Monteverde
By Jaimy de Vries
Monteverde, what means the green mountain, is true to its name. It’s so green, my phone got confused and added a purple filter to my pictures. We loved Monteverde! You’re surrounded by nature, what makes an nature admirer like me very happy. It’s a small town where there is a lot to do and everybody is nice. Make sure you bring some layers, it’s a bit colder up in the cloud forest!
The road up to the green mountain
We travelled from Nicaragua (Granada) to Costa Rica (Monteverde). We were a bit scared that the transportation will not go as planned, but it all turned out well. The communication is difficult sometimes. We took the central line bus very early in the morning at 5:30 am up to la Irma in Costa Rica. Central line is a good bus company who works with lots of care making sure everyone is back in the bus after customs. At the beginning of the afternoon we arrived in La Irma, a place nothing more than a gas station, restaurant and a bus stop. We were happy there was at least a restaurant. And it was actually a pretty good restaurant too with fair prices. We thought we needed to wait there for 2 hours. Instead of the bus arriving at 2:30 what we read online it was changed to 4 pm. That’s a 3,5 hour wait! Bummer! We killed some time with eating, playing games and working on my blog. Finally the bus arrived! It’s no chicken bus, it looks similar to our public transport busses. It was a comfortable bus. After stopping at one small village we climbed up in the mountains with spectacular views! Once we arrived, our hotel picked us up for free at the bus station. The place is great. We had a nice room and the bed was amazing. We were happy everything went well and slept like a baby that night.
Hiking the cloud forest
We slept a bit longer than usual. We needed some rest. After breakfast we decided to go to a free trail called Ficus Root Bridge. We hiked around 30 minutes to reach the Ficus root trail. The trail was not marked and we had trouble finding it. A guy that drove by stopped and gave us the direction. It was a small and steep way down. It didn’t look like a trail. we double checked it on the google reviews and it turns out to be legit. It was a quite steep and slippery trail. We needed to hold on to branches to get to The Ficus Root bridge. Luckily it was a short trail…and just after a 10 minute hike we had a first glimpse over this natural phenomenon: a natural bridge from a Ficus tree. There were roots everywhere. I was impressed. I never seen such a tree in my life. And we had a big surprise! There was a group of white faced monkeys walking there. We saw one of them walking on the bridge. An amazing sight! Once they climbed up higher in the trees, we started to climb up the tree bridge. We didn’t want to get that close to the monkeys and risk getting bitten or something. Some monkeys were throwing branches at us, maybe by accident but maybe on purpose…we still don’t know. But it was a funny experience.
White faced monkey walking on the Ficus Root bridge
Climbing the Ficus Root Vridge
White faced monkey
Hands free
We also hiked to a waterfall called the Monteverde waterfall, in Spanish: Catarata Los Murciélagos. We needed to pay a $6 entrance fee. In Costa Rica this is normal, you need to pay for every park you want to visit. Free entrance is rare. On the trail we walked down, we saw many ants carrying leaves more than 3 times their size. They may be small, but they’re really strong. The trail went down and after 20 minutes we arrived at a cute little bridge to cross the river and just 5 minutes after that we arrived at the waterfall. It was pretty and we took some nice pictures. It’s also possible to swim here, but the water level was quite low and we didn’t had our swim stuff with us.
On a bridge to the waterfall
Ants carrying big leaves
At the waterfall
Many banana trees
The other day we took a collectivo shuttle for $6 (2 way) to Santa Elena. This was definitely not walkable. It was a half hour drive up the mountain. We needed to pay an entrance fee. With our student card we got a good discount. In the park we walked for around 3,5 hours and went on 3 trails: the Youth challenge, Cerro negro and a part of Encantado. It was a cool hike in the middle of the jungle. We haven’t seen any wildlife, but they found us. We were attacked by a wasp kind of insect. They sat on our hair and our t shirt. Probably because we were carrying a bag with something sweet inside. We are both scared of wasps, so that part was no fun. But we didn’t got sting luckily. After doing some research, it turned out to be the paper wasp. We were lucky we didn’t got stinged, because their stings can be really painfully.
Green
Greener
Greenst
Truth about bats
We went to the bat jungle, an exhibit and rescue center that offers home to rescue bats. The owner is a very passionate biologist and he comes from Vlaanderen what is close to our home. He offers tours to learn more about bats and at the end we could see them from up close in the “bat cave”. He started the tour explaining us about the bad reputation of bats and fake stories going around. It was very educational and interesting. We learned a lot. Actually all what we learned in the past turned out to be wrong. Well first of all: In many languages the bats are called mice (flying mice, naked mice, blind mice). But actually, bats aren’t mice at all, they’re not even birds. We were very surprised by this: bats are actually very similar to humans. In fact they’re even older than apes and were living among side dinosaurs. I never heard about that! The similarity is easy to see with their bone structure, it’s very similar to humans: they have a chest with arms, fingers, feet and toes like us. Besides that they give birth like us,
but only upside down. They also have social structures likes us, couples, baby sitters and even midwives. When some bats are ill, the other bats collect food to share with them. So strange, but cool!
We learned they have many skills. They’re excellent flyers and that’s mainly because of their sight. They have excellent night vision and echolocation…Echolocation? Yes echolocation similar to dolphins. They can spot an insect from far away. And you don’t need to be scary they will fly into you or get stuck in your hair…they don’t! That’s a fable.
There are many different kinds of bats. More than 1000 species. Some are really small (like a colibri) and some are really big like the Flying fox with a wingspan of 1,5 meters (2.6 foot). Most of them eat insects and fruit. They have an important and crucial role in fertilizing plants. For example the banana tree is thanks to the bats. There are 4 animal species that are very import for the ecological balance, that are: butterflies, bee’s, plankton… and bats! And besides that, what I liked the most about bats is that they eats tons of insects like mosquitos! And I hate mosquitos. They need to eat their bodyweight on insects every night. Why we got a bit afraid of bats is that some can drink blood, but they only drink blood of animals and mostly cattle, not humans. People made up scary stories in history, like vampire stories, to make kids afraid to go out at night. This was just to protect them for other dangers at night, bats are no danger.
The skeleton of a bat, similar to our bone structure
A fruit bat
Horseback riding
Another fun thing to do in Costa Rica is horseback riding. We went on a 2 in 1 horseback trip. First we were riding on a horse and second we visited a sugarcane farm. I got matched with a white horse called Malibu. He was a good horse, a bit stubborn sometimes but I like that. The trail started quite exciting because of the muddy trails. There was a lot of rainfall, what is usual for a cloud forest but with rain season and a hurricane that passed by that same week it was really really muddy. The horses are incredible, they know how to walk through the mud, on rocks, branches and all that while galloping. Dutch horses are nothing like that, they are not used to any of that and can easily trip on a rabbit hole.
We rid along farms with banana trees, sugarcane grass, and got welcomed by a group of bellowing cows. Eventually we climbed up and had an amazing view over the mountain range of Monteverde. We made some pictures, but while doing that a cloud started to appear….creating a picture with a big white background haha. After that we went down through the jungle. That’s so unique, riding a horse in the jungle! Never thought I would do that on my world trip. The most fun part was that we went quite fast with the horses, not only trotting but we went galloping too. That was so cool!
After 2 hours of riding a horse with the bonus muscle pain we got some comfort food. We went to the sugar cane farm that runs in the family for a long time. First we needed to help a hand and squeeze the sugar cane grass. Then we helped cooking the sugar cane and mixing it with nuts to make a nice candy. And it was delicious. Our guide also gave is some traditional local food: banana bread and a cheese empanada. It was delicious. After that it was time to head back.
A muddy trail
Peace
Amazing views
Gallopping
Picture with a cloudy landscape
Vamos a la jungla
Night tour
We went on a night tour in Monteverde with Olingo Expeditions Monteverde. It was raining a lot and we were in doubt if we should go or not. But it’s rain season and it rains every day. Besides the tours still go on if it rains or not. What the heck, let’s go! We said to each other. We had a funny and good speaking English guide: Dani. It’s amazing how he can even spot the tinniest insect from a distance in the dark. You can say he has a sixth sense. The only thing I spotted was a cockroach giving birth 😅 Not the main reason I went on a night tour I would say.
First we saw different kinds of birds: a motmot and a keel billed toucan. Toucans are among the cutest vicious killers in the world. Yup, that colorful little guy is really a cold blooded assassin. While fruit is a staple of their diet they actively hunt other animals including tarantulas, lizards and other birds – especially eggs and hatchlings from nests. But besides vicious birds, we also saw vicious insects like the bush crickets and an orange kneed tarantula spider. And it got even better, we saw a sloth and it was big! There is one kind of sloth that lives here in the cloud forest and it likes to be high in the trees: the three-toed sloth. He was indeed high. It was actually climbing down.
The guide thought maybe he’s going to take a shit. Wait what!? He explained that sloths go down once time a week to poop. Their poop is 30% of their body weight (approx. around 2 pound). If they poop while they’re high in the tree and it falls with that weight it will make a hard sound what will attracts predators like the jaguar and eagles. So they go down quietly to take a shit and hide it, so they don’t leave any trace. Turns out they’re not so lazy right?
At the end we saw a snake, a very poisonous one that can kill a human in 5 hours, the viper. It wakes up at night and waits deadly still on a branch till his victim walks by and then he catches it. It could be a mouse, a frog or a small lizard.
Keel billed toucan
Mot mot
How can you spot something here?
Even the tinniest insect
Lizard
A tarantula coming out of his hole
A three-toed sloth, picture by @dani from Olingo tour
Pit viper snake, picture by @dani from Olingo tour
After Monteverde we took a bus – boat – bus shuttle to La Fortuna. This was surprisingly very easy! Check out my next blog post to find out more.
My guide for your Monteverde trip
We loved our stay in Monteverde, if we had more time we would’ve extend our stay. There is so much to do and see. Make sure you’ll visit Monteverde if you go to Costa Rica!
- Recommended duration visit: 4 days
- Bring layers: It's much colder in this area than other places in Costa Rica. This is because it's higher in the mountain and a cloud forest. Besides layers, bring a rainproof outerlayer with you.
- Restaurants: Gusticos, the Green, Tico y Rica, Natu, bar Amigos, Valle Escondido, Gastroclub
- Highlighted things to do: Visit Monteverde, Santa Elena and Curicancha reserve, go zip-lining, bungeejumping, night tour, bat jungle, see the hanging bridges, coffee tour, horsebackriding.
- Free things to do: Ficus root bridge trail, Cerro amigos (free trail of 2 hours).
- Our accommodation: Monte fresco. Price-quality a 10-10!! A little bit out of town, but the host brought us a lot for free to downtown. Breakfast was good and their service outstanding. The rooms were nice too.
- My favorite activity: Hard to choose, but we really liked the Ficus Root bridge, the bat Jungle, the horse trip and the night tour!