Manuel Antonio and Uvita

The 3 of us left Mal Pais/Santa Teresa on March 7 and headed to Manuel Antonio. We hadn't heard from Rick and Katie so we decided to head south anyways and stop to visit a National Park for a day. It was a bus ride, a taxi, and bus ride and another taxi ride and we got to the town of Manuel Antonio about 8 hours later.

We found a cheap, crappy hotel by the beach which cost the same amount as the luxurious place we stayed in Santa Teresa. The bed frame had no supports and we thought we were going to fall through to the floor. Manuel Antonio was really charming, very small and touristy but a place where gringos and ticos vacation together. The National Park is one of the few habitats for squirrel monkeys, which are very endagered. They are the one type of monkey living in Central America that we haven't seen yet. There was a little break where we could surf at the beach in front of our hotel. We had one day to spend in the park which was a monday and wouldn't you know that the park is closed on mondays. Defeated, we went for a surf and tried to find squirrel monkeys at the restaurant near the park at dinner. Still no luck. We did see a lot of white faced Capuchins, Ian gave them a lighter to see if they would burn down the forest but they dropped it when they figured out the couldn't eat it. We left for Uvita on March 9 sad that we didn't get to see the elusive monkeys.

We had heard from Rick and Katie that they were staying at the Flutterby hostel by the beach in Uvita. We left early and got there by 9am and surprised them. We pitched our tents and have been camping there for the last week. The Flutterby is an awesome place, very remote and protected, a big fence runs around the place. There's a communal kitchen and nice bathrooms and showers. It's a pretty new place owned by an american girl around our age. It's so safe that someone left their camera in the kitchen for a few days and was there when they went back for it (it wasn't us though, our camera is very closely guarded).

Since there was 5 of us we decided to go in on a rental car as the breaks and town are very spread out. We got a Suzuki Grand Vitara and have been bombing around on the dirt roads. We went on surf adventures everyday and took a trip to some waterfalls that had a natural waterslide down the falls that spit you out at the end. There was a ropeswing too ( I didn't got on that one). We went on a few night walks and Ian caught a baby snake the other night and lots of cool bugs and even tried to sneak up on a caymen. Rick and Katie left yesterday and since the closest major bus depot was up by Manuel Antonio, we decided to drive them up there and make it in to the park. Our friend, Taylor, was supposed to be in Manuel Antonio and we were hoping to meet up with him but never got a hold of him.

The park was awesome. We saw 3 3-toed sloths, and lots of cool birds and bugs. Ian caught a yellow-bellied racer (1 meter long snake) in front of a bunch of tourists and showed up all the tour guides. The beaches in the park were beautiful but crowded so we did a little swimming. Back in the town of Manuel Antonio, we had some drinks at a nice restaurent then headed back to Uvita. My surfboard has been wounded for the last few days and Ian has repaired it today after it finally dried out. I hope to get back into the water this evening.

We took the rental car back today but we are getting another one tomorrow for our trip further south to the Peninsula de Osa. We're renting a smaller car as there's only 3 of us now. We head out on the road tomorrow and will probably spend a week and a half there before saying goodbye to Tim and heading into Panama.