While we knew that we were traveling to Costa Rica during the wet season, it was impossible to prepare for the extraordinary thunderstorms and humidity, leaving our clothes and gear with an indefinite dampness and smell… After sharing a room in Monteverde for four nights, Gavin and I gave up on trying to identify what we were smelling in the room. The bathroom, especially, stayed wet and moist. We joked that our room felt and smelled like the jungle room that you can go in at the zoo.
Going north to La Fortuna consisted of a beautiful three hour jeep-boat-jeep ride. Our awesome hostel manager in Santa Elena recommended it and if I’m being honest, it took Gavin and I awhile to figure out what she was talking about (try saying “jeepboatjeep” fast and without the hyphens).
The boat-ride across the lake below the Arenal Volcano was absolutely beautiful. It felt like a secret entrance to this scenic city. We met a nice Argentinian and Belgian on the boat who we actually ended up spending a lot of time with during our time in La Fortuna (more on that later).
Arriving at the Selina hostel was astonishing. There’s a pool with a restaurant and bar beside it and bright, beautiful colors all over the premise. While our hostel in Santa Elena was peaceful, this was a nice change of pace back to the social side of hostels. There was even live music the first night. We immediately ran into our friend, Camille, from the San Jose hostel (small world in the Selinas).
Now I’ll get to the most eventful part of our day. We were invited to go to the hot springs about 6 miles away with the friends we made on the boat. We met up as soon as we were able to check-in to our rooms and put our stuff away. This happened to be the late afternoon for both of us, meaning that we didn’t meet until about 3pm for our outing. These massive, dark clouds rolled in at about that time and I thought the rain would pair nicely with the hot springs so no one worried.
However, as soon as we got dropped off at the entrance, it was dumping. We were still eager to go, even though the path was now becoming part of the river. We walked down as far as we could until the water was rushing over our feet and some of our legs and the rest of the walk looked like a suicide mission because we would get swept away with the river. Thinking the rain might stop in a reasonable amount of time, we walked up the road to the nearest shelter with service.
This walk was very wet — it was a good thing we were in swimsuits. The rain didn’t let up and it didn’t look hopeful so we called our same driver back and headed into town. I can only imagine what the driver was thinking of us tourists…
While we were bummed about missing out on the hot springs, it was a funny experience and we bonded with the other travelers over it. My friends, Sarah and Cara from the University of Montana happened to arrive in La Fortuna this same day so we met up with them for dinner. We got to say goodbye to our German friend, Pauline, as well, as she headed off to the Caribbean side.
The following morning, we tried the hot springs again. This time at 7am, before the consistent afternoon storm. It was absolutely beautiful! We spent all morning enjoying the river, chatting with our friends, and “forest bathing,” taking in the beauty around us. The sun rays shone beautifully through the trees, Gavin captured it perfectly.
After the hot springs and some down time, Gavin and I decided to go to the waterfall. It consisted of about 500 stairs to get down but was a quick journey. The waterfall was another “woah” moment. It was the largest and most powerful body of water I’ve ever seen. We swam into the clear, fresh water and it was cold at first but quickly became so comfortable and refreshing. La Fortuna has been a really special stop so far! We’ve been using our Spanish, trying to improve more each time and meeting new people. I’m looking forward to our next stop by the ocean.
Such great content! Keep it up! 🙂