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Day 19 EV AND ZOSTER!!

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Hi everyone! It is Zoe and Evie! We are in charge of the blog for Wednesday, July 6. In summary, today was a very exciting day in Monteverde! We had breakfast at the hotel before heading out bright and early at 7am towards the zip-lining tour. We had a ton of fun zip-lining for about 2 hours! Then, we headed back to the hotel for a bit of free time before walking to a delicious lunch. After lunch, we had a bit more free time at the hotel. At 1:40pm, we headed to a coffee/chocolate/sugar cane tour. The tour was very informative and it was so cool to see the processes behind foods that we all eat/drink so often! Afterwards, we went back to the hotel and rested before walking to a yummy pizza dinner! It was a great second-to-last day in Monteverde! Hi, it’s Evie! My favorite part was the zip-lining tour that consisted of about 9 lines of soaring from mountain to mountain over the beautiful scenery below. It was exciting, terrifying, and beautiful, depending on who you ask. People could ch

Day 18 Graham and Mina

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Hello everyone!! This is Mina and today Graham and I will be doing a joint post. I will be primarily doing the writing and Graham did a lot of photography throughout the day. This morning was busy and tiring but also extremely rewarding. We had breakfast at our hotel. Some of us ate gallo pinto and others had pancakes and fruit. After breakfast we got on a bus to head to the Children’s Eternal Rainforest. We spent the first three hours of the morning fixing the railings on the trail to make the pathway more accessible. We were fortunate enough to have a very friendly staff member helping us along the way and making sure we were doing what we could to be as helpful as possible.  We also learned about the importance of forest conservation and how essential forest maintenance is for the wildlife species that inhabit the area. We walked to lunch around 12 and ate at a local Italian restaurant. After lunch came the moment where we had to say goodbye to Hector (our guide for the past two wee

Grace & Lukas Day 17!!!

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Hey y’all! It’s Grace and Lukas coming at you with the first of 4 group blog posts this week! For each of the last 4 days of our trip, a different pair will be posting a joint blog.  Because today was our last day staying in Manuel Antonio, our lovely hostel hosts sent us off with extra pancakes and bacon at breakfast. We hopped on the bus around 10 AM to begin our 5 hour trip to Monteverde. Around 2 hours in, we stopped at a river that is highly populated with American crocodiles! We saw around 10, but thankfully we were on a bridge looking down on them.  About 10 minutes down the road, we stopped at a joint restaurant/souvenir store for lunch! We had a buffet style lunch and spent some time buying souvenirs and ice cream. We got back on the bus and arrived in Monteverde around 5 PM. After settling in on our awesome, spacious rooms, we hung out with the hotel dog Bobby and cat Welch before heading to dinner.  We walked about 200 meters to a local restaurant with delicious food and the

Blog day 16

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Good Morning! I'm Lukas and today is my blog day. Today started off unexpectedly as everyone managed to wake up naturally and be on time for breakfast. Once breakfast ended, we all hopped in a van that led us to Top Mountain Park where a tour guide lead us up the mountain, telling us all about the park and its preservation efforts. While we hiked, we saw many amazing animals including an Agouti and a poison dart frog.  At the top, we enjoyed the amazing view of the landscape and the ocean.  After some water and a quick break, we headed onto the tree top bridges which were extremely high and expanded across the entire park. It was really fun but sometimes nerve racking as the bridges bobbed up and down. After returning to the cafe at the top of the mountain, we enjoyed the view for a little longer before heading back to the hotel. We enjoyed an hour break before we ate lunch. We played a game, competing to find the person with which we shared the the most unique commonalities. It wa

Costa Rica day 15

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Graham Bennett Today was a very chill day. A lot of us woke up early to walk and fish on the beach. We had a lot of downtime. After a while we went shopping to get out of the hotel and many of us bought souvenirs and clothes. The markets were very cool and we’re packed with bracelets and wooden carvings. Then we went to the beach, waded in the water and played with the soccer ball. We had a lot of fun splashing in the waves and playing volleyball. It was good to have a relaxed day after a lot of work and travel days.

Joaquin Pliego Day 14!

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Hi all, Joaquin here! Today was a fun day. The day started at 5:30 for me, Graham, Grace, Tyneeta, and Hector as we decided to go fishing. The ocean breeze was amazing and the views were beautiful. The weather was also very nice. Not too hot, and not too cold. Graham caught a few small fish to use as bait to catch bigger fish, but we came up short catching any big ones. After a few hours of fishing and exploring, we returned to the hotel where we ate a breakfast of either gallo pinto, the traditional costa rican breakfast, or pancakes. After breakfast we walked for a couple minutes to the Manuel Antonio National Park. We spent the next hours within the park observing the beautiful nature and wildlife. We were able to see crocodiles, sloths, monkeys, and more! The whole experience was very cool, and the nature was amazing. After spending a while there, we returned to the hotel to eat lunch. There was a large variety in the food ordered, and I ordered chicken and rice. After lunch and a

Costa Rica Day 13—Trouble in the Lowlands

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Hi, it’s Zoe! Today was a very eventful day. As soon as we woke up and prepared for breakfast, we were informed by our guide Héctor that we would have to evacuate the Caño Negro camp. There is a large tropical storm coming from the Caribbean side, and with the water surrounding the area and the lack on mountains to protect us in the northern lowlands, there is too much risk of severe flooding. So, we were told to pack our things, and load the bus promptly at 8 am, which was in about 40 minutes upon hearing this news. The current plan is to stay in a hostel in the Manuel Antonio area until Monday, when we will hopefully return to Caño negro to finish up the projects we started and go on a boat ride along the river before head to Monte Verde. Although we were sad to leave camp Caño Negro, we were all feeling rather positive about getting to warm showers and air conditioning :) Our guide Héctor made sure our ~6 hour drive wasn’t too mind-numbing by explaining Costa Rica’s complicated rela