After we left the arenal volcano area, which is also part of the rainforest, we headed farther north to Monteverde, which is in the cloud forest:
We got there that afternoon & finally met up with another family who would be joining us for the rest of the trip. After we got settled in, we met up for happy hour & dinner:
Their welcome drink was AMAZING! And I am not a big drinker, in fact, I hardly drink anything but water, so that is saying something! They are a small eco-friendly resort with only 24 cabins & 1 small restaurant. We ate dinner there that night & I thought their food was great! They are also super gluten friendly, in fact, they are kind of known for it so they surprised me with gf bread:
I even ended the night with a gf chocolate mousse:
All of the cabins are spread out so you can walk the property through various trails:
We had a nice porch & lots of big windows so it felt like we were staying in nature:
It technically was a 1 bedroom so Bryan & I had that while they converted the couch & rolled in a twin bed for the girls. The views were awesome & it was so quiet, we could literally see & hear all of the animals while we were there! There wasn't as much pretty foliage there, but it was very green & they had banana plants & coffee plants everywhere:
We woke up our first morning ready to go so we headed out to Selvatura Park for a Canopy Tour! We did 13 zip lines, a tarzan swing & 8 hanging bridges. We started with the zip lines first & we loved it!
Thankfully we had done this before in Hawaii, so Sophie wasn't scared. In fact, out of all 8 of us, she wanted to go first! They recommended we leave all of our valuables behind in a locker so we wouldn't lose anything so we bought the pictures again, which was nice so we didn't have to mess with it:
Of course I took a few with our friends while we were out there:
They had a few tandem zips where we took turns zipping with each other. This one in particular that Bryan & Sadie are on is the longest - it is 1 km:
We ended with the tarzan swing & at first, I thought they were crazy. You are still harnessed, but you jump off of a platform (basically like you are bungee jumping) but the harness swings you forward. I thought for sure Sophie would chicken out but she walked right up there & went first! I could not believe it! Let's just say I was really hesitating, but how could I not do it after the other 4 children did?! I have some awesome videos of all of us doing this but here are a few action shots of Bryan & I swinging:
Seriously, it was so pretty out there! We had fun doing this in Hawaii, but gliding through the middle of the rain/cloud forest in the middle of nowhere surrounded by rivers & waterfalls? Truly amazing! After we met up to return our gear, we stopped for snacks & drinks - I went with the fresh watermelon juice:
So refreshing! Next up, we did a self guided tour of the hanging bridges with a lot of hiking:
I did not take many pictures because the kids were practically running the trails so we were so far behind them & I didn't exactly enjoy this part as much as I could have. Plus, I think everyone was tired after ziplining all morning. Eventually we caught up with the kids - they were sitting on a random bench waiting for us:
We headed back to our resort later that afternoon & were welcomed home by the coatie:
Literally, there were at least 30 of them!
Then it started raining so they all scattered. It literally rained every single day we were on vacation, especially here since we were in the cloud forest. We knew it would rain a lot because this is their rainy season but that is why everything is so green there! And we were prepared & had brought rain jackets & ponchos, which were put to good use while we were there. The sun sets before 6:00 every day & for some reason, most of the rain would start every afternoon/evening so the girls would tell you this part of the trip was boring. We got up earlier in the morning for our excursions, came home in the afternoon & then had nothing to do at night because there was not a pool or tv's here. Ha! We had to entertain ourselves with nature. It made it easier that we were with friends so we met them for happy hour, played games & then headed to dinner. This night we went into town & ate here:
which I had to document because at the end of the trip when we all talked about our favorites, this night came up several times. It was one of our best & cheapest meals of the entire trip! We may have been that loud, annoying table full of Americans who didn't speak much Spanish, but we sure had a good time!
In case you are wondering, it was an eclectic menu but I had the gf pasta & was delicious:
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