We arrived too late last night to return the rental car, so that was my task for the morning. Only real trick was we had a shuttle coming to pick us up for today’s tour right when the rental office opens. I took the car over early in the hopes that I could wave at someone and get checked out early. Fortunately, my gamble paid off and someone was in. I got all the papers signed and walked back to the lobby right as our van arrived.
We were heading out to a zoo that had a Sloth Rescue, but it was pretty far up the coast. Our driver was rushing us along since it was a big drive, and as soon as we were loaded, he took off. Instead of taking the main road he went up a back road that was curvy and smaller but had less traffic. I’m assuming our driver used to be a rally driver as speed limits appeared to be optional and he left no car unpassed, even on the narrow roads. We took the highway up the coast, passing the turn towards out property and passing the cafe where we had our Chifrijo lessons. We kept heading north and the resorts got a lot larger and more developed. We are definitely staying on the smaller end of the coast. Once we passed the big resorts we took a turn inland, and headed up yet another unpaved road.
Our driver cared a lot less for the potholes than I did and artfully dodged them ad a good speed. this turned into a hill climb and we could see the valley disappear below us and look across to the other hilly peaks. Everywhere we go Costa Rica is just beautiful. At the top of the hill we could see down into the area where the Zoo was located, and it was part of a really big adventure park. I huge hotel complex was over on the coast nearby, and high overhead there were huge ziplines, looking more like electrical wires than a tourist attraction. We went down into the parking lot, and a open air tour bus came to drive us up to the check-in center. This was a major park. Walking into the visitor center was reminiscent to the opening of Jurassic Park. It was a big Eco tourist destination, and we were just set for the zo for today. But they had ziplines, hiking, a beach, atv rentals and a direct connection to the hotel.
We looked out from the center balcony to a wide view of the hotel and beach. At that point Yulia realized this was the location of a gymnastics event that our partner went to years ago. Small World. Of course, that event was hosted by the guy we purchased the land from that we can’t use, so maybe the world isn’t really that small. Hard to tell.
We took another open bus down the zoo. It was crazy hot, and we spent some extra time in the enclosed exhibits. The sloth feeding time was at 12:30 so we were timing ourselves to make sure we didn’t miss it. The nice part of a zoo like this is the animals you don’t see elsewhere. The Poison frogs were great, as was the Marmoset. We spent extra time in the Butterfly exhibit talking to the caretaker who let Yulia and Sasha hold and release two newly hatched butterflies. We were trying to stay hydrated but really cooking as we walked the exhibits. We made sure to hit the cafe stand and got some iced drinks to cool off right as the sloth feeding started.
The zoo had three sloths, two of them rescues that couldn’t live n the wild after being injured and found. These were all two-toed sloths. Three toed sloths are the ones you see in all the photos are are in a different part of the country. The same caretaker we met at the butterflies was doing the feeding and explained that a new law forbids having mixed sex sloths in one group in captivity. This is to prevent breeding. Their third sloth was born at their zoo before this law, and the father sloth had to be moved to another zoo. What a deadbeat. One of the sloths just wasn’t hungry, bu the other two slowly made their way to the caretaker and slowly held out their hands to ask for food. They are honestly super cute. You can see why they are the logo of every Costa Rican tourist poster. And “Slow Down” sign.
We made sure to see the Toucans on the way out, and they were probably our favorites. The colors of a toucan are really hard to believe until you see it. and they are very curious about watching you as you watch them. And the caretaker immediately made a ‘Toucan Sam” joke so I got to check that off my list. We exited through the gift shop – as is tradition. and took a big bad of stuff back with is including sone of the special salsa used for the Costa Rican beans and rice. I’m excited to cook that later.
Our drive back was just as eventful as the drive out. I should have picked up a Sloth sign for our driver, but we survived so that’s really all that matters. We cleaned up and went out for some fish. There’s no shortage of seafood restaurants on the beach. after eating and walking the beach a bit we were brutally hot and tired. When we got back we sat in the pool for a while to cool off and finally got to see the really amazing sunset. Back in the room, we were getting ready to sit on the porch a bit – when the power stated having issues. AC shut off and half the lights didn’t work. We are connected to the main building, so they knew something was up and were working on it. We just hung out until the power returned and I could reset all the AC units then we were finally done for the day.
Cognitive Dissonance 