School´s out for the summer

My three weeks of school here in Costa Rica have officially come to an end.

Now it´s time to play.

Here´s a map of Costa Rica, in order to help you visualize the proposed itinerary for the next leg of my trip:

The town I´ve been living in for the past three weeks is marked by the red star. (Eco Praderas is a farm that´s apparently for sale in Coronado. I ganked this map from some realtor´s website.)

If you´ll direct your attention to the northeast portion of the map, you´ll find the town of Tortuguero. Tortuguero is the location of the national park I visited--and blogged about-- during my first weekend in Costa Rica. If you´ll look just west of the red star you´ll notice Alajuela. Alajuela is the location of both the Volcano, and the coffee plantation I visited--and subsequently blogged about--during my second weekend here.

The different regions of Costa Rica have many unique experiences to offer. In the remainder of my time here, I´d like to see as much as I can.

Here´s the plan:

On Sunday morning, I´ll head into San Jose bright and early and catch a bus to the town of La Fortuna, located to the northwest of San Jose on the map. La Fortuna is the gateway to Arenal--the most active volcano in the country--and on the clear nights in La Fortuna you can see lava spewing from the peak. There´s a six-hour hike in La Fortuna--beginning at a waterfall, and ending at the peak of an extinct volcano--which I´d like to tackle. It´s also supposed to be a pretty cool little town just for "hanging out." So that´s where I´ll spend Sunday and Monday night.

Early Tuesday morning it´s off to Monteverde, located just southwest of La Fortuna on the map. Home to a biological cloud forest reserve, Monteverde can only be described as an ecotourist´s wet dream. After checking into my lodging on Tuesday, I´ll see if I can take a guided hike through the forest to catch a glimpse of some wildlife. Monteverde is also home to the country´s best canopy tours (think ziplining from tree to tree, amidst a rainforest, a hundred feet above the ground, with monkeys.) That´s what I´ll do on Wednesday.

After a hearty night´s sleep, I´ll make a b-line for the famed beach town of Tamarindo, located on the northeast Pacific Coast, in Costa Rica´s Guanacaste region. I´ll spend the remainder of my Thursday on the beach, and on Friday I´ll surf.

For the first time.

My host father is twisting my arm to use his house as a central command post during the remainder of my travels in Costa Rica. So, in an effort to please the masses, I´ll return to San Jose on either Friday night or Saturday morning, where I´ll regroup, as well as collect all of the extra luggage which Kristian has demanded I leave at his house during my first week of solo travel.

Back at the lair, I´ll rest up for a night before heading off on the next leg of my trip.

Oh, what a brutal week it shall be.