tortuguero National Park. On the way, we stopped by a banana plantation, where we saw every part of the harvesting and packing process, from hacking down the fruit to smacking on the Chiquita stickers (see my post "Dando por sentado"). After one and a half hours on a boat, we made it to our isolated lodge in the national park. We were greeted by howler monkeys prowling around the turtle-shaped pool. At that same poolside, we would later see people acting like monkeys as they tried to dance the mambo and limbo. The next day we saw rarer wildlife as we took two rides through the intracoastal channels (see my post "Deja de dar leña al mono"). We also stopped at the Caribbean Conservation Corporation to hear about the protection of the nesting green turtles. It was neither egg-laying nor hatching season, but we swung by the beach to see their habitat anyway. We retraced our route out of Tortuguero to go to Volcán Arenal, a volcano so active that it frequently shoots lava and constantly is monitored for an eruption. People are not allowed to get near its crater; nevertheless, our luck with the weather allowed us to see its distinctive conical shape. Our day trips from Arenal included a soak in the Baldi hot springs and a ride on the Rio San Juan, a thoroughfare to Nicaragua. As we stopped at the official border, a water bus bringing passengers from Nicaragua passed by. While circling Lake Arenal on our way to the Pacific coast, we stopped at the Hanging Bridges attraction, where we crossed six suspension bridges leading us through the rain forest. I couldn’t get very many pictures of the bridges’ height off the ground because I was afraid I would drop my camera when they swayed. We made it to our Marriott resort just south of Tamarindo right before sunset on Playa Mansita. We took a morning nature walk in the area, but only a fourth of the group showed up. Most people just wanted to relax in the resort’s extensive pool. We did the same later in the day after getting scared by the rough undertow on nearby Playa Avellanas. The last full day was a long trek back to the capital, with some stops to assuage us with ice cream and souvenirs. If that wasn’t enough, at our farewell dinner that night, we were served filet mignon. Truly, I couldn’t have planned it any better myself.