Saturday, November 28th - Puntarenas, Costa Rica

Usual coffee meeting started around 5:30 am with breakfast as soon as the cafe was open.

We arrived at Puntarenas at 8:00 AM, we all disembarked shortly thereafter as we had a guided tour of the area booked with (are you ready for this?) "Ricky Ricardo Tours" and evidently we had "Ricky" himself as our tour guide.


The tour bus was fairly new and was in good shape, they had water or beer for our pleasure - no extra charge.






We started off with a stop at an area where small monkeys hang out in their natural habitat.  They actually come when called, but they do know that there is food available (bananas) when they come.  They jumped and swung around the branches during our visit.  Once their curiosity and appetite wore off they went back into the jungle.





We were pretty impressed with the tour guide, as our next stop was at a tourist store which had clean washrooms (very important) and free WiFi (an item that is becoming more important these days).  The store had the usual "local" items including a gentleman artist - good work, very colourful but we did not buy anything.









We were then taken to a small property (it really looked like someone's private home) where we were introduced to many medicinal and edible plants that are native to Costa Rica.  This was not as hokey as it sounds, both "Ricky" and the property owner were extremely knowledgeable and we saw and tasted many different plants.








Our next stop was an area where one could view Macaws (parrots) in their natural habitat.  They were very difficult to see due to the thick tree collage but we managed to get one picture.  Very pretty birds.










Our tour then took us to our next adventure, a ride on one of the local rivers to look for crocodiles!  We boarded our boat and off we went.  The river itself was very muddy from all of the silt it picks up along its meandering route.  It was an interesting boat ride where we saw a couple of crocs sunning themselves on the river banks.   About halfway we saw a very unusual site, it was a horse standing near the bank, our guide believed it had gotten too close to the bank, slipped and fallen in.  The horse did not look stressed out as it was just standing there very quietly. "Ricky" called one of the local farmers to advise him, the horse would have to be removed fairly quickly or it would be soon crocodile food!

We continued along the river for another mile or so and pulled up to the bank close to one very large crocodile.  Our boat driver then got out (he would be about 20 years old - our boat driver, not the croc) and started to feed this monster of an animal (he was probably about 20 feet long and looked to be very well fed).  The banks of the river are very wet and slippery, one false step and we would be looking for a new boat captain.  Not me thank you!!

Following the feeding we headed back down river, past the horse who had not moved and up some small tributaries of the river to look for crocs and view the local flora and fauna.  One of the things that we noticed about this river were the layers of dirt that you could see in the riverbank itself.  These layers included some garbage (plastic bottles, cans ,papers etc.) which was disappointing to see.  The garbage layers were about two feet below the surface, so it is hard to say whether the garbage had been placed there or if it had been carried down from elsewhere by the river waters during the flooding season.  It was time to return to the boat dock.


We were all getting kind of hungry by this time so "Ricky" took us for lunch (included in the price of the tour) at a good size open air restaurant.  I was a little concerned about the insects in this tropical climate and an open air restaurant but that was not an issue at all - no bugs at all!!








Following a very nice lunch of sea bass with rice we started heading back to the ship.  During our return drive we stopped a souvenir shop and a farmers market.  Both were not your typical "tourist traps" and had some very nice items.  We were very impressed with the different areas we visited.  They were not grungy or dirty and there were no vendors or children getting in your face trying to sell you stuff or begging for money!






We were dropped off just outside an outdoor market and made our way back to the ship looking at all the vendors wares.  There were hundred of vendors and we were told that the reason for all the vendors was that Puntarenas was having a celebration and an air show the next day at the waterfront....and we thought it was just for us :).

We changed for dinner (smart casual - meaning shorts and sandals...yea!!).  Following dinner we went to the evening show which was a magician.  His tricks were OK but he needed to work on his stage presence.  We had a great day!!