As I write about day two of our rainforest adventure, I should note it is actually the end of day three, and the rain is coming down like I have never heard before, a REAL jungle rain.  I have never heard it rain this hard.  We are all sitting on the porch with the one light on and the one fan going.  Spencer and Matt are goofing around, Cade and Audrey are in the hammock, and I am on the computer while Malena is reading “Bunnicula” next to me.  We cannot even talk to one another, because it is raining that hard and loud!  Very cool.

 

So, back to day two.  The day started early.  It ends early here too.  For example, we have already had a full day, it is pitch black, we have eaten dinner...and the time?  5:38.  Seriously.  The children are begging to go to bed by 7:30.  We are all up by 6/6:30am.  And yesterday was no different.

 

The day was planned to meet William the house caretaker at 9 am for a hike to the waterfall.  It wasn’t that hard of a hike, nor was it that far of a hike, but we would have never been able to find it on our own.  We were glad to hire him, as we had read great things about his animal spotting abilities.  We did see many amazing creatures. 

The hike was about 2.5 hours, and we enjoyed every moment of it.  Well, most of us did.  Spencer, not being outdoors man, was not too keen on the idea—but, in the end a good time was had by all. 

First, we saw a 3 toed sloth.  That was the ONLY animal I wanted to see while I was here.  Did you know they have a complete ecosystem in their fur??  Truly.  Their fur is so thick and gets so wet here, that they actually grow algae and things live their entire life in that dense mass of fur.  They even have a moth (that also lives on their fur) named a “sloth moth”—say that three times fast!  So, that was the number one animal I wanted to see that I actually thought I had a chance of seeing.  Here is where I should note William did actually find us a three toed sloth, but Eco-girl Audrey actually found us a BETTER three toed sloth right on the main road.  It was AWESOME!!  He was so close, and that is where you see the really good picts of a 3toed sloth.  The other ones don’t look anything like a 3 toed, but they are at the beginning of our walk. 

Regardless, we had a great walk, and saw many amazing creatures, including a poison dart frog, and a non-poison dart frog (the green and black one) lizards, morph butterflies, huge spiders, and an agoti, which was too far away for a good photo.  But, we SAW it…

After the hike, when we got to the waterfall, which was very beautiful, but to the kids, the best part was the fact that there was a ‘swimming hole’ right under the waterfall.  At the base of the waterfall it was deep enough for us all to jump in.  Very cool, and a lot of fun.  I mean truly, swimming in the rainforest under a waterfall.  Does it get any better?

On our way home was where eco girl discovered the 3 toed on the main road.  William was also helpful in pointing out various fruits on the ground we could eat.  There was a HUGE melon type of deal that Audrey, Matt, Malena, Cade and I all ate.  Spencer decided it was best not to eat fruit that had fallen off trees on the side of the road.  He said he would be sure to tell the story of our rainforest adventure when we were all dead from food poisoning.  :)  Good ole’ Spence.  Our favorite fruit on the road was what we deemed ‘sweet tart fruit’  which looked like little yellow tiny pears, but tasted like fruit tarts.  We ate a lot of those.

Once we were home, and not dead, we had lunch and then headed to the beach.  It was low tide again, so the kids enjoyed a good bit of exploration to the right of our house.  The beach here sort of goes in and out like a clover, so we walked over to the next ‘clover’ and found some cool rocks to climb on and some awesome tidal pools to explore.  The kids enjoyed a good amount of time riding the waves.  It is really nice to be in the water here, as there are no rip currents to worry about...however, there are a lot of rocks...BIG rocks, that the waves push in—and, without warning you can get ‘stoned’ like in bible times.  But, there are areas where it is perfectly smooth, or the beach isn’t sandy at all, just like a big solid rock going straight out into the ocean.  The beach sort of reminds me of Nova Scotia.  It is very rocky, and there are NO shells.  Well, there may be shells someplace, but they are inhabited by the thousands of hermit crabs. 

After spending the day on the beach we came home and grilled a chicken.  During dinner Kirk the owner of the house came by and introduced himself.  After we cleaned up from dinner, we went for a walk. 

Darkness comes quickly here.  VERY quickly!!  We enjoyed a walk after dinner down the ‘main’ road, but before we knew it, it was pitch dark!  We continued to walk, and made our way home with flashlights. 

Still interested in a little exploration, we went out to the beach.  There, we saw the famous

Halloween crabs—and about a million other crabs, we even found some eggs, which looked like turtle eggs to me, they were oval and ‘soft’—but I cannot be sure. 

Soon we were back at the hut, and the kids were playing another game of UNO before bed.  Like I said before, bed comes early here, and by 8pm they were ALL in bed, and half were asleep! 

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