Ali was leaving Friday, and kiddo and I were headed to the jungle of Pico Bonito. After our fabulous fast food dinner, we went to our rooms to pack and sleep. I was reading in bed, and shortly after midnight, I felt an earthquake. I’ve been in several earthquakes before, so I had no doubt what was happening. After a few minutes, it popped up online.
Needless to say, I had another restless night. There were half a dozen aftershocks, and while I didn’t realize that was what woke me at the time, my awake times aligned with the aftershock times. I’m very grateful it was not a major earthquake, because while I don’t typically feel in peril here, disaster response definitely feels outside the scope of what I want to experience! Thankfully, this wasn’t too severe and there didn’t appear to be any major damage.
We got picked up at 9:20 for our drive to Pico Bonito. Our taxi literally had a bungee cord holding the trunk closed. There were no seatbelts, the seat in front of me lost all of its bolts and sat on blocks of wood, and there was a notable draft on my backside. Anna-Sophia and I debated the likelihood of making it there in one piece. 🙂
By some miracle, we skidded our way in to La Ceiba (fast braking + bald tires = a whole lot of fishtailing) where we switched to another car for the final half hour up into the jungle. Our lodge, the Omega Eco Lodge, is like out of a picture book. After a small lunch, we walked around a bit and took a short hike.
It was kind of rainy and damp, so we put our feet in the pool with some fish (free pedicure!), enjoyed the hammocks, and debated what to do on Saturday.
By 8:30, I couldn’t keep my eyes open so we climbed into bed. I was asleep in about 3 minutes and I slept like a baby with the sounds of the insects and babbling water.
Nervous as I was about it, we had signed up for white-water rafting on the Rio Cangrejal in the morning so after breakfast, we got fitted with life jackets and we-mean-business-helmets before walking down to the river. We had a serious safety briefing, then got in the river and practiced what we learned (forward, backstroke, get down, get up, and how to gracefully respond if you fall out or we tip). Then we were off!
We started with a lazy river, then move into class I, II, and eventually III rapids. It’s definitely ominous when you can hear the rapids but can’t see them, but we navigated it all successfully and had a total blast!
Vacation Days 