It's hot. And wonderful! And it makes it even sweeter to check the weather back home and realize that it was about 80 degrees warmer here today. The resort we're staying in is green, lush and beautiful, albeit filled with a lot of very rich, drunk older women who will hit on anyone male within 30 feet. I have a lot of sympathy for the guys working any tour, who have to spend a significant amount of time dancing with and flirting with women three times their age.
We have a final itinerary:
- Friday: Check in and enjoy the pool
- Saturday: Outdoor adventure!!
- Sunday (today): Snorkeling, whale watching and very long boat ride
- Monday: Zip lining
- Tuesday: Dolphin park, botanical gardens or relaxing by the pool
- Wednesday: Whale watching
- Thursday: Botanical gardens or relaxing by the pool
- Friday: Relaxing until our plane leaves
The highlight of this trip so far: the outdoor adventure, hands down. We started out with a boat ride across the bay, switched into a unimog (big open air jeep) to ride halfway up the mountain, and then switched to ride mules. I love riding in both speedboats and open air jeeps; the wind on my face, the views and the rhythm of movement relax me.
I am not fond of mules. Really, I'm not fond of riding anything with four legs, and they aren't enamored of me, either. My mule had two speeds: gallop and stop. If I managed to make him walk at a reasonable speed, he spent most of the time trying to scrape me off against a tree. If he was galloping, I just held on for dear life and tried not to look into the gullys below. I didn't fall off, but I was definitely proud to make it up unscathed!
After the mule ride, the more adventurous part began. We did some ziplining to start down the mountain, which was a lot of fun. We saw some beautiful views of the trees and waterfall. We then progressed to the new experiences for me...rappelling down the waterfall (scary), free falling down a rope into a pool of water, going over the "commando bride" and a steel cable bridge and zip lining directly into pools. I got very wet, and spent a lot of time in the air swinging from cables. This part of the day was probably the biggest "adventure" for me--I don't suppose you can really call anything an adventure unless you're a little bit scared. And hanging from that waterfall (30 meters up on a slippery rock slope) I was definitely scared! I had to be told several times to loosen my grip on the rope if I ever expected to get the bottom. It was very beautiful and definitely exhilarating (especially the plunge into the cold mountain pool at the bottom ) but also absolutely terrifying. Immediately following the rappelling, we switched back to ziplining and landed neck-deep in the same icy water in the next basin of the waterfall. From then onward, I wasn't dry until we made it home--we waded and landed in and jumped into a whole lot of creeks and pools. The bridges ranged from a log suspended with ropes to a single rope under your feet and another one above your head to hold on to, and the guides thoroughly encouraged bouncing on each and every bridge. At the end of the tour, we rode the unimog and the speedboat back to the tour company's office, with a quick break in the middle of the boat ride to watch a whale leap completely out of the water about 30 feet from our rubber raft.
It was a good day.
Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take cameras with us and I wasn't ready to pay the very large fee they wanted for a few blurry pictures, so I am mostly picture-less from that expedition. The pictures I did manage to sneak, along with the rest of them from this trip, will hopefully be posted soon.
Buenos noches!
No comments:
Post a Comment