After one week of Spanish course, I was more than ready to start meeting the wildlife of Costa Rica. Three German co-students and I took the first bus at 6am for the two hour trip to Manuel Antonio. We had arranged a guide who met us at the park gates with two further guests. Before we even entered the park we saw howler monkeys in the trees. We later learned that these monkeys have abandoned the park in favour of locations where there is tourist food to be scavenged.

Within the first fifteen minutes, we saw the three creatures below: the beautiful hummingbird, some kind of wee crab that lives inland and grows its own algae for food and the Jesus Christ lizard, so named because it can walk on water. The photos were taken through the guide’s telescope.

What we really wanted to see was sloths. One of my German friends was on her last day after three weeks in Costa Rica and had not seen one yet. She was all ready with a massive paparazzi type camera. We took a few more steps in to the park – and there it was high in a tree.

Our walk continued, and then we spotted another sloth, an adolescent male. He was on the move down from the tree. The guide informed us that they only come down once a week – to do their toilet business. We were told to stand well back, be silent and wait. Once the sloth had finished his business, he decided not to go back up the same tree, but rather to cross the path. This is a very rare sight, apparently.

And so we watched the sloth cross the road and then climb up on the other side. High up on the other side, we spotted another adolescent male, which might explain why the sloth crossed the road. Those two faced each other off for a bit, but did not come to blows.

As our tour continued we saw more wildlife – squirrel monkeys, capuchin monkeys, bats, iguanas, white tailed deer, flightless birds, and many more creatures that I’ve never even heard of. We rounded off the day with a dip in the sea and lazed around on the beach for a bit before taking the long bus journey back to Jaco.

Manuel Antonio National Park

The long awaited trip to Costa Rica has finally happened and I thought I’d use the opportunity to revive this blog. You’ll have to bear with me a bit because my WordPress skills are very rusty.

I flew with Iberia and had a lovely view of the alps from the plane, followed by a view of more arid Spanish countryside. On the long flight I watched all the films I had missed at the cinema. I thought I should watch one in Spanish and chose Llena de Gracia -which translates as Full of Grace. Turns out it is the true story of some famous Spanish footballer.

I spent the first few days in Santa Ana near the school my niece attends to get used to the heat and adjust to the time zone. I love a market, so my first outing was to the San Jose central market.