Water Weekend: Rain, the Beach, and a Crocodile Tour Additional Photos
 Left to right: One of the local surfers is halfway through a front flip into the water. My friend Jeanette at Playa Doña Ana. The rocky point in the background is where my friend Melissa and I walked around to watch the surfers. This surfer found a good break.
This shot is from the other side of the rocky point, with some of the surfer kids ready to go. I realized the reason they went around to the other side is that most of the waves break higher on this side, after they pass the point.
This young tico surfer is jumping in with his board just in time to catch a nice break
(Click on photos for larger images.)
¡Hola a todos! Last weekend I went to the U.S.-Costa Rica soccer game as I said I would in the last article, but I forgot to bring my camera with me! I can tell you it was a great game, and there were more than 20,000 people in the stadium. Each time the ticos scored, a roar filled the air as everyone went crazy. Costa Rica ruled us . . . the final score was 3-0. We left San José as quickly as possible, to avoid the mobs of screaming fans, and got back to Puntarenas at around one in the morning.
This weekend I managed to go to several different places. It was raining Friday, so I decided to head to the mountain town of San Ramón to get some early Christmas shopping in. They had lots of finely crafted wood products there, and I was able to get some great deals on gifts for my family. One of the many advantages of knowing Spanish is that I can bargain with the vendors. It takes a lot of effort to keep a poker face and be firm with them when they want more than you’re willing to pay, but in the end it’s well worth the trouble.
 Here’s the group photo on top of the waterfall, without me, since I am taking the picture.
Saturday the sun finally came out, and my friends Melissa, Sara, Jeanette, Tobin, Cory, Daniel and myself decided to head to the beach. We had heard good things about Playa Doña Ana, and since it was only about half an hour away we took a taxi rather than hitching a ride on a bus. The beach was nice despite the muddy water from all the rain runoff. Melissa and I went around the rocky point at the north end of the beach, and discovered a bunch of kids surfing and riding boogie boards on the breaks. They loved putting on a show for the camera, and I got plenty of acrobatic shots. I played soccer with some of the ticos, and afterwards they took me to a hidden waterfall near the south end of the beach. We had to scale a pretty slippery trail on the rocky shore, but our hard work paid off with some nice group shots on top of the falls and plenty of new tico friends.
 Clockwise: The beautiful flower is from a floating plant in the river.
These are some of the Germans that went on the tour with me.
Our guide/boat driver Manuel playing his role as the “Crocodile Man” by jumping into the river near several big crocs and slapping the waters surface with some dead fish to try and attract them to him. This time the crocs kept their distance.
Manuel caught this bright green juvenile iguana. He somehow spotted it floating downriver on a branch, and leaned over the edge to snatch it up while driving.
On Sunday I decided to go on the Crocodile Tour that I missed several weeks ago on the Río Tarcoles. This large river drains most of the Central Valley, including the untreated water from all of San José. Sadly, this makes the water very filthy, and lots of trash can be seen along the banks. It's a shame that the Rio Tarcoles is one of the most polluted bodies of water in all of Central America. The crocodiles love the brackish water however, and the estuary near the mouth of the river has one of the highest concentrations of these fearsome creatures in the world. There are also many species of birds that live in the area, including spoonbills, various kinds of cranes and storks, hawks and even scarlet macaws. I saw several of each of these, but they were from a fair distance and there were only a couple good photo opportunities. White mangroves could be seen all along the banks, and we also motored up a couple small tributaries to get a closer look at the wildlife. Our driver, Manuel, actually got in the water at one point with some fish in his hand, and smacked the surface hoping to attract nearby crocs! His attempts were in vain however, and they kept their distance. We weren’t able to see the legendary croc nicknamed Tornado, a 16-foot monster that is one of the largest in all of Costa Rica. Since I was the only other person on the boat that could speak good Spanish (the rest of the tourists were German), Manuel and I quickly became friends, and he promised to give me a better tour for free if I chose to come back. I hope I have enough time! I already have made plans for most of my remaining weekends this semester, including a couple that are booked for class trips. I really would like to see this Tornado fella, though; he sounds pretty impressive.
 Another hurricane is coming towards us and it's going to be raining for probably the next week straight. So my plans to return to Santa Rosa to hike to Playa Nancite will have to be postponed. I don't want to repeat the perilous trip that we made several weeks ago. The peak season for turtles lasts until late November, and it should dry up before then to allow me to take another hike to the beach to get some pictures of the Olive Ridley sea turtles. Next weekend, I may go to the Central Valley again to check out museums and live animal exhibits, since I would be indoors and it wouldn't matter how much it rained. I have plenty of work to do this week for my classes. I have a midterm in tropical marine biology today, one in conservation biology tomorrow, a presentation on the differences between Independence Day here and in the U.S. for Spanish on Wednesday, and a midterm in Spanish on Friday. Yikes! It’s time for me to study.
¡Adios!
Additional Photos
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