Rebekah and the Motorbike

So today I had my first ride on a motorbike...and I was scared silly. Many Ticos (that's what the Costa Ricans call themselves) ride motorbikes or scooters around on the hills here; they're a lot easier to manuever on these bumpy roads, I imagine. I hadn't planned on taking a motorbike ride, in fact, I feel pretty certain that they are accidents waiting to happen. The roads are beyond bumpy- they are uneven, they are filled with huge mud filled holes, and they are all UPHILL. And I have yet to see a person wear a helmet. The elementary school teacher in me cringes everytime I see a person go flying by on his/her motorbike, hair flapping in the breeze.
But...today was an expection. There is safety, and there is courtesy. Today was an issue of courtesy. One of the workers on our house was riding by on his bike when I was walking to the store in Monteverde. On the way down, he offered me a ride and I politely declined. He smiled and went on his way. On the way back home, however, (when the road is uphill the whole way AND it had started to rain AND I was lugging a heavy bag of groceries) he passed me once again and offered once again. He waited and smiled and gestured to my bag as if to say, "Come on. You don't want to carry that ALL the way back up the hill?" Plus, I knew he was going back to my house anyway...and it felt very rude to turn down his offer again... and so I got on. He asked me if I spoke Spanish and I told him that I did (but just a little). So he explained that I needed to put my feet on these little bars. I put my feet on and then hesistated over where to put my arms. Certainly it was evident that I needed to hang on to him. If I didn't hang on to him, I would surely fall while zipping along. But the question was...where do I hold him? Around the waist? Is that strange? And what about my groceries? I couldn't hold me arm around his waist AND hold the groceries somehow. Do I put the groceries in this lap? On the front of the bike? I don't have enough Spanish to sort all of that out.
So I opted for an awkward sort of shoulder grip with my groceries balanced very precariously on my knee. I was certain that either i was falling off that thing or my groceries were. Every bump in the road, I held my breath, imagining the impact of dirt and rock on my face. He kept looking at me in the mirror by the handbars and laughing as I squealed in terror. He told me, "No tenga miedo!!" (Don't be afraid!) and smiled. We bumped along at a relatively slow pace, actually, but still it was scary.
But! We made it home unscathed. After getting off the bike, it seemed appropriate to ask his name, as we had recently been in such close contact. His name is Tonio. And he was very nice to give me a ride home.
I also had two conversation entirely in Spanish today. One at the grocery store with the man who works there, asking him if what I was holding was indeed an orange ( I was uncertain because it was green). I also talked to the secretary at my school a bit and she introduced me to the school's fix-it guy who also fixes stuff at teacher's houses. At least I think that's what she said.

The goats on the farm

These are the goats owned and milked by Benito. He is the son of the owners of the farm we live on, the Guindon farm. We pass these goats on our way to the main road when walking down from our house.

Rain and Fog

At the moment it is raining and there is fog sweeping in blanketing everything...I can barely see out the window; it's like pea soup out there.
It is Sunday and it is quiet here (other than the sound of the ting-ting and thump-thump of rain on the metal roof). The workers who are working on our house are off for the day. They have been here every day working on a shed out back that the owners are building to store firewood. They are also planning on finishing the bottom floor and making a second guest room down there, as well as a balcony.
Now the rain is torrential, coming down all around and pounding above.
The hummingbirds who usually visit the hummingbird feeder at all hours have flitted away somewhere to hide from the downpour.
Yesterday Michael and I were caught outside in our first serious downpour. We were walking home from Jonathon and Heather's house (two new teachers just arrived two days ago and live down the hill from us) and the rain started. We hiked about thirty minutes while the rain pounded down. We sloshed along in our boots and rain jackets through the mud and survived...but came home completly soaked through. It was hard to see where we were walking because both Michael and my glasses were covered in rain, so we stumbled a bit blindly, particularly through the last part of the walk through the woods.
Luckily, we were able to start up our lovely wood stove when we got home and could get warm and dry off. Something cosy about coming inside to a nice fire after being soaked through by relentless rain.
Unfortunatly, today Michael has a cold...perhaps it was the trudging through the rain and mud that did him in?

Our dining room

A path in the cloud forest

One view from our house

A very large fern in the cloud forest

Monkeys!

Yesterday we had quite a stroke of luck... just outside our window, about 50 feet away from our house, a group of capuchin monkeys were gallivanting around on the branches. They are medium-sized monkeys with dark bodies and white fur around their heads and faces. They jumped from one branch to another, showcasing an impressive ability to leap distances. One hestitated on a branch, munched some leaves or fruit, and looked directly at us (we were watching, breathless, with our binoculars). It was a beautiful sight. I said "OH MY GOD!" at least twelve times, if not more. It is somewhat unusual to see monkeys in Monteverde because there are so many people walking the trails in the cloud forest; we think that because our house borders the forest but is isolated from tourists and hikers and such perhaps we will be privy to a greater amount of wildlife.
We visited the Cloud Forest Reserve yesterday (Basque Nuboso Monteverde). Hiked for a while, looked at the impressive epiphytes climbing up the huge trees to the canapy (epiphytes are mosses, succulents, vines and such that grow on trees in the rain forest. They are what help to create that "life upon life" look of the jungle). Saw many plants with gigantic leaves, including some ferns larger than Michael.
We made a fritatta last night for dinner using eggs from the very farm we are living on. (Yes. I did say 'we'. I actually DID help with the cooking! I chopped things! And stirred stuff!) We also enjoyed some nice Argentinian wine from the Mendoza region with dinner.
There were less insects last night because we determined that using less light at night prevents the onslaught. We ate dinner by candlelight as rain thundered down on our metal roof. Lightening flashed high in the clouds and lit up the whole sky in short bursts.
A bit about the weather...right now, at 8:00 a.m, it is sunny and brisk. By noon it will most likely still be sunny, but a little warmer. There is always a cool breeze that blows no matter what time of day. It usually begins to rain around 3 or so...but we had one day in which it barely rained at all. The rain varies between light and heavy; on some days it has poured with thunder and lightening, on others the rain has been just a pleasant sprinkle. So far we are enjoying the rain very much...it keeps everything green and we are nice and cosy in our house with wood stove burning. The rain also keeps away insects from the windows, so that's an added plus. Folks here say the rain will be heavier come Sept, Oct...but thus far we're enjoying the weather quite a lot. The mornings are just perfect with sun and weather that's just cool enough for a little jacket.
Woke up again to the howler monkey howling this morning. We can hear him but can't see him, as is typical of howlers. The lone howler makes his strange growl/grunt and then the rooster crows. They seem to be speaking to each other because they always sound in turn: howler-rooster, howler-rooster, howler-rooster. But what would a howler monkey and a rooster have to say to each other?

This morning

Woke up this morning to the sound of a howler monkey caterwalling from the woods behind our house. Neat.
Last night there was an massive collection of insects on our windows. They were attracted to the light inside our living room and so plastered themselves against the glass. There must have been about a thousand insect blanketing the windows. And some, unfortunatly, made there way inside and we then had something of a bug invasion INSIDE the house as well. That was less fun; we prefer being able to watch them on the windows to having them swooping around our heads...

At our new home

It is 7:00 pm and we are now in our second night in our new house in Monteverde. I just came back upstairs after Michael called me outside to show me a "toad the size of a rabbit." And yes, there was indeed a very large toad out there.
This is not a surprising development. We are living as close as one can get to the jungle without living in the protected rain forest itself. Our new home is in a different ecosystem than the house we were staying in the first two days; here it is tropical cloud forest, jungle-like, with vegetation unlike anything else, with birds unlike anywhere else, with insects that you have to see to believe. The Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve proper is just a few steps away in our backyard.
Our view and the house are unbelievable. In is hard to describe, and my pictures are not uploading onto blogspot, so I will do my best with words. Our house is covered in windows; the house is octagonally shaped with windows on most sides of the octagon. Our bedroom is windows all around. When we wake up, we look out onto the treetops and out to the Gulf. The particular plant life around us is quite varied-- there are banana trees and cecropia trees and bushes and vines and flowers and grasses and aloe plants-- it is, in essence, a sea of vegetation. There is also a hummingbird feeder that is surrounded by hummingbirds at all hours. Behind our house there are hiking paths through the corner of the cloud forest. The paths are skinny and overgrown and teaming with life everywhere.
Then there are the sounds. The sounds! Every moment there are the songs of birds and insects and tree frogs. This morning, we heard the distant howl of the howler monkey. Tonight, the squeek and whistle of frogs with a backdrop of cricket and buzzing moth wing.
We have a wood burning stove in our house that we already love dearly. We've built several fires in it so far to warm the chill at night and in the morning. The house is also a bit damp due to the rain and proximity to the forest, so the fire helps dry the air a bit.
Last night I found a scorpion crawling near the bed. It was a bit hard to fall asleep after that, admittedly.
Our neighbors (who also own this house) are so wonderful. They own the farm we are living in and are two of the original founders of the Quaker community. Our first night, they brought us a cassarole, fresh baked bread, homemade jam and granola, and a container of goats milk (milked from the goats on this very farm).

From Monteverde

So...we are here at last. We arrived on Monday, so happy to finally be in the place we have dreamed of for so many months. Odilio picks us up at the airport and we take the four hour drive to Monteverde. The first part of the ride is along the Pan American Highway, and then, after a few hours, we reach the mountains. The road up the mountain is unpaved and quite bumpy; and the view is spectacular. Everywhere you look, majestic green vistas of rolling hills, verdant with LIFE- teeming plantlife everywhere- and the tumbling clouds blanketing from above. We bump along and can barely speak...we are in awe. After one turn, we suddenly see the sunset- and I cannot help but exclaim WOW at the brillant purple, orange, red dance that is happening above.
We arrive at Gina's house and fall asleep, exhausted.
The next day, we sit up in bed and realize we look directly out over a view of the mountains and the Gulf of Nicoya. It is sunny and breezy and again, we are speechless. How can you begin to speak about the wonder that is Monteverde? How can you begin to say to each other, "We LIVE here. We LIVE in this paradise on earth." Mostly we just look and stare and point.
Yesterday we hiked down from Gina's to have the local coffee at a cafe. The walk is amazing- beautiful views everywhere and a cool breeze tossing your hair about. Trees rising on either side of the road- banana trees and strangler figs and palms and others. Birds whistling from the trees. Every now and then, a burst of color in the form of flowers or butterflies. A blue morpho butterfly sharing its spectacularly vibrant blue.
At the cafe- the best espresso I've ever had in my life. Also journeyed on to Santa Elena, the largest town near here. It is small but has a lot of neccasities such as a grocery store, a place to buy wine, and a bank. It's much busier than up in the hills, where it is peaceful and the only sounds heard are those of birds, insects, and the occasionally barking dog. Down in Santa Elena there is a buzz of activity- taxis, buses, folks on bikes, people about, and more dogs.
For lunch we eat the special cheese they make here in Monteverde. Delicious.
For dinner we eat a tiny hotel near Gina's house where they have the following animals walking in the dining room: a parrot, a rooster, two cats, a dog, a rabbit and two cages containing a tarantula and tree frogs. The folks who own it are expats who we chatted with for a while.
I also visited my new school! It's adorable. It looks like a summer camp. My classroom has big windows all around.
Today we are going to our house! More on that later. And pictures soon!

Our New House

Here is a picture that was just sent to me of our new home...

I will post more once we get there.

We fly out on Monday!