manuel antonio

[la playa]

[zip lining crew]

[sarah, me, and allison at dinner]

[sunset]

just got back from a beautiful and fun weekend at manuel antonio, a national park about 3.5 hours from san jose.

after getting back from nicaragua on thursday evening, i had friday to lay low and then saturday i took the bus into san jose, taxi to the bus station, and the bus took us directly to our hostel! my friend caleb got us reservations at "backpackers manuel antonio" - an awesome hostel which cost us only $12/night and included pancake breakfasts in the morning! it was clean and had a nice lounge area as well as a pool and hammocks. that afternoon we headed to the beach and laid out, went in the water, and watched the sun set. they talk a lot in costa rica about being super careful when you go into the ocean because of the rip tides and sometimes the waves are really strong but thankfully we didn't have any troubles and the water was really warm!

on sunday, a group of 5 of us went zip lining with La Sevitra Tours and had a great time. the tour picked us up at our hostel and we drove about 45 minutes to a forest where we first enjoyed pineapple and juice and then started the zip lining! there were 10 lines, some were short and two were really long. it was awesome to zip over the green trees and we also got to walk a little bit in the forest going from one platform to another. while walking, we saw a poison green and black dart frog and some really cool trees and other plants. after zip lining, we had a delicious typical "Tico" meal which included chicken & rice (arroz con pollo), black beans, tortillas, yucca, salad, and pineapple. we enjoyed eating on a nice deck and then headed down to a small waterfall where we got to swim around for a little bit which was a lot of fun.

on monday i headed to the beach and soaked up the sun (unfortunately that included sun burn) and we left in the late afternoon. it was a really great weekend and i felt like i was in the US - manuel antonio is a high tourist attraction and you didn't really need to speak any spanish to get around. having said that, i need to get back to work on my español!