day 6

20.06.09

It was an hour and a half bus ride to get to Puntarenas from Alajuela where we boarded a catamaran that took us to Isla Tortuga!!!! Finally, we were heading to a beach :) Fishing is still a very popular career for many people in the area.... and many of the boats are very old!
The beach!!!!! A great day for the beach too!There was even a band playing while we ate lunch... they were good.Kayaking for 30 minutes = $5.... we kayaked from this point to the other island (that you can see on the left.) I was slightly scared because of the VERY large waves, but I did it!A pretty sunset on the way back. On the way back to the dock we were all pretty much falling asleep on the boat.

Day 6 was amazing.... long, but amazing. It was great to just relax! And a little excitement with the kayaking. Only 1 full day left...

day 5

19.06.09

This was day numero uno of our excursions!!!! 4-in-1 tour: Poas Volcano, Doka Coffee Plantation, Grecia, and Sarchi...

We were very lucky to be able to see the volcano! Many times the cloud cover is so great you can't see anything. (The white in the top of the picture is all clouds!) We saw the volcano and took pictures and then walked to the lagoon.... after pictures there, we walked back past the volcano and couldn't see it! The time in between the two visits was only about 30 or 45 minutes!I thought this sign was funny! (If you can't read it, it says: Do not descend to the crater.) HAHA... apparently someone has tried it if there's a sign...This is at the coffee plantation. (I will upload some other pictures of this part of the tour once I get some from my fellow travelers!) This picture shows how they start growing the coffee plants. The big plants in the middle of the picture (that are really leafy) are the full size coffee plants. [I don't really like coffee, so this part of the tour wasn't that interesting for me!]Grecia is known for this ginormous metal church. The church is made of metal because of all of the storms. You can kind of see the size of the church because of how small we are in the picture. There were green parrots on the ledges of the church but I didn't have a good picture of them.Sarchi is home of the Ox Carts. Ox carts were used back in the day for farming and I think for travel. Now they are mostly for decoration.

And all of the oxcarts are still handpainted! You could tell this guy was proud of his work when we asked if we could take a picture of him painting!
So day 5 was the beginning of even more fun for us! It was very cool getting to travel outside of Alajuela to see what the other areas of Costa Rica were like. We were all really tired when we arrived at our houses that evening! only 2 more full days left...