I’m a little behind; this is two and three weekends ago. Oops:
Arenal Volcano (March 3-4)
Our first weekend away-- meaning we don’t have Saturday classes. We can actually have two days off at a time! A group of 8 of us went to Arenal Volcano about 3 hours away from the center. We arrived Saturday mid morning, got settled in the hotel, and explored the town. In the afternoon we took a guided hiking tour of the Volcano. On our hike we saw spider monkeys with babies, a howler monkey eating dinner basically on the side of the trail, and several toucans. Our guide was really amusing and when he’d see a toucan up the trail he’d holler “quick everyone, let’s go see the fruit loop!” and would take off jogging for us to follow. After our hike we stopped at the Balde hot springs. We ended up getting a free all you can eat buffet dinner with a chocolate fountain! You’d think we hadn’t been fed in months. We got to go on water slides, a swim up bar, and a disco pool! It was pretty neat. There were over 70 springs at this one spot and the water ranged from 70-120 degrees C!!
The next morning we went on a Lost Canyon tour. This was AWESOME. We traversed this canyon by rappelling down 4 waterfalls. The heights were 25’, 150’, 45’, and 220’ in that order. It was unreal. Someone bought the pictures; I am working on getting those up on Facebook. We hiked in between each rappel to get the next and that was actually the scariest part. We had to do a bit of bouldering to get ourselves down and we also got to jump in a watering hole. I can’t even imagine going through the canyon during the wet season. That was definitely the highlight of the trip.
In the afternoon we hung out in our hostel, so I relaxed in a hammock looking up at Arenal. This volcano has previously been very active where visitors could see the lava flow at night. In the last year it suddenly became dormant and seismologists think that it is entering an inactive period.
Santa Rosa National Park (March 9-11)
Our camping trip!! YAY CAMPING. The hike to the beach was 11 km, hot, and rocky. It was great being on a harder hike. After we set up camp we went for a walk on the beach where BABY LEATHERBACK SEATURTLES were hatching!! We got to help them to the water. Check that off my list of life goals. They are only about the size of my palm when they hatch, but grow to be one of the heaviest reptiles on earth—up to over a ton. WOW.
We had classes in the afternoon and among other things discussed economic valuation of environmental goods. I really liked this lecture/discussion because it a globally applicable concept. Bottom line is that most products sold do not include the “real cost”, the cost to health, environment, etc. When we pay for items at the grocery or our water supply for example, we pay the price of production and transportation. What we don’t pay is the price it takes to sustainably produce these products. Commercial farmers are subsidized so that they can sell their crops at a lower cost than the value of their products. It is more expensive on a baseline economic value to give animals open spaces, grass instead of corn, natural growth rates instead of hormones. We pay for fast and efficient, not natural and ethical. Water companies charge the price for bringing people water, not the price to ensure they don’t pollute what they clean out of the water they bring to us. Those are just two examples but in all aspects of our life, it is important to consider the real cost. So when organic or sustainable products appear to cost more in the grocery store, they actually don’t because the cost to the environment, health, and ethical treatment of land and animals is included, or at least more included. It’s hard to sacrifice the money to purchase all organic food or offset the costs of your travel, but the cost will come back around later on with our health and the price it will eventually take to produce anything from our degraded land. Obviously, eliminating these externalities is no easy task, but it is important to put in the effort as a consumer to assist in internalizing these costs.
Overall camping was an awesome trip. Aside from there being sand everywhere, it was one of the best weekends so far. The beach was gorgeous and watching the sunset was so serene. At night we could see hundreds of stars. We saw Jupiter, Venus, and Mars all at once! Also visible were Orion, the Seven Sisters, Ursa Major, and more. A good reminder at how small we really are.
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