Volunteer weekends away

On our volunteer projects we worked through the week, Monday to Friday, then had the chance to go off and have a few days away at the weekends. We quickly formed a plan with some of the volunteers from the various other projects to go and have a weekend in La Fortuna. Despite having visited La Fortuna earlier in the trip I was excited to go and see friends made at the volunteer induction and have a relaxing weekend. Also having previously visited the area it made me a sort of accidental tour guide for everyone.


The minibus to La Fortuna, George stumbles across a machete under the seat



We were a little later arriving than the building volunteers and by the time we got to La Fortuna the plans for the weekend's accomodation were pretty much all sorted. We stayed in some delightful cabins on the road up to Arenal waterfall.

The cabins




I've written a little about the activities available in La Fortuna earlier on in the blog, and our plans for this trip were little different to the last time I visited. First of all we headed to the hot springs again, this time heading to a different resort, Baldy Hotsprings. Baldy wasn't quite as fancy as the resort we visited last time (not far off though), but it was alot more fun.


It had a number of waterslides, one of which was probably the world's most dangerous waterslide... to the extent it actually carried a disclaimer and health warning. The first time I went down it, I hadn't noticed this and tried to really launch myself down the slide. By the time I hit the pool I was going so fast at such a random angle I actually cartwheeled into the pool at the bottom. It made for a fun afternoon.

Like a human bullet


Hotsprings hangtimes


Stef and George in the waterfalls

Poolbar

Volunteer group shot

The one main thing I'd missed last time we were in La Fortuna was a night visit to the volcano to watch for lava flows, which are obviously far more visable at night. It involved a walk through the rainforest in the pitch black, which none of us were prepared for at all, one or two torch's between the group of 14 haha. It was fun and we saw a couple of lava flows glowing as they spilled down the volcano. However possibly the highligt was me being attacked by a huge insect and hitting myself in the face in an attempt to get it off me, then nearly falling off the bench I was sat on.

Volcano Arenal by day

The viewing area had a couple of toilets and after a couple of people had used them someone noticed they hadn't been alone in there... A huge spider and an even bigger bush cricket had also been sharing the facilities.

Giant creepy crawlies

The cabins we stayed in were very nice, and included in the price was a delicious breakfast which we all enjoyed together in the morning.

Breakfast time

Also somewhere across the course of the previous evening George and Sam had somehow adopted a dog and named it Scrumpy. The next morning they awoke to find Scrumpy asleep on the doorstep of the cabin.

Sam and Scrumpy

On the Sunday we got up and only really had one activity planned... ziplinning. Having missed out this activity earlier on in the trip whilst in Monteverde I decided to face my issues over heights head on and join the gang whizzing through the canopy.

I'm glad I did as well, it was another very fun activity and a very unique way to get a view of the rainforest from within the actual canopy of the trees.

Ziplinners

And then suddenly, as quickly as the weekend had come upon us, it was time to say goodbye to everyone as we all headed back to our various projects... and for not the first or the last time I was more than a little sad to be saying goodbye.

Sports day

The next day was our first day working with the kids at the summer camp, and it was sports day time. Despite the recent events in the local community there was still a huge turn out.

Our first job as helpers was to make sure all the children got from the english school offices to the playing fields.

A good turn out


George incharge of a rope of children


The journey to the playing fields

A few of us headed on to the playing fields ahead of the kids to get set up with the various games for them to participate in. Being in the Costa Rican uplands in the rainy season we had to have a back up plan for if the weather closed in, and true to form it did.

Setting up

Team George Breezy

Just chilling

As I say, within what seemed like minutes the weather turned and we had to run with the children back to the local sports hall to have the sports day indoors.

Rainy season downpour

Luckily the sports hall had ample room for everyone and all the different activities we had planned.

Mid sports day English lesson

Each of us volunteers had our roles for the day. Most people were helpers and assitants, however me and George ended up with the roles of photographer and time keeper respectively.

Time keeper George Breezy

Event photographer

The kids were all split into teams and there were numerous events for them to take part in. The different events included crab races, football slalom, biscuit and spoon races (similar to the egg and spoon but with less mess when things go wrong) and a couple of other events.

Kids and helpers enjoying the fun

Crab races

The leader board

At the end of the day all the kids seemed to have had a brilliant time and thoroughly enjoyed the whole thing... And I think the same could definitely be said for volunteers too.

Conservation?... no, construction

Once we arrived at the lodge we quickly found out that in addition to our conservation work, we would have the chance to work at a summer camp for the local primary school children being run by Donald and his wife Pip.

The next day was ment to be our first day working at the camp however, due to a very unfortunate and quite shocking incident in the local community, the camp was cancelled. This gave us a free afternoon, we asked if we could get started on some work around the lodge however we were told to just enjoy the reserve and take a walk through the trails and the hanging bridges.

Ironically the next day was to be manual labour from start to finish. As I mentioned earlier on in the blog a group of seventy christian missionaries were arriving from the USA to spread the word of God. The lodge had overstretched itself a little and didn't have enough rooms, as such we were called in to help complete some new rooms which were in the process of being constructed. We had 1 day to finish four rooms to a standard they could be lived in the next day... and there was alot to do. But this is Costa Rica, and we run on tico time so no-one seemed overly concerned.

The before shot


Our first job was a little landscaping next to the new lodges. This involved taking earth from a near by embankment and moving it to the area adjacent to the new rooms.

Professional landscape gardeners


Muscle vest

The embankment

Have a break, have a kitkat

After a couple of hours it was decided we were fighting a losing battle with the landscaping, especially as time was ticking on and the rooms were still nowhere near ready. As such we turned our attentions inside the rooms. Everything needed cleaning out thoroughly prior to the furniture etc being constructed. The Costa Ricans had an interesting approach to this, just hose everything down... including plug sockets and light switches.

Professional decorators

Hose it down and sweep it out of the door

The work force

We managed to get everything finished with literally no time to spare and the light fading. We did point out amongst ourselves that we could quite easily have gotten started on alot of the work the day before when we had our free afternoon... but again this is tico time.

Heliconias Lodge

After our night out at the casino in Alajuela it was time to head to our various projects. We headed off in a minibus and traveled to northern Costa Rica, dropping off the construction volunteers in San Ramon as we went.

Our first destination for our Conservation and Ecology volunteering would be Heliconias Lodge. Heliconias lodge is a reserve run by 10 local families in the foothills of Volcano Tenorio in the Upala region of Costa Rica.

Heliconias Lodge


As I say, the lodge is run by 10 local families and is one of the first of its type in Costa Rica. Originally the reserve was earmarked by the government to be deforested and used as farm land. However the local people protested and got together a petition against this and instead the land was passed over to the 10 families to be run as an Ecolodge and Reserve, with backing from an international tour company looking to build it's eco tourism credentials.

The lodge from above looking over the valley beneath


There were six of us volunteering at the lodge, four girls... Rhian, Ruth, Kelly and Laura, and then me and George. To begin with our accomodation was split into a four person room and a two person room, as such it made sense for me and George to take to the two person room. The girls were less than impressed when they realised that ment me and George were staying in a guest room in the lodge and they would be living in a space little bigger than a cupboard reserved for volunteers.

The smile was wiped off mine and georges face when, on the arrival of 70 missionaries from the US, we had to join the girls in the cupboard.

Mine and George's 5star Accomodation for the first week

A beautiful Heliconias sunset

Looking North to Lake Nicaragua

The builders yard with our cupboard accomodation... it looks bigger than it is



Lunchtime for the workers... left to right... George, Rhian, Ruth, Kelly and Laura

Because the reserve and lodge was run by so many families there seemed to be literally hundreds of people working there, each with their own roles. Donald was a guide and also heavily involved with teaching the local children english and other community projects.

Me and Donald in Leather cowboy hats. nice.

The local town to Heliconias was a small town called Bijagua and was a nice little place, Heliconias lodge sits 45 minutes walk further up the volcano in unspoilt rainforest... the most beautiful location to be working for a couple of weeks.

Bijagua town... under construction

The local carpark in Bijagua haha

Volunteer inductions

After a day in San jose it was time to go and meet up with all the volunteers for our time working in Costa Rica.

Our meeting point for the induction would be the airport, and getting there proved to be a very entertaining task. I knew I could quite easily get a taxi, but a bus seemed a relatively simple and cheaper option. So I headed to the bus station and used my best Spanglish to ask the bus driver if the bus went to the airport, he never answered me and instead just held out his hand for the money... I should have seen this as a sign.

I hopped on the bus and sat intensely watching for the airport stop, as we got close rather than go the airprt the bus suddenly veered off towards Alajuela. I immediately jumped up and got off. So now I'm about a mile from the airport, I can even see the place... but I can't get to it. Standing in my path is a six lane motorway. It's now getting pretty close to the time I'm ment to be meeting everyone, so I decided to just go for it.

So I'm there with my two big backpacks running down the central reservation of this motorway in the blazing sunshine. By the time I arrived I looked like I'd been pulled through a hedge backwards. I turned up and our coordinator was like 'where the hell have you come from?', my reply was 'well, I just had to run down the central reservation of the motorway' as though it was the most normal thing in the world ;) fun times.

Once I arrived I found out it wasn't just the conservation volunteers who were in town but instead about 70 people doing various volunteer work, ranging from building house's to saving turtles, and before heading off to our various projects we would have a couple of days of induction together.

We were split across two hostels and with various people arriving across the course of the afternoon it was a good time to get to know everyone.

First night bonding session


Literally the first person I met was a guy called George, who by a crazy coincidence turned out to be from Ilkley. We quickly became thick as thieves and George would become the person who kept me sane whilst living in a cupboard in the jungle. As we were meeting everyone we were all discussing our various projects and I had to admit that because our projects had changed around so many times I actually had no clue where we were heading or what we would be doing... At which point George said 'thank god, I have no idea what we're doing either', I think that was the point we bonded.

Taking it real easy... with George breeeeeezzzyyy


George had managed to travel to Costa Rica in the rainy season with no form of waterproof clothing, so the next day we headed to a second hand store to try to pick one up. Whilst in there we couldn't resist trying on some entertaining atire. Moments after the below photo was taken we were politely asked to leave the store haha. And in hindsight it was a good job we did as our early departure from our shopping trip lead to a chance meeting with a certain someone*

Evening wear


As I say, on our return to the hostel we met a few volunteers from the other hostel who were going to go Bungee jumping at a place just outside of Alajuela. I had no intention of jumping myself but was quickly talked into going along to spectate.

The below photo shows the guy from the bungee jumping place climbing down the front of the bridge with no form of safety harness what so ever, to say health & safety doesn't exist in these places is a major understatement.

mental mental chicken oriental


This isn't me I'm quick to point out

Bungee jump spectators

In the evening we all got together for a meal and then headed to Casino for ladies night... this basically ment the girls got in for free and didn't pay for drinks... it's all very sexist in central america.

Grub

Casino entertainment

Like every good casino, no natural light or clocks on the walls

The next morning we all got up with not enough sleep, some people's wallets being significantly lighter, and headed to our various projects.

Heliconias bound