09.10.2012 – 09.10.2012  30 °C

Woke up at the ungodly, but strangely normal, time of 5am to go canoeing out into the jungles of Tortuguero. I say normal because I seem to be waking up at 5am every morning here in CR. I think there are two reasons for this; 1 the sun gets up at this time and 2 it’s the same time as I was getting up in NS (although they are two hours ahead in time zone).

Ok, so got up extremely early and boarded a ten man canoe. Destination, Tortuguero Jungle. My fellow travellers took pity on me and decided to put me at the front of the canoe without a paddle. They’ve taken pity on me because I am almost constantly sneezing with this annoying cold. I’ve worked out that sneezing and paddling don’t really go hand in hand. So, feeling like the Queen of Sheba herself, I was paddled up stream and into the deep dark heart of Tortuguero NP.

The jungle is strangely familiar. I guess I haven’t thought about it before, but Aussie rain forests are very similar to the Costa Rican jungle. I’m sure the plants and stuff are very different but from a visual perspective, looks similar! Paddling along the waterways we are constantly surrounded by an impenetrable wall of green foliage. The trees and vines though, are alive with plenty of birds and mammals.

We were super lucky today, we got to see plenty of very colourful birds including Toucans! (Which I hasten to add, are very fast movers so I haven’t really had a chance to appreciate their colourful beaks.) We saw monkeys, white faced, howler and squirrel. We also got to see Caymans, which turned out to be itty bitty crocodiles.. In fact, I thought they were baby crocodiles until our guide pointed out the differences (their eyes are on the top of their head being the main difference). No sloths yet, although we are assured we will see some before we leave Costa Rica!

About half way thru our canoe trip and the rain started to again fall. I’ve worked out that I should expect to be wet for approx. half of my day so I had better get used to it! Anyway, once the rain started the animals all seemed to disappear (a bit more intelligent than us humans huh?) and so the last forty minutes or so was uncomfortably wet and slightly dull.

After arriving back at the hotel a few of us headed into town to grab ourselves some brekky (pancakes for me) before we all decided to have a nap for an hour to try and make up for the lack of sleep from the previous evening. Nap done (in my case rest done as I couldn’t sleep, I just blew my nose and sneezed constantly), so Ursula and I headed back in town to check out some of the local handicrafts. Not long after we started walking around the sun broke thru the clouds and the temp soared. Five minutes later (or so it seemed) our clothes were starting to soak thru and we decided it was time for a swim. We grabbed a couple of the boys and hit the beach. Sun was out, surf was still low and water was warm.. Almost ideal conditions!

Ursula and I went and grabbed a snack downtown for lunch (vegetable pastie type things) before the group got ready to head out for a walk thru the jungle. By now, I was completely worn out, starting to feel feverish and altogether not healthy, so I vetoed the walk and decided to just rest in my cabin. A few hours later the group returned (I spent the time sleeping, reading and working on my laptop) and I was feeling more sprightly so we all headed into Miss Junies restaurant for dinner.

The food was delicious! I had garlic prawns and they were some of the best prawns I’ve had in ages. A couple of downsides to Miss Junies… The food is fab but service is slow. One thing I’ve noticed about CR is that everyone works on what I call “Fiji time”. Stuff happens whenever people get around to it.. It is certainly a big change from being in the US where you are constantly being served by wait staff. Here, you get fed when the cook is finished cooking, you pay the bill when the staff are ready…. Too funny! In fact, it took 25 mins for the 8 of us to pay our bill!!! We actually got to the point of taking bets on how long it would take for us all to finally pay and get change!!!!! Fortunately, our guide had warned us about how slow the service was at this place, so we had ordered five hours before dinner. We ordered our meal for 7pm and were served at 7.45! I felt slightly sorry for a couple who came in about five minutes after us and still didn’t have any food on their table when we left at 9.15pm.. Could be a long night for them!

The rest of the group went into town to find a bar after dinner. I was not up to going out so went straight to bed, and blessedly straight to sleep. Fingers crossed I’m feeling a bit better tomorrow.