10
Location: Boruca and Terraba Reserves
Day 10 of Costa Rica! It’s crazy, it feels like we’ve been here for months, but also it’s gone by so fast! Our day started out with a delicious breakfast of cereal with bananas. After getting ready for the day, we loaded the bus to go drive to a waterfall. Or so we thought. About 10 minutes into the drive, we noticed a traffic jam. Upon further inspection, we realized a protest blocked the bridge we needed to cross. 15 or so students were holding a flag across the bridge, with signs, and whistles. Apparently, this type of thing is very common in Costa Rica. It wasn’t a problem, though. We just got out of the bus and started walking.
It took a little over half an hour to walk to the waterfall. We were all so hot that the cool water felt so refreshing. At the waterfall, we swam around for a while, then climbed up the waterfall and jumped off. We did this over and over, then got out and dried on the rocks in the sun. Then we walked back to Hugo’s van on the other side of the bridge (the protest was still going on) an drove back to the hotel. We packed up the rest of our clothes and showered before making lunch with our leftovers from last night. For lunch, we had rice, beans, fruit, and eggs on toast!
We were supposed to leave from the waterfall to go to the indigenous, but the protest caused us to change our plans. Our new route was very south, almost to Panama! It took us about 2 hours to get to the indigenous community. Our accommodations were wooden houses, and we settled into them easily. After an hour of rest, we convened in the common space for a snack. Then some of the elders from the community taught us how to make a bunch of different jewelry. The teaching involved a lot of them doing motions really fast, and us trying to follow and messing it up. We all became experts by the end, though! After amusing ourselves with that for an hour, we had dinner. Rice, beans, and vegetables were our dinner (per Costa Rican usual.)
After dinner, we had a little game and activity. Once we got to our house, we had a little surprise waiting inside. A scorpion on the walls! We all freaked out naturally and ran out screaming. By the time the other girls, Anna, and Enrico came running, we had evacuated the house and were standing outside terrified. One of the guys came with a spray to kill it which we were thankful for. After it was dead, Anna stayed in our room with us to calm us down, and we talked with her for a while and fell asleep.
Thanks for tuning in!
Kendall K.