Manuel Antonio

Manuel Antonio

If you ever plan a vacation to Costa Rica, Manuel Antonio should be a top 5 place to visit. The beaches are gorgeous and the rain forest trails can't be beaten. True, it is touristy but if you keep an eye out you can stake out a nice place relax on the beach or escape into the maze of trails in the forest. I did both :)

Leaving at 6 am has its pros and cons. Obviously a con was waking up at 4:45 am to catch your bus. One of the pros was we had the whole day ahead of us to explore. The bus took us into the town Quepos, and from there we had to ride another bus to Manuel Antonio. Cultural realization: most of the people on the bus were tourists, but there were also a handful of kids going home from school. Who would have thought in high school you'd be sharing your school bus with tourists from all over the world? Not me, and not in Arizona, that's for sure.

We checked into Backpackers hostel (same chain as the hostel in Arenal). Being the only male in the group, it was obvious what the trip's first plan was: beach. And wow, what a day that was! It was the hottest day I've experienced in many years. Your skin instantly feels burned when the sun hits it. I must have applied sunscreen to my chest, shoulders and face 5 times over 3 hours' time. Almost everyone else thought one coat would do... I learned the hard way my first weekend here in Puerto Viejo, so this time around, the sunburns caught up with the girls.

We woke up early Saturday morning and ate pancakes for breakfast. The hostel had a public kitchen, so we ate what we made. I got some compliments on mine, and of course, it wasn't the first time I'd ever flapped a jack. We took a bus 6 km from Manuel Antonio to the entrance of the National Park. It cost $10 to enter the park for the day - not a bad deal for what you get out of it. The beaches' names are numbered, and Playa Tres was the hot spot. Indeed it was:

The girls didn't quite feel their sunburns yet on the second day, so of course, it was another day (although not as hot) to the beach, this time inside the National Park. I was determined to do something else with my time, so I went exploring. I climbed over a stretch of rocks that hugged the shore and found a nice place for lunch.

It was pretty much as far out as possible without getting swallowed up by the waves. And, it was not easy getting there. The rocks were sharp and in many places, steep. I counted around 8 species of crabs, too, but was not able to get any good pictures because they scurry away as soon as they see you coming. Anyways, I brought tortillas, beans, and mango juice for lunch. You can buy a squeeze pouch of beans here for like $1.50 and although it looks downright disgusting, it's delicious on flour tortillas (NOT corn, haha).

After lunch, I met up with the group who had moved over to Playa Dos. Animal life can easily be found on the beach; the majority hang out in the shade. I happened to see a scuffle between an iguana and a crab! It was a pretty big crab, like the size of a dinner plate. I even video-taped it but it didn't turn out that great. On the smaller side of things, hundreds of hermit crabs were crawling around on the beach in search of food. This one was no bigger than a fingernail:

After a nice relaxing swim in the ocean and playing a little Frisbee with some other Americans my age, I hit the trails. The first one, Punta Catedral, basically circled the entire peninsula. It's a fairly small peninsula, so it only took an hour or so. I got some great views and pictures, like this one:


My next destination was Puerto Escondido. The hike was not what I expected. When I started out, I heard occasional rustles in the leaves around me, which turned out to be crabs. As I progressed deeper and deeper into the jungle, the number of crabs grew, therefore the rustling grew louder. I was the only one in sight, and when the crabs sensed me coming, they scuttled away from me as fast as their little crab legs could take them. It produced the domino effect, and the entire forest became alive. The sound was so intense it sounded like rain. Or a running river. Gave me goosebumps! At some points, I could easily count 50 crabs ahead of me on the trail. Even better, when the trail changed to only stone steps set into the ground, the crabs had no where to go but down! They catapulted themselves down, step after step in panic, trying to avoid me. I might've seen close to 10,000 crabs on the 3 trails I hiked. And like I said, I did not expect to encounter a crab forest and I'm glad I did.

Quite colorful, aren't they? Anyways, Puerto Escondido turned out to be a small, rocky nook.

The last of my trails was one that ended high up at a lookout called Mirador.

Besides the exact same crab experience on this trail, I saw hummingbirds, a woodpecker, a toucan, raccoons and some kind of hawk that I've yet to identify. The agouti (guatusa in Spanish) is a brown, cat-size rodent that scavenges the forest floor looking for fruits and nuts. I probably saw 12 of these critters.

There were also what I think were ducks in the forest. Their red legs were longer than a typical duck and they had brownish-gray bodies and bright yellow beaks. Ah! Just found it online:

It's called a gray-necked wood rail. Interesting. Anyways, to wrap things up, I'll leave you with a sighting of one of the most popular and quite prevalent Costa Rican creatures, the capuchin!

He was looking for handouts standing on a trash bin. A gang of them was hanging from the tree limbs waiting for the opportune moment to snatch some food.

Until next time!