I believe I mentioned in my last blog that after we finished the basketball camp 3 fellow Peace Corps volunteers and myself decided to take an adventure into the wild…
The adventure was composed of Daniel Buffington (a volunteer from Seattle Washington who despite studying at U Dub is has become a great friend of mine down here) Kyle Grieffe (A tall lengthy volunteer who hails from Denver Colorado) and Angelo Concocalis (who is from North Carolina) and myself. Dan, Kyle and myself lived in the same training community in San Jose for three months with another female volunteer and became very close throughout training only to be Separated as far as possible by the PeaceCorps with our assignments. Lope (Penelope Kim) lives on the Nicoya Peninsula in Guanacaste, Kyle lives almost in Nicaragua in San Carlos, Daniel lives on the Bri-Bri indigenous reserve in Talamaca on the Carribiean side, and of coarse I live here in San Luis of Perez Zeledon in the Southwest part of Costa Rica. Despite being from the Peace Corps group a year after us Angelo fit in good with us on our trip.
This backpack trip had been talked about since training almost 2 years ago, for those who don’t know Corcovado National Park is Costa Rica’s most remote and biologically rich region. It’s the largest remaining patch of virgin lowland rainforest in Central America, and takes up most of the Osa Penisula. Jaguars, Crocodiles, Scarlet Macaws, Tapirs, Wild Bores and all 4 of Costa Rica’s Monkeys call this place home. I’ve even heard that is could be the most biologically diverse place in the world. So needless to say it was on my to do list.
The difficult thing about Corcovado is its remoteness. It’s only accessible by feet, boat, or plane. Wanting to get the most out of the experience and doing on a PeaceCorps budget we had decided that hiking would be the only way to fully see all that it has to offer; and that was a great choice.
After staying with Morgan and Jerred Clouse a married couple of volunteers who put on the Basketball camp in San Isidro on Saturday January 22 we took a 5 hour bus ride to La Palma a town just outside Puerto Jimenez and that is where the journey began. A volunteer named Laura Trinkle lives in La Palma and although never having done the journey she was a great help with putting us in contact with a hostel and driver that we would need the next morning. Sunday morning we started off at 4:30am in the back of a 4x4 truck we needed to get to Los Patos ranger station. After an hour and half and a dozen river crossings with the truck we made it to the ranger station to check in and start our 20-kilometer hike to La Sirena Ranger Station.
Being somewhat concerned about the heat of the lowland jungle, we had been hydrating ourselves since the night before and on the way to the ranger station in the truck. The ranger station was the last place to fill up water until we reach La Sirena. I filled up my 32 ounce Nalinge bottle I had already drank that morning and still had a 42 ounce bottle of water I bought at a grocery store the previous day (by the time I reached La Sirena both would be drunk).
The rangers informed us that we should stay on the trail because they would be very reluctant to come rescue lost tourists and warned us about a recent Jaguar sighting and snakes we should watch out for. The hike started off exactly how we were told a mile and half of steep uphill hiking but with the added distraction of mud. It had rained hard a day and a half before and being a thick jungle the sun doesn’t enter to dry the land out, within an hour we were covered in mud, slip sliding all over the place. One nice thing about this hike was that the sun didn’t hit us directly, which made Kyle’s super duty sunscreen irrelevant but kept the temperature tolerable. As we walked through the jungle we took in the beauty and the size of native hardwood trees, Scarlet Macaws, spider, white-faced and howler monkeys were also seen. At numerous spots we saw tracks in the mud of varies animals including the wild bores. At one point I saw something fall from the trees and next thing I know some monkey shit lands two feet away from me… I guess white-faced monkeys have a habit of throwing feces at people and one almost got me. The hike was great but our packs were heavy and we were very happy when we finally got to our destination after 8 hours of hiking.
La Sirena is a Ranger Station/research facility and was a lot nicer than we imagined. After hiking 20K in the shade we finally saw sunlight and freshly mowed grass. The station came to view and as we looked down to the right there was a long strip of grass that leads to the beach and doubles as a landing strip. I had just gotten my pack off to enjoy the view when Angelo says “lawn match” and tries to tackle me. Quickly he regreted this decision saying he forgot that I wrestled and that I was really sweaty and smelly (which was very true). There were a probably 25 people at the station most lounging around reading or hiking the trails looking for wildlife. Most were European, a few Canadians and a handful of Americans and Ticos. We realized we were by far the least equipped and youngest group being one of the only groups without a guide or the nicest equipment REI can buy. (We all hiked in shitty tennis shoes)
After re-hydrating and checking in with the park rangers we decided to go check out the beach. Miles of untouched beaches surround the park and at sunset the view was worthwhile. We got back to the station where there was a deck with a roof that people can camp on. Knowing that in advance I choose to hike in my Peace Corps issued mosquito net instead of a heavier tent. We set up the nets and then enjoyed our dinner of cold bean and corn burritos with fresh avocado and salsa I packed in. The food hit the spot and we ended the night with a game of hearts accompanied by my travel size friend of Ron Cortez (cheap Panamanian Rum).
We woke up the next day to howler monkeys in the neighboring trees and spent the day checking out the abundant hiking trails around Sirena. Tortillas with bananas and peanut butter made for a nice change from our cold burrito diet. In the afternoon we checked out a local river at high tide and got a glimpse of bull sharks feeding on fish at the mouth of the river. It was somewhat an unsettling thought knowing that the next morning we would have to cross the same river… Dan and I headed back early and got lucky to walk upon a Tapir resting in the grass. It was another checkmark to add to the wildlife seen.
In order to get to La Leona Ranger station there is a river crossing about a half hour after leaving Sirena. After checking the tide chart we thought it would be wise to get there at 8am in order to successfully cross the river without danger of sharks or getting swept out to sea. We got there a little early and I volunteered to check the depth, I took off my pack and walked into the river at the mouth of the ocean. Immediately I was swimming over my head, getting drug out to sea. We then thought it would be smart to wait for the tide to go out a little more. After waiting and trying numerous times more, we started to get frustrated. Dan who is very accustomed to crossing rivers on the indigenous reserve made it across the river swimming and would have been difficult with his pack. After over an hour of waiting and watching the water slowly drop, Angelo who had the smallest pack got tired of waiting and went for it. He made it across mildly getting his bag wet. I double bagged my camera and followed suit. Shortly later Dan and Kyle were across as well and we could continue our journey.
The hike from La Sirena to La Leona/Carate is quite different from the hike in from Los Patos. This part was longer at 24-kilometers and despite being hotter it was actually an easier hike. Instead of the lush rainforest that we hiked in on, the hike out when along the peninsula and for the most part hugged the beach, so it was much flatter. Its difficult for me to say which part I enjoyed the best, they were up there with a couple of the hikes I have done in the Grand Canyon with beauty or even better. The views were spectacular. At one point we were hiking on a sandy trail just inland from the beach and I saw a paw print. I pointed it out to my friends and we all were in agreement that it looked like a big cat print. Sure enough about a half-hour later we caught up to a guide with to hikers asking us if we saw the 2 pumas on the trail. This grayish cat is almost impossible to catch a sighting. A male and female puma crossed their path and the male one even stopped, stretched, and starred at the hikers. They said their excitement turned to fear quickly and were happy when he decided to leave on his own. I asked the guide how long it had been since he had seen a puma in the forest. He said over 2 years. These two hikers from New York City were very lucky; unfortunately we were not. We were able to see 3 types of monkeys, dozens of types of birds, wild pigs, Tapirs, Pizotes, ant-eaters, wild central American turkeys, and even fins of bull sharks; It was by far the most wild animals I have ever seen in my life on one trip.
We hike for 7 hours to get to Carate where we got lucky and a garbage truck was leaving for Puerto Jimenez. We were hiking in the same dirty smelly clothes that we had hiked in with, so the garbage truck seemed perfect instead of waiting two hours for a slower collection truck. The ride took an hour off of the time to get to Puerto where we immediately caught a bus back to the Palma. Now it was afternoon everybody had just gotten off work and the bus was hot, and crowded; we were the only gringos and from the reactions around us, I think we smelled pretty bad. The first thing we did back in La Palma was get a couple of cold victory beers and then went back to the hostel to shower. It was a good end to a great trip that I will not soon forget.
