Costa Rica Update: Rafting the Pacuare

We all arrived in San Jose on Saturday night. We spent the night at Hotel Brilla Sol, where we all quickly got to know each other and soon went to bed after a long day of travel. The next morning, we all got up super early to get on our bus to go whitewater rafting on the Pacuare River! A ride meant to be one to three hours turned into a five and a half hour ride, but eventually we made it to the river.

We had an awesome two hour rafting trip to what would be our home for the next two days. We arrived at the ecolodge and got settled in before looking around the lodge. For dinner we had a delicious chicken and rice meal as we all squeezed in at one long table. After our meal, we learned to play Yeehaw!, an awesome game Maclaine loves. We also did a cool team building exercise that was super fun. We chilled out in the hammocks before heading to bed – an incredible first day.

Tuesday morning we headed out on a hike up to an indigenous community school and home. We saw tons of cool trees, animals and insects. The trails were very steep and muddy; everyone was falling all over the place and it was great. When we got back to the lodge, we had to rush through a field to avoid the bulls! The hike had awesome views and was quite the workout.

After a delicious lunch, we went nearby for a reforestation project. Each of us grabbed a baby almendra tree and shovel and started to plant. We learned that the almendra tree provides a habitat for the lapa bird and green macaw. After that we went down to the river for a swim. The current was really strong and we let it pull us for a while – so much fun! After the swim we did some journal activities, had dinner and called it a day.

Today we woke up, did some yoga at 7:00am and had breakfast. We then said bye to the ecolodge and headed out rafting for the second day. We went through class three and four rapids and were jostled about in the tumultuous water with huge smiles on our faces. After rafting, we had lunch and came to Earth University where we reunited with our dry clothes and got to shower and change! So far this trip is amazing!!