The Schiffers: Day 38 – Get Your Head Out of the Cloud Forest

Off to Monteverde. It is around 7am and the troops are being awoken. It was a late one last night and the kids seem to be moving somewhat slowly. Anna is moving even slower. A little café con leche and I think the eyelids will open a little wider. It is about a 3 ½ hour trip to Monteverde, so I wanted to get an early start. I took one last walk on the beach this morning at around 5:30am to see the sunrise. It was beautiful. It is some amazing that you can this magnificent place to yourself here. I know the kids will hate to leave the beach, but I think a little jungle adventure will do them well.

We managed to get in the car and on the road a little before 9am. It was to be a 3 ½ hour ride to Monteverde if all went well. Rossi, the owner of “The Flying Scorpion”, gave us some pointers last night on how to get to Monteverde. He showed me on my map a road that was no longer a 4x4 road, but should now be paved. When a map says 4x4 in Costa Rica, they mean 4x4, River Crossing, “You ain’t getting’ through unless you have a real 4x4” terrain. So as you can imagine, I was somewhat hesitant. It is hard to imagine that they go from 4x4 to paved here. Once passed that road and over another mountain we would be on main roads.

Last sand dollar found at around 5:30am right after sunrise before we left San Miguel.

We did managed get over the two white knuckle mountains and got on Costa Rica Interstate 21. Interstate 21 has the pavement condition of the worst country road in South Carolina, added with multiple severe pot holes. It reminds me of playing dodge ball. Believe it or not, this road was a dream in comparison to what we had been on over the past month. We stopped somewhere shy of the Tempisque Bridge for Lunch. It was a soda off the side of the highway. No complaints. Lunch was good.

Neighbor looking for a little goodwill from us during breakfast.

Anna took over driving and we were back on the road. As we got close to Monteverde I took back over driving and it seemed we were in the middle of nowhere. The roads were getting worse and we were in for a climb. The RAV4 started up a mountain that seemed to take forever. The grades were very steep and it was hard to imagine that anyone was living up this high, let alone there be a school. Turns out, they were multiple schools. Where the heck they all lived was beyond us, because we hardly saw any civilization, except for every now and then. We got to the top of a mountain which seemed to take forever and we stopped for some drinks at a soda. It was basically someone’s house. After a quick break and a small bit of entertainment with some bunnies, we were off again.

Took a little stop along the way at a Soda on Interstate 18.

After about another 45 minutes we ended up going from almost nothing to a metropolis in the mountains. Within 50 yards it went from rough gravel road to houses and pristine pavement. Anna and I both looked at each other in amazement. This town was the biggest we had been in since we had first arrived after San Jose and San Ramon on day 1. We saw a sign as we entered for a hotel called El Establo. It looked pretty nice, so we proceed to go and check it out. Once looking it over, we checked in.

On the way to Monteverde. The picture does not do the real view any justice.

We unloaded the car and then rushed the bathroom. The rooms were very nice. We had a two story room. The kids had a bedroom upstairs with a balcony look over to the downstairs bedroom where Anna and I slept. The bathroom was the nicest we had seen in some time. It had a wonderful shower and big bathtub. Anna took her first hot shower in 5 weeks. Olivia and Thomas both took a bath. After drying off, everyone got on the king bed and veg’d out for the next hour.

A beautiful looking pasture up in the mountains. We were maybe 20 minutes from Monteverde. Unbelievable watching the clouds pass by at a pretty fast pace. You could literally cut the air.

Took a break here at when we hit what we thought was the top of the mountain climb. We stopped for some drinks.

It was 6:30pm when we finally got enough motivation to get up and go to dinner. Laggus is a restaurant on the property that we went to. It was okay, but nothing amazing. It was definitely not worth the money what they charged. The cheesecake dessert that Olivia ordered was presented very well though. After dinner, we all headed to the room and watched a little TV and called it a night. Tomorrow was to be a big day.