La Fortuna

From Monteverde we headed on to La Fortuna. On a map it appears these two little towns are quite close to one another, however due to the fact that all the land between them is Rainforest reserves its actually quite a journey. First we had to take a bus to Lake Arenal, then get a boat across it, and then another bus to La Fortuna.

La Fortuna sits in the shadow of Volcano Arenal, which incidently is one of the most active volcanos in Central America (and I actually saw it erupt when I was in Costa Rica last time).

Lake Arenal


Volcano Arenal in the distance


Our little ferry boat


One thing I forgot to write about in Monteverde was how much it rained... and how heavily. Well as the below photo shows, La Fortuna was no different.

When it rains, it pours!



There are many activities to do whilst in La Fortuna, however for me one of the most underated is a visit to Arenal Waterfall. Its an amazing waterfall where the valley suddenly falls away out of nothing. Its fun to swim in the pool too, and luckily the rain held off just long enough for us to do exactly that.

Arenal Waterfall


And again...

And again :)

Swimming

The big Swede explaining to me he'd lost his contacts

Downstream

While we were at the waterfall michael found this little critter underneath a rock. We assumed due to how flat the rock his body looked that he was unfortunately dead. After we'd taken a few photos Michael decided to give the little chap a nudge... at which point his tail shot up in the air and he scuttled back into his hiding place. It turns out he was just sunning himself in order to raise his body temperature, what with scorpions being cold blooded n all.

Playing dead

After we'd swum in the waterfall pool we headed slightly downstream for another little swim and found there was more than just us in the river.

Lots of little fishes

After a day at the waterfall we decided to head to the hotsprings that La Fortuna is also famous for. We didn't head to any normal hotsprings though, we headed to a 5star resort. Unfortunately again it was raining, but it didn't dampen our spirits.

Rain rain go away

Hot springs waterslide

The resort had a nice pool table and a darts board, me and Eric had a good few games of spears. The first one literally lasted about an hour haha, not so accurate.

Bullseye

La Fortuna would be the last stop of the tour before we finished in San Jose. A few of the group had a few more days in Costa Rica before heading home or onwards like myself. So we got together and under my guide decided to travel down to Manuel Antonio to see the beaches and national park.