Molasses Covered Honeymoon - Day Six

Day six of the molasses covered honeymoon adventure started a little earlier than usual. The owner of the Villa Alegre Bed & Breakfast – who also functioned as the concierge – booked us an all-day excursion to the Rincon De La Viejo National Park. We were picked up at our front door at eight am by a man named Gustavo who was driving an old eight passenger Toyota Hiace van.

Two other guests from our hotel joined us on our excursion. A pair of sisters from New York that were right out of college. They were spending the holiday with their dad, but he declined to join us on the excursion because of some chronic back issues that did not allow him to sit for long periods of time in vehicles traveling over bumpy mountain roads.

The drive up to Rincon took about two hours. We chatted with the sisters along the way, and every now and again Gustavo would tell us to look at something interesting. We learned a little about sugar cane farming and molasses production. And since we had to drive through Liberia, we learned a little about the history of that city. Gustavo also told us that the name “Rincon de la Vieja” translates to “The old witch on the mountain” in English. Apparently, old folklore attributed the periodic smoke rising from the volcano to an old witch brewing her concoctions from her hermitage on top of the mountain.

We arrived at the Rincon visitor center around ten am and stood for a bit while Gustavo paid our fees and worked out our itinerary. He was concerned about crowds and long lines for the activities, so he set up our itinerary to try to avoid the crowds. That meant our first activity would be a horseback ride to the hot springs, with a quick pit stop at a waterfall.

I had never been on a horse before so I was a little nervous. I told Gustavo to put me on a steady veteran. He hooked me up with a small white horse with a noble disposition. I put on my helmet (required by the park) and mounted up. I didn’t catch the horse’s name, so I just called him “Hombre”. Gustavo selected horses for Olivia and the New York girls, and then selected one for himself. He gave us a quick tutorial on how to stop, go, and steer, and then we were off.

Right out of the gate, we set off up a steep hill. I was a little anxious that I might not be able to hold on to my horse, but White Hombre strolled up that hill in a very smooth and steady manner. I patted him on the side and said, “Buenos hombre”. (Me espanol est mallo.) Olivia overheard this and pointed out the fact that my horse is not an “hombre”. She then informed me of the proper Spanish word for “horse”. I did not comprendo, so I said thank you and patted my horse again and repeated, “Buenos hombre”. Ole White Hombre and I had been through a lot together. It was too late to change his name.

So the four tourists, Gustavo the Guide, and one of the local park employees meandered up the hillside path to the waterfall via horseback. Every so often, two horses might decide to take the same path and bump into each other. Or one horse might decide to pick up the pace a little bit, and start trotting ahead. But these were very minor issues to deal with. Overall, the horses were extremely docile and easy to maneuver. I enjoyed the experience immensely. Olivia appeared to enjoy herself as well. Although, I don’t think she was thrilled to be required to wear a helmet.

We arrived at hitching post after about a twenty minute horseback ride. Gustavo informed us that we would have to walk down a short trail to see the waterfall. I dismounted clumsily and told White Hombre to “no vamos”. I’m pretty sure he understood me because he just stood there looking me. I said, “Buenos hombre”, and left him with the local park employee.

We walked about a quarter mile along a slightly muddy path to the waterfall. Along the way, Gustavo pointed out various flowers, trees, and plant species unique to the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica. There was another group of about ten people walking behind us, but otherwise it was quite serene. The waterfall was somewhere around 100 feet and quite voluminous. We snapped a couple of pics and returned to the hitching post.

When I returned to White Hombre I could tell he was relieved to see me by the way he was standing in the same spot as when I departed. I said, “Ola, White Hombre. I am glad you have decided to stay with me on my journey.” He stood there looking at me like he usually does when he understands me.

We mounted our horses again and began our next journey: to the hot springs. Another twenty minutes along the equestrian trail and we were there. Gustavo told us to say goodbye to our horse at this point, fore at the conclusion of our visit to the hot springs, we would return to the visitor center via motorized tram. I said goodbye to White Hombre and he just stood there looking at me. I could tell by the way he stood there looking at me that he didn’t understand. How could I just leave him behind after everything we had been through together? It was impossible to digest. So he stood there looking at me. Or she. He/she stood there looking at me. I walked away. I had to go to the hot springs. I was told it had a mud bath in which the mud contained rich minerals from a volcano. I had no choice. My skin was kind of dry. I knew White Hombre would understand someday.

The hot springs area was more of a man-made situation than I had anticipated. I was expecting natural pools of steaming water and bubbling mud next to cascading mountain streams. What I found were man made concrete pools, snack machines, and locker rooms. The steaming hot water was piped into the pools through PVC pipe. That said it was still a very tastefully designed mountain retreat. And it’s hard to complain about the availability of lockers and snacks.

We stashed our hiking clothes and shoes in a locker and changed into our swimming gear. First stop was a sauna. We were told to sit in there for at least five to ten minutes to allow our pores to open. After the sauna, we found large buckets filled with volcanic mud. We applied the mud liberally to our skin and then stood there like idiots for ten to fifteen minutes while the mud entered our pores and dried. Then we were told to shower off and go sit in the hot spring pools for as long as we like.

When I turned on the shower I found that there was no hot water. I found it odd and slightly discouraging that a hot springs facility had no hot water connected to the shower. But I was comforted by the fact that a hot spring pool awaited me as soon as I was cleaned of the volcanic mud. I manned up and entered the cold shower, but when the water hit me I screamed like a small child. This appeared to be the highlight of the day for Olivia. She giggled uncontrollably for several minutes.

After the shortest possible cold shower required to rinse off the mud, Olivia and I entered the hot spring pools. There were four different pools, each with varying degrees of hotness. We sampled each, spending the majority of time in the hottest pool.

After thirty minutes of loitering in the hot spring pools, we dried off and found the motorized tram; which was actually a large tractor hitched to an open-air passenger trailer that held about 25-30 people. The tractor hauled us back to the visitor center where a free lunch was being served cafeteria style. It was standard Costa Rican fare; black beans & rice, grilled chicken breasts and thighs, dried plantains, Greek salad, and some sort of lemonade type beverage.

After lunch Gustavo told us that our remaining two activities contained short lines, so we could choose which one we wanted to do first; water slide or zip lining. I pondered the merits of both for a minute or two before I realized that these weren’t just a couple of options to consider. These were the ONLY options to consider. I knew the Rincon de la Viejo National Park includes these activities, but I did not realize that I had paid for them as part of my package. And more importantly, I did not realize that my fee did NOT include some sort of viewing of volcanic activity in the form of a crater, geyser, and/or bubbling pond. It took a couple of minutes to register in my brain, but little by little I realized that while I thought I paid a good amount of money to go to a volcano, I had inadvertently paid to go zip lining and water sliding.

(I would learn later that due to an eruption in 2011, the hike to the crater is no longer accessible to tourists.)

At that moment, I was a little disappointed and a lot frustrated. I was disappointed that we would not see any volcano related activity, and frustrated that I paid for something I didn’t want to do. But it wasn’t a total waste of time. The hot springs and horseback ride were well worth the trip. I suppose the zip lining and water sliding would just be a bonus activity.  I can think of a thousand other things I’d rather do in Costa Rica, but I suppose this was better than being tied to the bumper of car and dragged along a gravel road.

We elected to do the zip lining first. We strapped on our harnesses and walked up a path in the forest. It must have been a quarter mile, but not too strenuous. We arrived at the top of the path to find a small group of people standing next to a wood platform, listening to a super fit Costa Rican guy give instructions for the zip line.

It took about fifteen minutes to get all the information, and then we all stepped up to the platform one-by-one and began the zip lining adventure. There were about ten platforms to zip to, with varying distances between each. No zip line was more than two hundred feet long.

Along the way, we saw a family of howler monkeys hanging out in the same trees that we were zip lining through. They were swinging around on the branches looking for snacks and paying little attention to the humans around them.

When we finished zip lining, we removed our gear and were shown to a locker room. We changed into our swimming gear and proceeded to the water slide. Before we could get on the slide we were told we had to get a helmet and an inner tube, and because the girls were wearing bikinis, they were told that they had to put on a protective cover for their rear ends. It looked like a burlap sack that had been cut into the shape of a diaper. Olivia and the New York girls were mortified for a brief moment. But since we were in the middle of the jungle, they agreed to wear it.

We walked up another forested path to get to the top of the water slide. The slide was built out of concrete right on the hillside. It didn’t look too foreboding stationed as it was directly on the ground. If it wasn’t painted in festive blues, reds, and greens then it would have looked like some sort of industrial conveyer of heavy liquid materials. Even as it was painted to look fun, it still did not look like something a rational human would slide down for amusement.

When we arrived at the top of the slide there was a single young male attendant that couldn’t have been over the age of eighteen. As the only male in our water sliding party, I felt compelled to be the first to volunteer to go down the slide. The attendant didn’t speak much English, but he was able to gesture well enough to convey to me to sit down and wait. As I sat down and adjusted myself into the inner tube, I noticed him slightly lower a hatch behind me. It was controlling the amount of water running down the slide. I thought this was very cordial of him. After a couple of seconds he asked me if I was ready. I gave him a thumbs up and he yanked up the hatch as quickly as he could. A torrent of water engulfed me and I shot down the slide like a fucking cannon ball.

As I rocketed down the slide, I was very grateful that I had the helmet and the inner tube. The water was violently banging me back and forth on the concrete embankments and very nearly tossed me clear out of the slide on a couple of the turns. I even wished I had one of those burlap diapers because my back side was getting severely scraped through my swimming trunks. It felt like I had been tied to the bumper of a car and dragged along a gravel road. I eventually tumbled into the pool at the bottom and promptly returned my helmet and inner tube and got the hell out of there.

After I handed my helmet and inner tube to the attendant, I stood at the edge of the pool and nervously waited for my wife to appear. I thought for sure she would either be screaming or weeping in pain. She has told me repeatedly that she doesn’t have a very high threshold for pain. To my surprise, when she came barreling into the pool, she seemed to be in good spirits. I think she even enjoyed it. Although, she was out of that pool and out of that diaper with no absolutely no delay.

We changed out of our swimming gear, loaded up in our old Toyota van, and drove out of the park. Gustavo got us back to the Villa Alegre unscathed. We showered up and took a cab to the most popular restaurant in Tamarindo. A little seafood place called “Seasons”. When we arrived, we were told that they wouldn’t have an available table for the remainder of the evening.  As it was our last night in town, we were both pretty deflated.

We walked down the street and found a little pizza joint that didn’t appear to be as crowded as the other restaurants. Although, after we sat down at the bar, the bartender informed us that he was short-staffed. It appeared that it was him and one other person attempting to serve about twenty tables. We told him to get us a bottle of wine and we would try to wait patiently. We really didn’t have any better options.

While we waited for our pizza, we entertained ourselves by eavesdropping on a family behind us. As far as we could tell, an American mom and dad decided to take their two teenagers and toddler to Tamarindo for a little Christmas vacation. The dad spent most of the time managing the toddler while the mom incessantly attempted to engage the two teenagers about recent and upcoming excursions. The sad (and entertaining) aspect of the conversation was how awful the kids treated their mother. It was like the two teenagers decided to travel down to Costa Rica on their own and begrudgingly allowed their mother to tag along.

From what we could hear, the son had rented a surf board and had lessons that afternoon. After he curtly answered his mother’s questions concerning the success of his surfing lessons, he informed his mother that he would be doing the same activity the following day. When she asked if he would like to take part in the family day trip, he said no. There was no “thank you” or “sorry” from the boy. Just “no” and “I’m not doing that”. It was despicable…and quite amusing. Olivia and I could not fathom how a teenager could be so scornful to someone who bankrolled a trip to a surfing village on the Pacific Ocean in December. But who knows. Perhaps he had his heart set on going to New Zealand or something. That’s tough luck. Life is hard for the young and entitled.

After our dinner and a bottle of wine and some shameless eavesdropping, we adjourned to our hotel. Our last night in Tamarindo was a little disappointing as we did not get to try the most popular restaurant in town. We saved it for our last night and it backfired on us. Alas, we were eventually sated and were able to sleep contentedly in our private air-conditioned room.