Have you seen heaven on earth? I have! Except it is not called heaven there, it is called Costa Rica :)
Soon after having our second baby, back in May 2012, we found ourselves confined to home and very short trips. It felt like a long time since we took a vacation (even though we took a babymoon to Mexico!) and our next vacation seemed distant. So we found a new pastime..... virtual travel on Jetsetter.com, we literally did a world tour, day dreaming about where we could go next. But when we came across pictures of Costa Rica and a resort in Bajos del Toro in particular, our jaws just dropped to the floor! We had to figure out a way to get there, with the baby of course. We booked our tickets for December and crossed our fingers, hoping it would be a trip we could take with an eight month old. What we did not take into consideration was, how our then 5 year old son would manage all the hiking we had unknowingly signed up for. Needless to say, he surprised us!
Our itinerary included flying into San Jose and driving to Arenal for a two day stay. From Arenal we would drive to Bajos del Toro where we stayed for four days and then would go to Manuel Antonio National Park for a day before heading back to San Jose for our return flight.
Having visited Cancun, Mexico the year before, I was hoping to see similar azure blue waters from the aircraft. Since we were flying into an inland city nothing of that sort happened and I was mildly disappointed, wondering if this place was indeed as beautiful as the pictures had promised to be. I couldn't have been more wrong, thankfully!
We hired a taxi from the airport and drove to La Fortuna. It was a 90km drive and took us approximately 5 hours to get there. The drive leading us up to our destination was scenic and filled with lush greenery. I have to remind here that we were getting out of the NY area in December, so all that warmth and greenery was a huge bonus! The roads were wide and smooth for the most part until we got closer to the volcano where it was a single lane mud road.
Arenal is one of seven historically active Costa Rican volcanoes, very active until 2010 and one of the ten most active volcanoes in the world. It is located at the center of Arenal Volcano National Park, in La Fortuna district and is an important watershed for the Arenal Lake Reservoir. It is a young volcano and its age is estimated to be less than 7500 years. In 1968 it erupted unexpectedly and destroyed the small town of Tabacon. Since Oct 2010, volcanic activity appears to have decreased and explosions have become rare ~ wiki
We stayed at Arenal Observatory Lodge which is situated at the base of the volcano and quite liked the place. We were greeted by Howler monkeys and our room had the most amazing view of the volcano. The peak of the volcano was covered in clouds while we were staying there but the weather was perfect and the pace at the lodge was calm and peaceful. The next morning we took a hike to Catarata Waterfalls.
We put our younger son Nihaar in the baby backpack and he seemed to have a fun hike perched up there, pulling leaves and twigs along the way.
It was a short hike and the waterfalls turned out to be decent. The baby backpack was a blessing and our little one was also taking short naps in there.
We returned to the lodge observatory where a breakfast buffet was set out for us. There was a huge group of professional photographers with all their equipment in place trying to capture the beautiful birds that came to feed on the watermelon set out for them.
I found this video on Youtube and thought it would be a nice addition to get a better understanding of the Hanging Bridges.
Overall it was a fun trip to La Fortuna and we were gearing ourselves for the next leg of our trip...... Bajos Del Toro where El Silencio was located. This got us excited as this was the reason we were in Costa Rica and couldn't wait to explore the Cloud forest.
So stay tuned for Part Two of our vacation with beautiful pictures of the resort and property and a detailed report of all the activities we did there.
Soon after having our second baby, back in May 2012, we found ourselves confined to home and very short trips. It felt like a long time since we took a vacation (even though we took a babymoon to Mexico!) and our next vacation seemed distant. So we found a new pastime..... virtual travel on Jetsetter.com, we literally did a world tour, day dreaming about where we could go next. But when we came across pictures of Costa Rica and a resort in Bajos del Toro in particular, our jaws just dropped to the floor! We had to figure out a way to get there, with the baby of course. We booked our tickets for December and crossed our fingers, hoping it would be a trip we could take with an eight month old. What we did not take into consideration was, how our then 5 year old son would manage all the hiking we had unknowingly signed up for. Needless to say, he surprised us!
Our itinerary included flying into San Jose and driving to Arenal for a two day stay. From Arenal we would drive to Bajos del Toro where we stayed for four days and then would go to Manuel Antonio National Park for a day before heading back to San Jose for our return flight.
Having visited Cancun, Mexico the year before, I was hoping to see similar azure blue waters from the aircraft. Since we were flying into an inland city nothing of that sort happened and I was mildly disappointed, wondering if this place was indeed as beautiful as the pictures had promised to be. I couldn't have been more wrong, thankfully!
We hired a taxi from the airport and drove to La Fortuna. It was a 90km drive and took us approximately 5 hours to get there. The drive leading us up to our destination was scenic and filled with lush greenery. I have to remind here that we were getting out of the NY area in December, so all that warmth and greenery was a huge bonus! The roads were wide and smooth for the most part until we got closer to the volcano where it was a single lane mud road.
Arenal is one of seven historically active Costa Rican volcanoes, very active until 2010 and one of the ten most active volcanoes in the world. It is located at the center of Arenal Volcano National Park, in La Fortuna district and is an important watershed for the Arenal Lake Reservoir. It is a young volcano and its age is estimated to be less than 7500 years. In 1968 it erupted unexpectedly and destroyed the small town of Tabacon. Since Oct 2010, volcanic activity appears to have decreased and explosions have become rare ~ wiki
We stayed at Arenal Observatory Lodge which is situated at the base of the volcano and quite liked the place. We were greeted by Howler monkeys and our room had the most amazing view of the volcano. The peak of the volcano was covered in clouds while we were staying there but the weather was perfect and the pace at the lodge was calm and peaceful. The next morning we took a hike to Catarata Waterfalls.
We put our younger son Nihaar in the baby backpack and he seemed to have a fun hike perched up there, pulling leaves and twigs along the way.
It was a short hike and the waterfalls turned out to be decent. The baby backpack was a blessing and our little one was also taking short naps in there.
We returned to the lodge observatory where a breakfast buffet was set out for us. There was a huge group of professional photographers with all their equipment in place trying to capture the beautiful birds that came to feed on the watermelon set out for them.
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The observatory had the best views of the volcano and the Arenal Lake Reservoir.
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Next we headed out to The Hanging Bridges of Arenal. There are 8 bridges in total and offer spectacular views of the rainforest and often wildlife sightings. Sriman my older son was getting tired every now and then but kept at it and we managed to cover all of the bridges in less than 2 hours.
I found this video on Youtube and thought it would be a nice addition to get a better understanding of the Hanging Bridges.
Overall it was a fun trip to La Fortuna and we were gearing ourselves for the next leg of our trip...... Bajos Del Toro where El Silencio was located. This got us excited as this was the reason we were in Costa Rica and couldn't wait to explore the Cloud forest.
So stay tuned for Part Two of our vacation with beautiful pictures of the resort and property and a detailed report of all the activities we did there.
Also read:
Part Two and Part Three of our travelogue to Costa Rica.
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