Day 3 of boot camp.

Today I climbed a volcano. Rincon de la Vieja, to be exact. Google Earth that shiz and idolize me.

The troops woke up birght and early for a 6:30 breakfast so we could get an early start on our hike. They had laid out a cooler of gallo pinto, a cooler of huevos, and a cooler of--brace yourself--PANQUEQUES!! I freaking love this place. We also had wonderful coffee and pina. Be jealous.

We were on the trail by 7 and had severed all of our weak links (sorry sweet K/Carlas) so that we could pick up the pace. Today's hike was optional after the lagoon craziness and in expectation of an intense rest of the week, and I came pretty close to not going because my blisters were (are) killing me. Then I realized how incredibly lame that would make me so I sucked it up and just dealt with it. Katie awarded me hardcore points--as if I need them. Ha. Everyone was so concerned with me making my blisters worse and being in pain all day. Annie-poo and I decided to place bets on how many times people asked me about my blisters throughout the day, based on the 5 times I had just been asked in a row. Ann guessed 42 and I guessed 35. Sadly, everyone stopped caring shortly thereafter and the grand total came to 8. Are you freaking kidding me?

Needless to say, I ditched the rubber botas in favor of my awesome Keen hiking botas. They were a million times better. I'm not saying my blisters felt great. They grew, actually. And reproduced. I have six now. I hate them each equally.

Tess did not ditch the rubber botas on account of she does not have awesome Keen hiking botas. She headed back after about the first hour, knowing she couldn't go all day in such miserable footwear. Can't say I blame her.

So today, instead of stopping to chat every five minutes, we actually hiked. Weird. We were all dripping sweat by the time we left the rain forest and stopped for a snack and to pat ourselves on the back for getting through the first part of the trail in an hour (it took us three hours yesterday). And that was with us stopping to monkey-watch. There was a spider monkey fam just off our trail, so we stopped to check them out. Too bad they turned out to be punks! We were admiring how cute they were when all of a sudden they started chucking sticks and fruits straight at our heads. We all covered our heads with our arms and made a run for it. All of us except Scott, that is. He was just asking for it. Good thing they had terrible aim.

We are getting kind of good at plant and insect identification, embarrassingly enough. Fabricio gave us a couple of pop quizzes by handing us plant samples during the hike and having us tell him what family it's in. We are 2 for 2. Scott does the same thing with insects, and we're getting weirdly good at that, too. We are really lame, and we like it.

So we'd gone about a third of the way after that first bit of trail, and it was mostly flat-ish field up until the last kilometer. It was all in open-air, which was so nice because we had a breeze. Love me some breeze. We stopped to look at a fumeral, which is this little opening in the earth that emits insanely hot gases, indicating just how close we were to magma. Yikes. It was really cool, though.

The last kilometer was freaking hardcore. It was straight-up to the volcano's crater on switchback trails made up of loose gravel. Good times. I declared a snack time about halfway up when I was sure that my legs were about to give way. Everyone happily obliged. I just barely had time to stuff my face with a few dried apricots before we were on the move again. My legs had already started to tense up from that shorty break, but whatever. We made it! All of us, even poor Tia-ita who was hating life with a fiery passion at that point. We were stuck in the middle of a cloud, so we had water droplets clinging to every hair we had exposed. Fabricio looked like he had a headful of greys, and my arms were coated. We couldn't see very far into the crater because of the cloud, but we did eat our lunches sitting on its edge. Pretty freaking cool.

It was also pretty freaking cold up there in that cloud. It was weird going from sweating like a pig to shivering cold in a matter of minutes. I was all bundled up, in addition to my pants being tucked into my socks and my walking stick clenched in my fist, and Scott said I looked like Sir Edmund Hillary. Awesome. I love looking like a man.

We were determined to get back before dark today, so we headed back shortly after lunch. Going down the loose gravel switchbacks put going up them to shame. It was ridiculous. I was terrified of kicking a rock out of place and having it slam into someone's head, or having one slam into my head. Somehow we all managed to make it down without giant bloody gashes on anyone's head, thus avoiding the need for a First Aid kit yet again. Good thing, too, because we still don't have one! Geezum.

We made it back to campus by early afternoon in good spirits. It feels pretty freaking great to climb a volcano. I highly recommend it if you ever get the chance. So Scott and Fabricio gave us a shower break, then put us to work on a plant lab. They had a fat pile of plants, and we were instructed to divide them based on a dichotomist key that we were to compose ourselves. Oh joy. Sun set before we could discuss our piles, so it was postponed til tomorrow morning. Yay for darkness.

Dinner was okay. No mix together gloriousness, but we had all the staples. Then they had these cups of hot green sugar comas out for dessert, but I passed in favor of Chikys and peanut butter. Yum.

After dinner, Scott said he was going on a frog hunt that would take no more than twenty minutes and that we were all welcome to come along, but didn't have to. We all went in the "we're only in Costa Rica once" spirit, and it didn't hurt that we were getting to said frog hunt by truck and not by foot. We were told to wear rubber boots. Like an idiot, I obeyed. My feet have never felt worse in my life. I wanted to cry with every step I took. But it was only twenty minutes, right?

Wrong. When have they have they ever accurately conveyed a time frame on this trip? We frog hunted for an hour and fifteen minutes. I wanted to die. I mean it was cool-- we saw six different species of frogs and this crazy bug and a terrestrial salamander. Nonetheless, I was in a foul mood and was hating life. And the Oscars.

Oscar is the owner of the hotel we are staying in. He is this large, pushy man that puts food you don't want onto your plate, insisting that you will like it. Oscar has a son, Oscarini ("little Oscar"). Oscarini is 8 years old and has that excessive energy that only little boys have. HE runs around with us on our night hikes shining his flashlight in everyone's faces and pushing everyone out of his way and man-handling lizards and frogs and whatever else he can get his grubby paws on. Oscar finds this cute. When we got to the frog pond for our hunt, we were introduced to the family dog, Oscar. Oscar is loud and unpleasant and insecurely tied to a tree by his waist. So there you have it: the Oscars of Rincon de la Vieja. Too many if you ask me.

And just to clarify, our guide today was not Oscar. Nor was he Paolo, despite Cayman calling him as such on multiple occasions throughout the day. Yikes. It was Oscar's brother, actually. Much more likable than any of the Oscars in my opinion.

Best of luck to Barack.

peace love and volcano domination