Costa Rica - quick update

It is Monday (I think) and we are in Questo outside of Manuel Antonio National Park. This is day four of the master gardener tour of central and western Costa Rica.

There has been a lot of bus riding and some truly amazing sites. Dave and I landed in San José, Costa Rica Thursday night and were taken to the Hotel Bougainvillea in Santo Domingo, a suburb of San José. Unfortunately quite a few of the bougainvillea at the hotel of the same name have been cut down or removed. No one has found out why.

Our first day of traveling took us to central Costa Rica at an eco-resort named Trogon Lodge. It is in a valley in the central mountain range who's name escapes me right now. There was a disastrous landslide on the Pan-American highway which required us to detour two additional hours to an already long drive. We passed fascinating coffee farms and quaint towns. We arrived late in the afternoon to this spectacular location.

Unfortunately, we had to leave early the next day for another long drive to the far southern coastal town of Golfito.

We took a boat from Golfito to an eco-resort named Playa Nicuesa in the western rain forest. Truly spectacular in ways that are difficult to describe. It poured rain after dinner which made the "rain forest" locale all the more special.

As to be expected, it was warm and extremely humid. The sounds of tree frogs, macaws, howler monkeys and whatever else was around made falling asleep challenging.

We spent two nights in the rain forest and our now on the northern portion of the Costa Rican Pacific coast.

I will be restrict my photographs for now to being very very selective.

I did get to snorkel at the rainforest resort...Golfo Dulce

Learning a lot about orchids.

And learning a lot about bromeliads.

More snorkeling in Golfo Dulce

There will be lots more photos later.