Monteverde Cloud Forest

Monteverde Cloud Forest and Santa Elena

This was the second weekend trip that I had planned since Manuel Antonio. When I originally signed up for the program, I thought this was supposed to be included in our program instead of La Fortuna. I'm not disappointed though, because there is so much to see here and I am glad we did it on our own time and schedule.

The cloud forests in this area consist of a few different reserves, including Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve, Children's Eternal Rainforest, and Santa Elena Cloud Forest Reserve. The cloud forests are different than other rainforests in Costa Rica because of their altitude. They are part of a temperate ecosystem at elevations of 900-1800 meters. The vegetation is typically larger and consists of more epiphytes, mosses, and ferns. To me, the vegetation reminded me a lot of Pacific Northwest vegetation, especially that found in the Ho Rainforest. Some of the animals typically found here includes coatis, quetzals, tarantualas, and monkeys. This ecosystem is considered to be threatened or endangered, meaning they continue to disappear for human consumption, but it is difficult for them to grow back. This makes visiting the Costa Rican cloud forests that much more special because there aren't many places left in the world where you can do so, and Costa Rica has done a decent job at maintaining a lot of the original primary forests in this particular region.

Cloud Forest

Much like with Manuel Antonio, I knew a lot of people wanted to visit this place, so I arranged to have a private shuttle bus take us over so we didn't have to deal with the public transportation. There was a bit of confusion over who could and wanted to go, but in the end we had 14 people and it ended up being about $20 per person. We left after class on Friday at noon and headed up there. It was only about a 3 hour drive (it was just supposed to be two, but the bus was having issues). About five minutes from the town of Santa Elena where we were staying, our bus broke down. Luckily the driver called us taxis and covered the fees for us, so we got to our hotel just fine.

My group of eight people stayed at the Pension Santa Elena, which was located right in the middle of the town. I found this place from my Lonely Planet book and chose it because of the price (only $20/person for two nights) and they had breakfast included. It was a weird hotel/hostel combo and we ended up staying in the hotel part of it. Right away I really liked this place. It is owned by an American guy from Colorado and he was there when we arrived. It was someone's birthday so they let us have some of the cake. The rest of the staff was super helpful and friendly as well and they even had a little gift shop full of handmade crafts and art attached to it. Our room was just two rooms connected to each other with lofted and bunk beds, but these were some of the comfiest beds I stayed my entire time in Costa Rica. The whole place was so clean and it had a hostel feel to it, where everyone was friendly and sharing stories and interacting with each other, but the quality of a hotel.

Since the bus fiasco happened, we arrived a little close to 4. After settling in, some of us were hungry and some of us just wanted to explore the town, so we walked around and then found this place called Taco Taco. This place was recommended to us at least four times so we went in to try it. I just got a drink, but my friends said the tacos were pretty good. Afterwards, some people wanted to check out a reptile place and some of us wanted to go find a ficus tree. I went with the group to find the ficus tree.

The focus tree we found

We had to take a taxi to get to the ficus tree, and when we did, it kind of just dropped us off on a dirt road near a patch of forest and he told us it was on the land. He said the property is owned by someone, but he lets people come on it to see the tree. The reason why these trees are so special is because they they start their life out as an epiphyte, meaning they are a type of vine like plant that uses a tree to grow up to reach the sunlight. However, when a ficus plant reaches to a high enough point that it has sufficient sunlight, it starts to turn into a tree. Eventually, the ficus grows around the original tree and can suffocate it so that the original tree dies on the inside, but the ficus is still hollow on the inside. This does not happen often, because this process takes a really long time, especially for the original tree to die, considering the fact that it is usually pretty big. Monteverde is one of the only places where you can find these hollowed out trees. They are really appealing because you can climb the tree from the inside. It has become really common for visitors to climb the trees and they are often unsupervised. There have been a couple of instances where people have fallen off the tree after trying to climb the outside of it and getting injured, so it is hard to find one of these trees where you can actually climb it still. Luckily, I got the number of someone who lives in Monteverde and she told us where to go to find one.

The inside of the focus tree

This was probably my favorite experience from this trip. We arrived just a little before sunrise, and had to wait a bit while others climbed the tree. We ended up meeting a group of people from the U.S., a couple from Chile, and a group of European. We were the last people at this tree before the sunset, so my friends took off to the top, while I climbed a little ways us and then just hung out. Just as the sun was setting, my friend and I noticed a group of large birds in the trees next to us. Then we heard monkeys coming home to sleep. They were the white faced capuchin monkeys and it was really cool to watch them settle into a tree near the one we were climbing. My friends up at the top of the tree got to watch the sunset from up there and then see all the monkeys come and settle in the branches right next to them. Overall, it was a really cool experience.

A video from the top of the tree with the monkeys and the sunset.

We couldn't call a taxi from the tree, so we ended up just walking home. It was a quick 20 minute walk downhill back to the hotel. On the walk down we got to see the rest of the sunset and some of the town. The plan was to make vegetables and Alfredo pasta so we went to the grocery store and then cooked food back at the hotel. For the rest of the night, we just hung out in the room then went to bed.

Saturday was our only full day there, so we dedicated this day to exploring the parks in the day and at night. I got the contact of an American who lives in Monteverde from one of my professors, so she recommended a bunch of activities for us and gave us advice about the town and the parks. She actually arranged all of our tours and activities for us, which was really nice of her.

We woken up on Saturday around 6:30 so we could eat breakfast at the hotel and catch the bus at 7:30. For breakfast we had the option of yogurt and toast, breakfast tacos, or homestyle with toast, eggs, and potatoes. I chose the homestyle option. At 7:30, the bus picked us up right in front of the hotel. There are three different parks, but we chose to go to the Monteverde Cloud Forest one because it is the most famous and it was recommended to us. We were a large group of nine, so we split off into two groups going on different trails. I really enjoyed this national park. We didn't see many animals but it was interesting to observe the vegetation. The first trail my group went on was to the waterfall. It was a pretty easy hike with a mostly flat and clear trail. For the most part it was pretty quiet although we did run into some other large tour groups. The waterfall itself wasnt super spectacular, but it was relaxing to look at for a while.

The waterfall in the park

For the rest of the reserve, we followed a trail that went over a suspension bridge and up to the top of a lookout point. When my friend Jordan and I got to the bridge, we probably spent a half an hour there just watching and listening to the birds. It was really cool at this spot because it was canopy level so we got to watch all the birds flying around us and we saw a lot of varieties as well. After a while, we continued our path up to the lookout point. When we got to the top, it was too cloudy to actually see anything, but I still really enjoyed the experience because we were above the clouds and they looked really cool as they settled around the tops of the trees. On our way back down from the lookout point, it started raining. Hard. My rain jacket got absolutely soaked, so I sprinted back to the park entrance to hide in the gift shop. While here we ran into the rest of our group and decided to eat lunch at the on site cafe to wait for the next bus at 2.

Our view from the lookout

In the same area, there was a hummingbird garden. After lunch, we spent the rest of our time waiting here. There were so many hummingbirds, it was really easy to see them, especially up close. A couple even ran into me, which was freaky. Eventually, the bus arrived and we went back to Santa Elena. Later that night, a few of us were going to go on a night hike. Until then, however, me and a few others took a nap.

One of the hummingbirds we saw.

Around 4:30, the driver for the night hike came to pick us up at the hotel. For our night hike, we were going to a different reserve. This time we went to Bajos del Tigre, which is part of the Children's Eternal Rainforest. All the proceeds from the night hike go to support this forest, which is the longest continuous stretch of cloud forests in the world. This forest was actually bought and protected from a global fundraiser started by children in Europe. The park is really large, with trails only going in a small part of it. For the night hike, we started at the info center. Right away we saw a green tree snake and many bats. We kept walking and then saw many more insects and flying animals, mostly bats. One of the reasons we decided to go on a night hike is because they have been having a lot of tarantula activity, which we were all looking forward to. This hike did not disappoint, because we saw five different tarantualas and their nests. During this night hike, we also saw a kinkajou, which was one of the animals I was hoping to see before leaving Costa Rica. Overall, we had a really fruitful hike.

Tarantula coming out of her nest

After the hike, we went back to the town and immediately went to dinner because we were starving. We found a really good Mediterranean restaurant where I, of course, had a hamburger. The food was really good and then we went home to hang out for a little while and go to sleep.

The next morning, we had breakfast again at the hotel. We split up in groups again this day, except one was going to go by gee jumping while the other went to go to the suspension bridges. I chose to do the suspension bridges because bungee jumping was significantly more expensive. The shuttle to take us there picked us up at 8 am this day.

One of the suspension bridges

The suspension bridges were really cool. In total there were 11 different bridges of different heights and lengths. Again, we didn't see much wildlife, but it was fun to just be on the bridges and see the trees from a different perspective. On the second to last bridge, we saw a howler monkey hanging out in the trees really close to the bridge. He was very calm with everyone around him. Right before the exit, there was a small little art shop in the middle of the woods. It kind of looked like something out of a fairytale. The artist and his wife greeted us upon entry and showed us their studio. It was really interesting and his work was a combination to realistic and more abstract depictions of Costa Rica and the wildlife. I really liked all of his work, so I ended up getting a few prints. He also designs skateboards, which I also almost bought.

The artist's skateboard designs

This place was the last place we visited before heading back to Santa Elena to wait for our bus back to San Ramon. The bungee people weren't quite back in time, so we ended up having to wait a little longer to leave, but eventually we got back on the road with no troubles the rest of the way.

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